Sean Parker brings Forbes journalist into his world

Sean Parker
Photo Credit: Creative Commons

Tracking down Sean Parker wasn’t easy, but once Forbes journalist Steven Bertoni caught up with the billionaire, Parker took him along for a two-week-long journey. I recently talked to Bertoni about his piece, “Sean Parker: Agent of Disruption,” which ran in the Forbes 400 edition of the magazine last year.

Background:

NYU Business and Economic Reporting alumnus Steven Bertoni writes about technology, entrepreneurs and billionaires for Forbes and also edits the magazine’s front of the book section, Leaderboard. In 2011, about three years after he began working for the magazine, Bertoni landed an interview with Sean Parker who’s had a hand in Napster, Plaxo, Facebook and Spotify – some of the most disruptive companies in tech. Bertoni’s story was featured in the Forbes 400 — the Forbes issue which features the richest people in America — one year after Justin Timberlake portrayed Parker in what the billionaire feels is a less-than-flattering light in the blockbuster movie The Social Network.

The Pitch:

Bertoni didn’t have to convince anyone at Forbes to allow him to write the story, but he did have to pitch Parker and spent about a year chasing him down.  Contacting Parker was not too difficult, but getting him to commit to a time for an interview was a different story.

The owners of the New York City based company called EMM GROUP introduced Bertoni via email to Parker. Bertoni was writing a story on the entrepreneurs, Eugene Remm and Mark Birnbaum, in 2010 about what he dubbed their “nightlife empire.”  EMM Group owns restaurants, lounges, a luxury concierge service and a house in Sag Harbor, Long Island used for hosting private parties for VH1 and the cast of Gossip Girl.  Their flagship club is Tenjune, located in the Meatpacking District of New York City. EMM Group’s owners run in the same social circles as Parker and connected him with Bertoni through email.

Parker seemed amenable to sitting down with Bertoni for an interview and asked him to set it up with his PR agent.  Parker is not a fan of the way he was portrayed in The Social Network and Bertoni told him that he wanted to write a business story focusing more about his earnings (at age 31 Parker was worth $2.1 billion) than the drama surrounding Facebook. In the movie, Justin Timberlake’s Parker forces Eduardo Saverin out of the company and robs him of his shares, something that happened to the real-life Parker when he left Plaxo. To this point, Bertoni quotes Parker saying: “I don’t mind being depicted as a decadent partyer because I don’t think there’s anything morally wrong with that… But I do mind being depicted as an unethical mercenary operator, because I do think there is something wrong with that.” Parker says his partying habits were exaggerated in the film, too. He didn’t stumble upon Facebook during a one-night-stand as The Social Network portrays, but from a friend’s girlfriend.