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They Won. We Lost. Next.
May. 30th, 2025 09:45 amOne of Icky's side hustles is dog-sitting.
He showed up here yesterday with an absolutely adorable spaniel mix, an eager-to-please guy named Tofu.
Pity the poor animal that is abandoned to Icky's care! Think puppy version of Oliver Twist at the orphanage or a canine Jane Eyre at Lowood.
I felt so sorry for poor Tofu that I volunteered to take him for a walk.
We hit the rail trail in a drizzle. But practically the moment we got out of the car, the sun burst from the clouds & within five minutes, the sky was blue & in my red sweater, I was overdressed for the heat!
My mood-o-meter swung from bleak to benificent in a heartbeat.
Which makes me think I do not have Seasonal Affective Disorder.
I have Angst-When-the-Sun-Isn't-Shining Affective Disorder.
I really should move to Nevada or Arizona or something.
###
Otherwise, I spent the day Remunerating & reading Barry Diller's autobiography, which I found quite fascinating.
When Who Knew first came out, it racked up huge amounts of press because Barry Diller is gay but Barry Diller is also Mr. Diane von Fürstenberg. (I must note here that back in the Jurassic when I was modeling, my two DVF wrap-around dresses were my proudest possessions, & I just love Diane von Fürstenberg to death!)
For years, the assumption was that Diane von Fürstenberg was a beard.
But, no, sez Diller in his autobiography. The two met & fell in love back at the dawn of time. They had passionate sex just like any other two people in love. And in between dates, Diller continued to have sex with guys.
Forty years later, they got married.
I don't understand why this is so hard for the maintream media—I am pointing my finger at yew-w-w-w-w, Daily Mail!—to comprehend.
Personally, genitalia has never been the determining factor in who I fall in love with.
I fall in love with men, I fall in love with women. And anyone I fall in love with, I want to have sex with.
(Although it occurs to me that I probably should have written that in the past tense because I doubt very much I am capable of falling in love with anyone anymore.)
Obviously, sexual desire is a spectrum.
But more than that, terms like "gay" and "cis" are essentially marketing categories—"gay" considerably more than "cis" because show me a marginalized group, & I'll show you a business development opportunity!
But anyway, Barry Diller's sexuality & love life don't interest me.
No, Barry Diller's horizontal leap from Hollywood mogul to digital tycoon is what interests me.
Today, Diller owns InterActiveCorps (IAC), a media fleet that used to include Match.com & Tinder, and still owns a lot of B-list cyber-publications. (People! Barry Diller owns People! I used to work there!) Diller also owns Expedia & all its subsidiary vassals like Tracelocity, OrbitZ, Hotwire, etc.
How do you end up owning all these companies?
Well, you start out in the William Morris mailroom, just like everybody else. And you devote the first 10 years of your career swinging from salary-star to higher salary-star, spending relatively little on status details.
And after you accumulate a stake, you start buying the little pieces of the Rube Goldberg machine that the tastemakers ridicule or overlook but that you see potential in because you have vision. Barry Diller bought the decidedly low-rent QVC because when he looked at it, he immediately understood that screens could be used for purposes other than telling stories.
That was genius-level insight.
I was around during the early days of the Internet, too, & I never had that insight! Although, of course, today—a mere 35 years later—it seems so-o-ooo obvious.
Also, Barry Diller refused to feel bad about his own failures. I mean, he registered them and felt disappointment, sure. But he refused to dwell on them. Describing a mega-deal-fallen-through to someone, he commented, They won. We lost. Next.
Which I think is a demonstration of extraordinary emotional intelligence.
He showed up here yesterday with an absolutely adorable spaniel mix, an eager-to-please guy named Tofu.
Pity the poor animal that is abandoned to Icky's care! Think puppy version of Oliver Twist at the orphanage or a canine Jane Eyre at Lowood.
I felt so sorry for poor Tofu that I volunteered to take him for a walk.
We hit the rail trail in a drizzle. But practically the moment we got out of the car, the sun burst from the clouds & within five minutes, the sky was blue & in my red sweater, I was overdressed for the heat!
My mood-o-meter swung from bleak to benificent in a heartbeat.
Which makes me think I do not have Seasonal Affective Disorder.
I have Angst-When-the-Sun-Isn't-Shining Affective Disorder.
I really should move to Nevada or Arizona or something.
###
Otherwise, I spent the day Remunerating & reading Barry Diller's autobiography, which I found quite fascinating.
When Who Knew first came out, it racked up huge amounts of press because Barry Diller is gay but Barry Diller is also Mr. Diane von Fürstenberg. (I must note here that back in the Jurassic when I was modeling, my two DVF wrap-around dresses were my proudest possessions, & I just love Diane von Fürstenberg to death!)
For years, the assumption was that Diane von Fürstenberg was a beard.
But, no, sez Diller in his autobiography. The two met & fell in love back at the dawn of time. They had passionate sex just like any other two people in love. And in between dates, Diller continued to have sex with guys.
Forty years later, they got married.
I don't understand why this is so hard for the maintream media—I am pointing my finger at yew-w-w-w-w, Daily Mail!—to comprehend.
Personally, genitalia has never been the determining factor in who I fall in love with.
I fall in love with men, I fall in love with women. And anyone I fall in love with, I want to have sex with.
(Although it occurs to me that I probably should have written that in the past tense because I doubt very much I am capable of falling in love with anyone anymore.)
Obviously, sexual desire is a spectrum.
But more than that, terms like "gay" and "cis" are essentially marketing categories—"gay" considerably more than "cis" because show me a marginalized group, & I'll show you a business development opportunity!
But anyway, Barry Diller's sexuality & love life don't interest me.
No, Barry Diller's horizontal leap from Hollywood mogul to digital tycoon is what interests me.
Today, Diller owns InterActiveCorps (IAC), a media fleet that used to include Match.com & Tinder, and still owns a lot of B-list cyber-publications. (People! Barry Diller owns People! I used to work there!) Diller also owns Expedia & all its subsidiary vassals like Tracelocity, OrbitZ, Hotwire, etc.
How do you end up owning all these companies?
Well, you start out in the William Morris mailroom, just like everybody else. And you devote the first 10 years of your career swinging from salary-star to higher salary-star, spending relatively little on status details.
And after you accumulate a stake, you start buying the little pieces of the Rube Goldberg machine that the tastemakers ridicule or overlook but that you see potential in because you have vision. Barry Diller bought the decidedly low-rent QVC because when he looked at it, he immediately understood that screens could be used for purposes other than telling stories.
That was genius-level insight.
I was around during the early days of the Internet, too, & I never had that insight! Although, of course, today—a mere 35 years later—it seems so-o-ooo obvious.
Also, Barry Diller refused to feel bad about his own failures. I mean, he registered them and felt disappointment, sure. But he refused to dwell on them. Describing a mega-deal-fallen-through to someone, he commented, They won. We lost. Next.
Which I think is a demonstration of extraordinary emotional intelligence.
