He may win over more people if he adapted the architecture to a style that fits the area and enhances the scenery. From a distance the modern glass and ruddy panels make it look like a rusty jagged shack with an iron roof. Local opinion might be amenable if instead it was stonework, or Spanish-style, or Gothic Mormon.
This is his chance to build an American Neuschwanstein, why not bring quality to the table?
> He may win over more people if he adapted the architecture to a style
The problem is not the architecture but that certain people can't stand anyone building anything near them, once they've built their own thing. Pure unadulterated nimby-ism.
I would never want to be one of the CEOs because of this gap in options between having the money and skills to manipulate Bavaria in to selling you the real Neuschwanstein and then moving it brick by brick and living in a converted olive garden.
Every time I read a story like this, I console myself with the fact that there are decent rich people out there like Warren Buffett, Mackenzie Scott, and George Lucas. (Bill Gates is on the fence; it's hard to forgive him for the Linux Wars.)
I'm a fan of Buffet, but you can easily say he is a 'bad' billionaire. He makes profits (and a lot of them) by pushing Coke and other unhealthy things on the masses. You could argue that buffet directly funds a significant percentage of diabetes cases in the world. You can say similar things about the others
Allowing unhealthy food to be produced seems like a problem our government should solve, not private industry. Businesses should be allowed to work within the confines of the boundaries we establish - i.e., the law.
If you google “Park City Utah homes” you will see hundreds of larger and more eye-catching houses, not sure what all the fuss is about. Maybe just demand they get a better architect?
> His new home would cut into a mountainside just beneath an open space that taxpayers had bought for $64 million to fend off future development.
> After many discussions of rules and regulations, city officials eventually cleared Prince’s plans. But a group of locals led by residents Eric and Susan Hermann have appealed, maintaining that his house would violate ordinances.
Think this is the source of the concern for some of the locals initially. The rest I feel is the bad response to the criticism the project was getting.
If this is a DNS issue (e.g. CloudFlare blocked due to refusing to send DNS location), just put the IPs in your hosts file, it's easy. https://dns.google/query?name=archive.ph
The regions you mention are also very much ruled by money, just like everywhere else. The only difference is the demographic of the people calling the shots. Old oil money/railroad money/ranch money billionaires will put any costal startup founder to shame with their power and antics.
Imho, there's difference between "money of a community" vs "money in a community".
Ranch/mineral family money seemed tied to land/place/town in a way that's fundamentally different than corporate wealth.
Which isn't to say that those folks can't be assholes too! But I gotta support rich assholes who have generations of history in a place, over rich assholes who are transplants.
Seems from the article he wants to build something that doesn't adhere to local code restrictions on height and size limits.
It seems to be a part of the human condition to want to say "we should make these rules!" and then say "but I don't mean for me" It's just that people with a lot of money have more options when it comes to that second part.
> Seems from the article he wants to build something that doesn't adhere to local code restrictions on height and size limits.
Meh. It seems as if his plans were approved, and now those plans are being reviewed, because a few noisy neighbors want to meddle with how he wants to use his land. If those neighbors didn't want someone else to use the land, they could have bought his land, like the town bought the acreage above.
> It seems to be a part of the human condition to want to say "we should make these rules!" and then say "but I don't mean for me"
It seems more like these neighbors are trying to achieve what they couldn't achieve with their dollars. Like -- now that they've bought some land ~4000 feet up the mountain, their wish, through regulation or otherwise, is to make sure no one builds any higher. Again, this is simply rich people pissing on each other.
If this was about water rights, something important, etc.? I could understand the meddling. But, here, I don't tend to think this is very principled. So, if there is a principle I'd defend, it's that this guy owns it, and he should be able to build what he wants.
> Bruce Baird, an attorney for Prince, said he doesn’t agree with the characterization of Prince as a bully. If anything, he said, Prince is being bullied by his neighbors who are “trying to play the victim card.”
He's just a regular Joe Billionaire trying to build his McMansion and buy the local press to give him positive coverage. Everybody needs to take a good long look at themselves and then stop bullying him by playing the victim card.
Every person in this story is a multimillionaire. Yes, it is objectively hilarious his neighbors are playing the victim card -- "Don't build your giant mansion next to our giant mansion!".
It seems like such an absurd thing to care about. How nice of a home do you really _need_? Is it really necessary to bully and harass the citizens of your city into capitulating to your demands? If you stop being a paper billionaire can you even afford to keep the home?
