From the article's author's words "if I could have substituted all the plain-clothes promoters for traditional booth babes, I would have done it in a heartbeat," I would say your understanding is correct.

What the author experienced is status-checking. Status-checking is a human activity. Here is a key component in this conversation. The author writes: "When trying to join lots of interesting conversations, I either had to be that asshole who casually drops her credentials, or deal with a few rounds of being told things were “complicated engineering stuff.”"

That is a problem ALL male developers face repeatedly. It's the problem of getting respect and status. It's the same as when two dogs meet in a park. You always have to fight to convince other people you're intelligent. I have three degrees and 20 years of working experience, yet I still have to compete with others to convince them I deserve the status and respect I do. Probably many of you who are reading this now will not be convinced. I am tested daily at my job. And it's got nothing to do with my gender. It's how living beings maintain order. We test each other. We sniff each other's butts. We keep track of who knows what they're doing and who is a pretender or out of date.

The author suggested that if all the non-skilled ladies were pigeon-holed as sexual objects, the male geeks would be prejudiced into adorning her with the status she deserves. This assumption is false. She would still have to compete. In tech circles and every other field from welding to law to nuclear physics to snowmobiling to kitesurfing, one faces significant social obstacles when meeting strangers to communicate one's experience and status levels. There is no shortcut (until you're famous). This is quite simply how human interaction works in competitive environments: people jockey for position. It's in our DNA throughout all of the mammalian kingdom. All of the blogs and tweets in the world won't change this. One notable exception is the "nice guys" who afford woman status before they deserve it. Many women are quite familiar with this behavior (and many of them are frustrated with it, because once they realize they are afforded status they haven't earned, they realize the person is unskilled at determining people's social status or just trying to appeal to their ego).

I hope every woman who thinks that the tech world will suddenly somehow deviate from 195 million years of evolution - who thinks that the tech world could possibly ever deviate from 195 million years of evolution - in order to accommodate her unfounded expectations takes this seriously and deeply to heart. No matter what, you're going to have to fight to convince other people that you know what you're talking about and that's got nothing to do with your gender, it's got to do with the fact that you're in a competitive social situation. That's they way nature created mammals, and eventually, the human being. I hope they all recognize this behavior in all of the other situations they take part in: going to the bank, playing on a team, fitting in with a church - all humans of all genders experience this. The "world of tech" is especially rife with it b/c it is especially competitive.