Soho House
“The geeks all want to be rock stars and the rock stars all want to be geeks.”
And they all meet at the Soho House.
If you want to pose, if you want to be seen, save your money, your membership is worthless.
But if you’re a thirtysomething and networking is your thing, this is the place!
He said he’d come to me. And as I was picking out restaurants I realized that the Sunday brunch crowd could make it difficult to get a reservation, to walk right in without a wait, so I asked him, “Are you still a member of Soho House?”
Soho House… I first went in New York. Where nobody was playing pool and the emphasis was on the food. Then they opened in West Hollywood and the mad dash for membership had my eyes rolling into the back of my head. House in the hills? Check. Sleek sports car? Check. Membership to Soho House? Check. Walk in and you see so many wannabes you think Soho House should pay you to come in!
But this person I was meeting doesn’t live in L.A. Soho House is his office away from home.
And it turned out all of his brethren were in attendance.
First was the private jet broker.
We tend to think of the private jet as a perk. But to my friend, it’s business. First and foremost, it addresses the number one problem of the entrepreneur…time. They’re not making any more of it. If you can shave an hour here and an hour there, it more than pays the freight. Furthermore, it’s a great gift to hand out on a whim. That’s where you can get a ton of business done. Up in the air in a tiny tube for a few hours. Offer someone a free flight and not only does their perception of you change, you’ve got their complete attention.
Then there was the possible to hire. A demure woman who barely said a word.
But when I quizzed her, she’d gone to Cambridge, spoke Arabic and had lived and taught in Kenya.
Just like Justin Bieber, right?
Yes, that’s what you’ve got in music. Ignorant wannabes. Who try to make it on bluster and pluck. And when you’ve got nothing to back it up, you’re nothing more than Snooki. A momentary item, a passing phase, a trivia question. Whereas those truly shaping the world are smart. And nimble. And wealthy.
But they work hard for the money.
Zuckerberg’s name came up. How he might go home for dinner, but then he’ll come back and code. Not only on Friday night, but Sunday too. You see it’s a calling. As soon as you put money first, you’re time-stamped, you’re heading straight towards your expiration.
That’s what these techies do. Work. Almost around the clock. The dream they’re chasing isn’t accumulation of toys, ultimately repossessed after they’re exhibited on “Cribs,” but a lasting impression on the culture, they truly want to change the world. Once upon a time musicians wanted to do this. When the best and brightest played music and everybody wasn’t bitching that there was no money left and how can we get what the bankers have got? Yes, greedy acts ripping off their constituents. Class warfare. Whereas tech, successful tech, is more about being equitable. Sure, money is in the equation, although often you pay with your data as opposed to cash.
But you pay for Hipstamatic.
Lucas Buick was having lunch with Nic Adler in the booth behind us. After Nic departed, Lucas sat down with us.
What Lucas, what none of today’s techies did, was boast.
That’s the musical way. Lead with your mouth, your story, leave the essence for last. Because usually there is no essence. Anybody telling you how great they are probably isn’t. If you’re not comfortable with where you’re at, who you are, you’re gonna have a rough go of it. We’re looking for people who are comfortable in their skin, who are willing to live by their wits.
That’s what struck me about so many of these young entrepreneurs, and they certainly were young, the willingness to pivot, to abandon ship, to do anything but what depression-era parents would want them to.
In my era, you went to college. Careers were important. You invested your time in the company. But the company oftentimes disappeared, your investment was for naught. Today’s successful kids don’t worry about building a resume so much as building their own company, a product, something that embodies their hopes and dreams.
So Lucas Buick takes one art course in high school and decides to go to art school. He can’t get into a good one, because he’s got no portfolio. He ends up at a college in Duluth, which he quits, because he’s already taught himself Photoshop. Thereafter he attends another school for a while, works as a designer and then starts an agency with a buddy where they promptly have success but get stiffed by companies as big as “Tribune” and as small as the tech companies that went bust before anybody ever heard of them.
So then they decided to go into business for themselves. Lucas and his partner created Hipstamatic.
And I had to drag all this out of Lucas. Unlike in entertainment, he wasn’t looking down his nose at me, wondering if I was worth the conversation. Then again, he was all of thirty.
And Lucas is eager to solve the riddle of mobile advertising. And rather than reveal his thoughts, I’ll let you wait and experience them, but the point is he’s thinking ahead whereas in music everybody wants to get on a realty TV show even though their track record of making stars is abysmal and one hasn’t been built since the beginning of the paradigm.
Are you looking towards tomorrow or today?
Are you trying to get on Top Forty radio or thinking about a career, where you’ll be when the old game craters?
Intelligence.
That’s what these techies have in spades.
Have a meal with those in the music sphere and your eyes will roll back into your aforementioned head. They don’t stop selling, pushing themselves upon you, when the whole world has gone to pull. Can you create something I need, that I want, that I’m going to search to find?
Sit with the techies and they can hold two opposing thoughts in their brains at one time. They can reason. They can plot.
Whereas in music it’s still about who you know and braggadocio.
Not that who you know isn’t important in tech. It’s just that the relationship is only the beginning, not the end.