It just seems like unsustainable absurdity for the primary purpose of rubbing everyone else's face in it. I suppose that's what makes some people good at being CEOs, but consequently, it makes them terrible neighbors that no one wants to be near.
> It just seems like unsustainable absurdity for the primary purpose of rubbing everyone else's face in it. I suppose that's what makes some people good at being CEOs
The arrow points the other way: Power corrupts, corruption then loses power.
Spending resources on rubbing people's faces in 'it' doesn't produce anything of value; it wastes valuable resources on personal desires, which is corrupt.
A traditional model of Chinese history is the pattern of the dynastic cycle: The dynasty rises to power, then they are corrupted (I'm not sure of the model says 'corrupted by power' specifically) and decay, and then finally lose their mandate and fall.
Much better to have democracy, where you can vote them out much sooner and generally they can't stay for generations. And also, better to have well-governed corporations where the board is independent from the CEO.
You don’t need a nice home, but you certainly need a big home. Otherwise, how do you show how much money you have?
But realistically, I also think are just automatically more critical of billionaires. If this had been anyone nameless building a house on this property I imagine people would be less inclined to protest it as much.
What an absolute non-issue. Take a peek at 555 King Rd., 445 King Rd or the other nearby mansions. Good luck Mr. Prince, enjoy your new house (and that what looks to be a kickass ski mountain behind it).
Eh... It's a big house but not unprecedented. Apparently 7500 sqft of finished space plus a lot of unfinished basement, on a 3500 sqft footprint[0]. That's like... maybe 2x-3x a "normal" house. But if you look at the fanciest neighborhoods of any big city there's usually streets where every single house is this big. In fact, there are several such streets in Park City! I loaded it up in Zillow and immediately found an entire neighborhood full of similar-sized and larger houses [1][2][3].
As for "hideous", I guess that's a matter of taste but the style is frankly very common and popular these days, and IMO not at all out-of-place compared to some of these...
Yeah, it can be a little mindblowing coming from the SF market, but just about any city[0] you can name has a couple of 10,000 sqft houses on the market right now. Sometimes they are pricey [1], sometimes less than a starter house in SF [2].
that means it should have competition. The fact we all agree to just dump money in ONE company is dumb and inexcusable. The fact you just use market cap in a phrase as meaning profits for one company is stellar.
I mean personally, I'm a straight-up Titoist. I don't think private enterprise should be allowed past small family companies.
But within the capitalist framework that we live in? I think a progressive wealth tax that reaches 100% for everything past a few mil would be reasonable.
I mean let's not be so negative here. The lives of majority of humans on the planet in this generation are incredibly better off than the ones before it and the ones before it. Sure wealth inequality exists but why don't we focus on moving the needle on important things than spending countless hours and energy trying to split apart our populations opinions trying to fix something that is inherent in human since the dawn of time.
Government really is where community goes to die huh? The only reason this asshole even has the chance of getting what he wants is that once he buys his approval he will have state backing to protect it. Without violence-as-a-service he's just one guy pitted against a town that hates him that would seemingly happily send him packing. The fact that the people of the town have any means whatsoever to stop him is a feat unto itself.
It truly is amazing how government enables this kind of assholery at an institutional level under the guise of property rights. I can't even imagine trying to join a community with my first move being to piss them all off by building an eyesore right in front of the nature conservation the town just paid for out of their own pockets.
So what do ya do when they manage to buy the government instead? I don't know if there's any good answers here, if there was an obvious solution we would have implemented it by now. I'm not saying that the alternative isn't worse but the current state of things is nonetheless bad.
The fact that this guy very nearly got legislation quietly passed against the will of the larger community means something is terribly broken.
I agree. As I said in another comment I think the solution is to prevent them from getting rich enough to buy government in the first place. Wealth tax the shit out of everything over a few mil.
He's a self made billionaire that seemed to want to build a big mansion around where he grew up ( did a sanity check in this)
He's involved with websites/piracy/..., so he's more accustomed to law suits and legal affairs than us/me.
He's not doing anything illegal and there seems to be a build violation from ( his also rich) neighbor.
Probably they can't agree on something and the court will decide.
Ps. It's also private matters, but I don't see much actual off.
Bought the newspaper, but also the guy is now living/working, seems to be more close involved than just trying to influence something. Perhaps they just hid it off as friends too and things led to unexpected ways?
Either way. It's his personal life and private matters. Just didn't want to jump to conclusions as many others and has not much value here in hn.
