conflict

The Netscape Public Relations department saw my invitation, and their eyes filled with terror.

``Tell Jamie he has to make it clear that this is his party, not a Netscape event,'' came the word from on high. ``Oh, and get him to take out that comment about Marc Andreessen cage-dancing nude. That's really not the kind of image we'd like to project.''

Meanwhile, I had learned that I had at least a dozen guarenteed attendees, since the whole PR department was going to be there, on the off chance that a Netscape employee showed up, they felt it necessary to protect said employee from the swarming reporters. Engineers? Alcohol? Press? Control! Must have control!

Then I got some bad news: Andreessen had agreed to speak at the Silicon Valley Linux User's Group meeting that night! I couldn't believe it. Two events appealing to the same group, one in San Jose and one in San Francisco. So, I tried to convince the SVLUG folks to relocate their meeting to the Sound Factory: we could open the doors earlier, have the Linux meeting there, and then have the party afterwards.

This suggestion was met with similar bleatings to those that emanated from VP-like objects at Netscape: ``San Francisco is so far away...''

They had an alternate proposal: ``How about you hype our event on your incredibly popular web site, and in return, we'll suggest to people that they carpool to your party afterward?'' Wow. What a deal. But, I'm a big softie, I went along with it anyway, fully expecting that nobody who had driven all the way down to San Hoser was going then drive north to civilization on the same night.

Nobody was going to show. There were going to be twenty of us in a gigantic empty room. The party was doomed.

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