Descriptive Tags and Descriptions
E-Mail Addresses and Telephone Numbers
Events Hosted by Other Organizations
Participating with Other Organizations
The purpose of these parties is for interesting people to meet other interesting people, whether to make new friends, develop business contacts, or for dating. When you meet people, you reveal information about yourself; otherwise, you might as well stay home. So there is a balance between being open and not wanting to reveal certain information to everyone.
In devising these policies, I've consciously made the same tradeoff. Revealing nothing about anyone on the list to anyone else defeats the purpose of this social group. Revealing too much information makes people uncomfortable. I have considered (i) what most people in the group want, and (ii) the fact that the people in my group are on the whole great people who won't use such information improperly.
When people are placed on the information list, they are asked to write a descriptive tag and a description. For the large cocktail parties and some of the smaller ones, a few days before the party, these are distributed via e-mail to everyone who RSVPed "Yes" or "Maybe" for that party. We do not distribute your e-mail address or telephone numbers to those attending (except for the facilitators). At each large cocktail party, there is a white notebook containing a list of these descriptive tags and descriptions.
You have the option of writing a request to the facilitators, which can be public or private. Public requests are distributed to everyone who is attending the party, while private requests are distributed only to the facilitators.
Several people on the invitation list have volunteered to be facilitators. Before each party, they receive your descriptive tag, description, your public and private requests to the facilitators, and your e-mail addresses and telephone numbers. Our facilitators are discreet.
Everyone on the invitation list is expected to write a descriptive tag and a description. Those who don't pay an admission fee of $20 per party. These descriptive tags and descriptions are one of the many reasons why these parties are considered to be the best in Boston, and they have already led to numerous friendships, business relationships, and romantic relationships. Their benefit to the group is enormous and we have no intention of making them voluntary. You should obviously use your discretion in writing your descriptive tag and description — these are probably not the best place to reveal your recent suicide attempt or that you need an attorney who specializing in defending those accused of income tax fraud.
On this Web site, we have published examples of descriptions and descriptive tags. We will publish your descriptive tag and description on our Web site only if you authorize us to do so. If you do, you may change your mind at any time. If you do change your mind, it may take as long as two weeks for us to remove your descriptive tag and description, since we do not update our Web site very often.
Several people has asked that before each party, that along with the descriptions we also distribute guests' e-mail address and telephone numbers. I am unwilling to do this, as too many people would balk. Please note that the facilitators do receive your contact information.
If someone reads your description before the party, or someone meets you at one of my parties, and then writes to me asking me for your contact information, I will provide it to them. My usual practice is to reply to that person and cc you at the same time, and enclose contact information for both of you, so you can contact them and they can contact you. Since my parties started in November, 2002, I have done this several hundred times and so far, no one has had a bad experience. The number of positive experiences has been remarkable — people have found activity partners, jobs, investors and clients. About 75 first dates have occured as a result, with about 30 second dates. About 10 short-term and about 5 medium- or long-term relationships have developed.
A few dozen people on the invitation list have volunteered to be facilitators. In most cases, these are people I know well and in all cases I believe are people who will be discreet with information I provide to them. The facilitators are sent your e-mail addresses, telephone numbers, and public and private requests to the facilitators. Facilitators will sometimes take the initiative in making introductions, usually at parties but occasionally by e-mail. If you say you're looking for a tennis partner or a man who sails and is at least 6 feet tall, you might receive an e-mail from one of them with the name of someone you should meet.
At many of our parties, volunteers take photos of those attending the parties, which are published on our Web site. By attending these parties, you give us permission and authorization to take your photo at the parties you attend and to publish them on this site. Photos of previous events are the most popular feature on this site — everyone is curious who is attending.
In addition to your photo, we will publish your name and a professional description of you, typically your profession and which company you work for. We do this because it is consistent with the theme of these parties — we are not just yet another social group with attractive people who attend fancy parties and upscale venues, but in addition we have on our invitation list an extraordinary range of people with impressive professional and education accomplishments. By listing the professions of those who attend, others can get a sense for the kind of people who attend these parties, and it helps us differentiate these parties. The professional description you post is provided by you at the party, and you can tell the photographer whatever you want. (Please at least be truthful — "Chairman of Microsoft" might not be a good description unless you really are Bill Gates.) By attending these parties, you give us permission and authorization to list your name and professional description on our Web site.