I see this thrown around and want to understand what this means. When I hear "self made billionaire" I imagine someone with zero connections or family money or money at all, going out and starting a business with loans that then years later they become a billionaire.
It seems as if Matthew Prince doesn't meet my qualifications for that:
"His father, John Browning Prince,[3] is a former journalist, restaurateur, and owned a stock brokerage firm, while his mother owned several gift stores; in high school, Prince worked for his mother. The Prince family, who have resided in Park City for multiple generations, assisted in the construction of various buildings in Park City, such as the Parleys Summit Ski Resort, the Stein Eriksen Lodge Deer Valley, and the Yarrow Hotel."
Yep, the “self-made” is absurd. We’re all so intertwined and the amount of people who help build a billionaires empire is never ever just the billionaire.
How many times have we seen a billionaire declare “look what I did!?” when something works, and then when something doesn’t work, suddenly they have a team behind them who messed up.
For so many of these people they take credit for the “self-made” wins and distribute blame amongst others when something goes wrong.
For me, would be that you earned the billions yourself.
Getting the right attitude, connections and perspective on life/business on how to approach things, is something that you need to learn/observe early on from your parents.
That's almost always related to your parents being rich in this case ( multiple millions), but not billions.
Bill Gates, Elon Musk, ... Are all self made billionaires. But their parents were still rich before they were billionaires.
Money provides opportunity, better education, early networking with other wealthy people, the ability to try and fail. If your family was in the most common tax bracket growing up, then maybe you could be considered self-made. Otherwise, you had opportunities the majority will never have.
None of these require lots of money in many cases/places.
They mostly depend on some money and what you learned early in life ( not school related, but in how to connect with the right people even later in life)
- You can go bankrupt and start again without problems in my country.
- Education is good and cheap, the US is an exception in comparison to Europe
- Networking can be done at any age.
To become super rich though, you'll probably be better off in the US. Investors are easier with giving you a bunch of money and if you tried well, could give you another shot later on.
Most of all, I think, is you need exposure to how others did it to find your own "place".
- Going bankrupt in the US is a black mark on your future in the US, unless you're wealthy (which is ironic that you can go bankrupt and remain wealthy). Student loans are not dischargeable in bankruptcy in the US, they stick with you for life.
- I'm speaking from the point-of-view of a US citizen in the US. Education is, on average, fairly limited/poor without money. Getting an education, without money, even with grants/scholarships still typically burdens a person with significant debt before they've even entered the workforce.
- Networking can be done at any age, but if my father is a CEO I'm going to have access to other CEOs, if my father is a welder I'm going to have access to other welders. Neither of these things are bad, but one of these things provides significant advantages when it comes to future employment opportunities and avenues for early investment.
I don't really agree with that assessment from networking ( note: I'm a social guy, much of those limits you mention, don't apply to me).
Student loans suck in the US, sure.
Is a bankruptcy really a black mark as you think it is? Is anyone actually stopped to start again? Will their network actually consider them a complete failure and disband ties with them? Can't they get any loans after? I don't think so tbh.
Since a bankruptcy is just lost money for banks and you'll need to rebuild the credit score for some time. But nothing is stopping you from planning ahead and retry.
> For me, would be that you earned the billions yourself.
I think that would be billionare.
At the least, yours seems to be an uncommon understanding. It deviates from 19th and 20th century use where self-made was applied to wealthy people that started without any access to privilege - commonly immigrants and their direct descendants.
This was during a time when historical class divisions were still in play. There was real distance between the upper classes and everyone else.
Buying a newspaper to alter coverage of one's own story not only crosses ethical lines but also mirrors an oligarch’s tactic to manipulate public perception.
Your dismissal of these actions exposes a lack of objectivity and betrays your partisan stance.
- he has a big place. As far as I can see, he worked for it. Nice
What I see from his company ( my so called bias):
- fair in the amount of possible, growing pains
- accurate quarterly reports ( low balling future revenue) with detailed info on delicate things and interesting perceptions ( eg. Marketing headcount replacement during mass layoffs in other companies) - new boss in the department too then
- good products that I want to use, interesting approaches ( eg. Egress costs vs. ml ingress). My employer uses them
- potential cloud competitor ( huge market)
Business wise. Sure, I'm biased because of my past analysis :)
> Rogers says he doesn’t believe Prince’s ownership of the paper (or his current living arrangements) poses a conflict of interest.
Sure, Don.