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Harvey Weinstein is bailing on his investment in snooty, exclusive social network aSmallWorld.net, the so-called "MySpace for Millionaires." Apparently it's flopping. Gawker argues:
The problem was fundamental: Rich guys don't want to socialize only with one another, and once you let in enough attractive young women and such your VIP site loses [its] cachet and everyone might as well just hang out on Facebook.
I'm not sure Gawker has the second part of the problem precisely right (though A Small World's membership policies seem well-designed to allow "[t]rusted and loyal ASW members who meet certain criteria" to invite "a limited number of their friends" enough attractive young women to keep all the bankers happy. But even assuming that's the dynamic at work, there seem to be at least four distinct possibilities: a) Snooty rich men don't want the kind of women who would sign up to meet only snooty rich men; b) Snooty rich men need a larger pool of women to draw from than a 'limited number of their friends" can provide; c) Even snooty rich letches don't want to be made to feel like snooty rich letches; d) Even non-lecherous snooty rich men don't want a website where their competition is other rich men! They'd rather be the richest guys in an average neighborhood, where the population is easier to impress.
So, is aSmallWorld's unsuccess a victory for social equality? You make the call:
Yes! Attempted stratification undone by the common characteristics (sex drive) of mankind! Sex, solvent of snobbery.
No! The status hierarchy of money just needed a bigger empire in which to recapitulate inegalitarian financial relations as inegalitarian sexual relations!
All the lechery-related reasons suggested above point to "no," yet it's hard to not see aSmallWorld's decline as, somehow, a "yes." How about a dialectical Third Way: In asserting itself outside its own sphere the hierarchy of money nevertheless sows the seeds of its own destruction! [Which would be ...?-ed Facebook] ...
P.S.: Why didn't The Atlantic think of this idea? An exclusive site where "Brave Thinkers" like Pinch Sulzberger and the "Atlantic 50" ("the most influential commentators in the nation") can talk to each other! Writing the first draft of history! Then we charge the Boeing lobbyists $10,000 each to join! And let everyone else pay to watch! It's genius. The American Idea! ... [Isn't that the Atlantic business plan?--ed Not yet fully realized. Email suggestions to David@IoverpaidforthebestopinionwritersinAmericaandnowImdesperate.com] 8:44 P.M.
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No saintlier man has ever walked the earth than the brilliant and beloved David Bradley.** That goes without saying. But how, exactly, would it help solve the ethical problems created by his corporate sponsored "salons" to put them on the record--as TPM's Zacary Roth, Slate's Jack Shafer and Bradley himself seem to believe?
The problem with Bradley's salons, like the problems with WaPo's similar, now-cancelled events, is that they create two big conflicts: 1) The need to avoid pissing off the corporations who fund (and then some***) the salons in the hope of getting access to influential journalists and administration bigshots; and, even more corrupting, 2) the need to suck up to the administration bigshots to get them to show up at the salons where they can be accessed by corporations who are paying for them. ...
Shafer argues that making the "salons" off the record is a key part of Bradley's marketing strategy--it convinces the corporations that they are getting something special.**** Shafer's no doubt right. And generally, "on the record" is good (though "off the record" can be valuable too). Putting the salons on record would also help solve the Atlantic's seemingly congenital "We're Insiders, Aren't We Great, Look at Us" problem. But I don't see how it would do anything to remove conflicts 1) or 2). ... Plus, even if the meetings themselves are on the record, there would still be plenty of time for off-the-record lobbyist-to-player contacts in the halls or at any pre- or post-event cocktails. (Even if there isn't, just encountering someone face to face can make it easier to "access" them later.)....
P.S.: Marc Ambinder's post quoting Bradley's response without daring to link to what Bradley is responding to is a little creepy. Who is this guy, L. Ron Hubbard? What is Ambinder scared of? At least he gets beaten up in his comments.
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**--He's also the Last Sucker "ridiculously generous" in his willingness to pay big bucks for opinion journalists, but that in no way influences my opinion of him.
***--Bradley says openly that the salons are "one of our revenue streams."
****--I suspect that the privately funded, non-profitmaking salons Bradley also gives might be another part of the overall effort: If you are a policymaker and you show up at one of his profit-making confabs do you then you get invited to the more exclusive and legit private confab? If your corporation funds one of the profit-making salons do you find yourself invited to the more intimate event? But I am being entirely too suspicious. Bradley is just a wonderful, wonderful man. I am the one who should be concerned--for thinking such bad thoughts. My apologies. ... 4:09 P.M.
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