Before they take your photo, our volunteers are instructed to tell you that they are taking your photo for the purpose of posting it on our Web site. They are also instructed to ask you if that is acceptable and to not take your photo if they detect any resistance. Nevertheless, it is possible that in the midst of a party they might not do this. Irrespective of whether they do or not, you give us permission to post your photo, name and professional description on our Web site. If you don't want your photo posted, it is your job to tell the photographer that you do not want your photo taken. This is very easy — simply don't pose for him or her. In addition, if in the excitement of the party you relent and then you regret it the next day, e-mail me immediately and I will not publish your photo. It takes me at least 24 hours to assemble all of the photos and to publish them and if you reach me in time, I can easily exclude your photo in the upload I make to our public Web site.
It takes a lot of time for me and my assistant to choose the photos and to create the Web pages. Once we do so, we will not take your photo down, ever. The only instance in which I will make a change are if we made a mistake — we identified the wrong person, we misspelled your name or professional desription, that kind of blatant mistake. Other than than, your photo will be published for posterity. Therefore, if you don't want this to happen, it is incumbent on you to tell the photographer you don't want your photo to be taken (again, simply refuse to pose for him or her) or for you to e-mail me within 24 hours after the party. If you do send me an e-mail, ask for a confirmation receipt when you send the e-mail.
When a person changes jobs, they sometimes ask that their new employer be listed, rather than their employer at the time the photo was taken. I'm simply unwilling to do this. These parties already take a considerable amount of my time and assembling photos and creating Web pages takes me several hours afterwards. I'm unwilling to spend additional time doing this.
I've received other requests to take down photos. "I've lost 15 pounds since then." "I'm more blonde now." "I don't want my girlfriend to know I was at that party with that really attractive brunette." As sympathetic as I am to the emotional angst they must be going through, the photos are the photos and I simply don't have the time to change them. Sorry.
If a person has asked to be taken off the invitation list, sometimes he or she will ask that their photos from parties taken when they were on the invitation list be taken off our Web site. I'm unwilling to do this for two reasons. First, I don't have the time. It's not just removing your photo, but I would have to reassemble the thumbnails for a different layout. Second, and more important, it smacks of George Orwell's 1984, the rewriting of history simply because the situation is different now than it was then. Philosophically I find that objectionable and will not participate in such a practice. Unless we made a mistake — i.e., you really weren't at the party or you misidentified you, something like that — I'm not going to rewrite what happened.
When a photo is published on our (or anyone's Web site), obviously they are available to any person on the planet who has Internet access (and once we establish communication with extraterrestial beings, to them also). That is the nature of the Internet.
If you want a copy of your (or someone else's) photo, click on the photo, right click your mouse button, and choose "Save picture as ..." and then choose a folder to save the photo in. (I'm using Windows and Internet Explorer when I do do. I assume other platforms and other Web browsers have this functionality.) We do not encrypt our photos.
If you really object to having your photo taken, do not pose for the photographer, e-mail me aftewards, or if you're really concerned about this, ask to be taken off the invitation list.
I ask each person on the invitation list to provide their year of birth. I do so because going forward, we'll be having numerous smaller parties that are age specific — e.g., 21 to 30, 30 to 45, 40+, etc. I do not need to know your exact year of birth. If you were born in 1980 and you list 1977 or 1982, that's fine, because it still allows me to put you in the correct age category.
People regularly ask me if I will tell me how old a person is. Under no circumstances will we do that. The year of birth they provide is strictly confidential and is not even provided to the facilitators. If you really want to know this information, you could try something like, "You went to Smith? I have several friends who went to Smith. When did you graduate?" and then hope they graduated at the "normal" time. In addition, there is nothing wrong with asking a facilitator, "That cute girl over there, could you find out how old she is?" The cute girl would then have the choice of whether to tell the facilitator this information.
When I create an invitation using Evite, I usually choose the option of permitting each invitee to view the names of everyone else who has been invited. For the same reason that people like to gossip, I find that people like to see who is coming. Many people post a textual response along with their RSVP, and you can choose whether this is seen only by me or by everyone on the invitation list. Only those who have been invited are allowed to see the invitation list; this information is not available to the general public. Please also note that your name will be listed but not your e-mail address. Evite does not provide the option of my selectively choosing whether someone can see whether or not you have been invited.
Except as stated on this page, I will not provide your e-mail address to anyone, including organizations that host other parties.
In addition to the parties I host, I send out numerous invitations to parties and events hosted by other organizations. The categories of events I could invite you to are listed here. If you are a member, you will then choose which of these categories you want to receive invitations for. Some people want to receive everything, while others have much more limited interests. If you're an organization that wants me to publicize an event, you'll want to read my criteria for events that I publicize.
