Wednesday, May 03, 2000

More honorable acts


In a week of three media summits, three award shows and parties in triplicate, it's nice to see that at least the Alley events are picking up the pace in partnering with charities. The Industry Standard and New York Magazine co-produced a one-day summit where the media got together and debated, discussed and mused about the topics of the day. Jonathan Weber interviewed C. Michael Armstrong, Chairman/CEO AT&T Corp. Weber and Wolff moderated a panel with Rob Glaser, Chairman/CEO, RealNetworks; Brad Grey, Chairman/CEO, Brillstein-Grey Entertainment; Maxine Lapiduss,EVP/Founder, Voxxy, Inc. and Geraldine Laybourne, Chairman/CEO Oxygen Media Entertainment Group on whether the entertainment business can survive in a world of fragmented audiences, open distribution and questionable (if even present) copyright protection. And John Huey, Managing Editor, Fortune Magazine, led James Cramer, Contributing Editor/Director, TheStreet.com, Sanford R. Climan, Managing Director, Entertainment Media Ventures and others in a discussion on what will be the state of financing newer new media ventures.

After the VIP reception in the Sculpture garden the Net21 honor awards were swinging to the loud, disco beat at Centro-Fly. All the usual suspects were there, but I also met some new people. The charming Ann Lydecker of XUMA.com and I talked about what is going on in San Francisco (where she recently moved from) and summer plans. Catrina Gregory was especially sharp-looking in her stylish new haircut, and I met Miguel Santos of Technisys and David Shrier of NBC. Jim Ledbetter was looking happy, and we talked of his exciting move to London, where he will be setting up The Standard's office. And as Dead or Alive's "You spin me right 'round, baby" began pumping through the sound system, I spun myself right around and walked home.