The Remote Island by Bryan Christian The burning question of the day: Life on Mars or Eleventh Hour? Plus: Britney goes on the record, USA may not renew Monk, and our Grey's Anatomy recap.
We are the Dot Com Kids. Or at least that's what news correspondent Bob Simon called us in a recent (February 15) 60 Minutes II profile on Silicon Alley* entrepreneurs. Before I unpack that catchy moniker (perhaps the catchiest peg for a segment of my generation since its inverse, "slacker"), I should make clear that the interest 60 Minutes II had in Hooksexup thrilled the shirt right off me (as was evident to all six million people who saw me running through the streets of New York along with Hooksexup's dedicated staff, in various states of disrobe, passing out fliers). We had decided that three minutes of airtime on a show that sells a thirty second ad spot for the price of our annual editorial budget was worth some public nudity and self-debasement. Being a company that is blessed with a good "story" (read: sex), yet run on a relatively tight shoestring, we've come to rely on the kindness of the press to advertise us to the world.
Granted, what the press has to say is not always kind: 60 Minutes II painted a picture of a new media industry driven and reaped by spoiled early-thirtysomethings, some of whom had trouble putting into plain language what their companies actually do. (Though, to be fair, having heard and seen my own words twisted in television and in print, I usually assume that such embarrassments have more to do with unkind editing than the speaker's inadequacies.)
It's also not lost on me that without the media coverage, Hooksexup might be lucky to have half the readers we have today. Which is to say that I don't mind being called a kid, if that's what CBS wants to call me. One could do worse at thirty. Besides, the only other person besides Bob who still addresses me as Kid is my dad, and he calls my mom that too.
But (aside from our willingness to jump through the occasional hoop for the press) what makes the young(ish) founders and hardworking employees of companies like Razorfish (web design and production), Pseudo (streaming media), The Silicon Alley Reporter (industry news) and Hooksexup seem so kid-like to the writers at 60 Minutes II? Why didn't they coin us the Dot Com Going-For-Broke-Before-They-Hit-Middle-Agers, or even the Slaves of Silicon Alley? After all, most kids don't work eighty hour weeks trying to get credibility, success and money.
Perhaps underneath all the hype, what Bob Simon and his writers were really reporting was more significant than they chose to let on: boisterously arrogant or not, the leaders of new media are impacting world markets. In addition to driving the bull that is NASDAQ, they are creating technologies that the old media doesn't know how to package for the public; so instead of stretching themselves to understand the sometimes bizarre logic of this new economic culture, newscasters, reporters and magazine writers often choose to focus on the ridiculous behavior that ridiculous wealth begets. By quoting, for example, the excitable Pseudo founder Josh Harris saying, "The new boy is in town. The new boy is taking over as the King of New Media," 60 Minutes II made sure that his next boast: "I'm in a race to take CBS out of business," would sound more laughable than perhaps it should.
Because Hooksexup is a forum for the discussion of sexual experiences and ideas, imperialistic language doesn't best express my ambitions for the company; I do believe, however, that Hooksexup has only just begun to impact sex in America. And oddly enough, by skipping parties and forgoing my weekends to throw myself into this work, I am living closer to my id than ever. Freedom is thought to be one of the treasures of youth, but when I was a real kid, I rarely got to do my own thing. I did what my parents, my teachers, my friends and even some of my enemies wanted me to do. I tried to be popular, I tried to be good, I tried to fit. But I didn't, and breaking the rules never seemed to amount to my idea of independence, either.
Now I'm lucky enough to work in a culture (the New York new media world) where sex isn't taboo, so whatever Dot Com Kid I do have in me doesn't thrive on a sense of rebellion, exactly. And the truth of the matter is, I am still far from impervious to the opinions of others. I care even more about living up to the high expectations of my colleagues than I once did about making the grade. Still, I am, for the first time in my life, doing exactly what I want to do. If that's not the ultimate, selfish teenage dream, what is?
*New York's new media center, the stretch of Broadway between Battery Park and 23rd Street.
, featuring curious yet marvelous infusions of cucumber and rose petal.