The process works as follows. The organization creates an Evite, subject to my guidelines. They then transfer control of the Evite to me (technically, the command within Evite is "Change the organizer"). I then run a query, generating all of the people on my list which have said Yes for that category of events. This query creates a list of names and e-mail addresses. I then cut and paste this list into the Evite and then send off the invitation.
Since I have control of the Evite before your name and e-mail address is added, the e-mail addresses are not available to anyone else, including the organization that created the Evite before they transferred control to me.
Some organizations request that they keep control of the Evite, or that I transfer control back to them after the e-mails have been sent. I am unwilling to do this, because whoever has control of the Evite has access to the e-mail addresses. It's not that I don't trust your organization, it's just that I made a promise to my guests.
Some organizations have requested that we swap or exchange e-mail addresses or that I provide them with my list. I'm not willing to ever do this, for the reasons stated above. Furthermore, if you are an organization that will regularly ask me to publicize your events, I would argue that you don't need to have the e-mail addresses. I've learned the hard way that e-mail addresses become stale quite quickly — you would not believe the number of changes per month that my guests make to update their e-mail address. Keeping this list up to date would take your organization a considerable amount of time. With my system, I've already done the work for you. When I send out an announcement, it's to e-mail addresses that are quite fresh — we rarely get more than 3 or 4 bouncebacks for every 1000 invitations we send, because if we receive a bounceback, my assisant telephones them or we put them on hold. Thus, I have a very fresh, highly accurate list.
If you provide other organizations with your contract information when you register for their event, then obviously they now have such information, and their usage of such information is subject to their privacy policy, not mine.
Every month, I receive several requests from other organizations to work together. Here are my thoughts. First, our market is the "high end" in Boston — we have an amazing group of people on the invitation list and we choose really nice venues to host our parties. Unless your organization is focused exclusively on the high end, or has a way of sorting its members, the fit probably might not work.
If you believe your organization does serve the same demographics as mine, I am open to working together. There are some groups in Boston that I think highly enough of that I would be willing to invite their entire list to one of my parties, and I could do the same for theirs. Under such circumstances, I would give them an invitation to send, and they would send it, without providing me with the names or e-mail addresses of their members. Conversely, they could create an Evite invitation, transfer control to me, and I would send it to my members, without revealing the e-mail addresses of those I have invited.
Please note I am not looking for "quid pro quo." If I believe your event meet my criteria for publicizing events, I will do so, without any expectation in return.
By being on the invitation list, you will be provided with certain information — e.g., if you say you will attend a party, you will receive the descriptions of everyone who said they will attend. You are expected and required to use such information with discretion. If you read about someone who appears to be interesting, then by all means write to me and ask me to make an introduction, or try to meet them at the party. If they are unreceptive to your overtures, then you must back off and not bother them. Those who do will be removed from the invitation list.
Conversely, if someone approaches you, you are expected to act courteously to them. You must return their telephone call or respond to their e-mail. If you're uninterested in further contact, say so, in a very polite way. ("John, I'm really flattered you want to have dinner with me, particularly since you seem like such an interesting person. My gut feeling is that we might not be a good match. I'm sure at James' parties there are several wonderful women who will want to meet you.") Do not lead them on by saying, e.g., that you are busy — how do they know if you're just temporarily busy rather than uninterested? We have a very specfic set of expectations, which we expect our guests to follow. I have and will in the future remove those who act rudely to someone else they met at my parties.
Now and then, someone asks me to make an exception to these policies. The most common request is to be more restrictive concerning their information — e.g., not sending their description to those attending the next party. I'm unable to make exceptions, for several reasons. Much of the parties are run by a fairly sophisticated database I run. Adding logic to handle exceptions like this simply makes the database harder to maintain, and there already is a lot of complexity in maintaining this database. In addition, I simply don't have the bandwidth to remember, "John said it was OK to disclose this under these cirucmstances, but not under those." Rather, through this Web site, John is aware of these policies. If he feels strongly enough that our policies are wrong, he always has the option of being asked to be removed from the invitation list.
I also receive several requests to provide information about others on the list that is protected by our privacy policy. The most request is how old someone is, which I simply won't reveal under any circumstances. People ask if John is seeing Sarah, if John was flirting with Susan at the last party, etc. Even when my friends ask me this kind of information, they should understand that I cannot and will not reveal such information. If they really care whether John is flirting with Susan at the next party, they can simply come and observe.
If you have any questions, please do not hesistate to telephone me at (781) 647-0136, which is good day and night.