Suvarna Garge (Editor)

Netropolitan Club

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Netropolitan Club was a social network created by composer and performer James Touchi-Peters, which launched September 15, 2014, and died in November of 2014. It was designed for use exclusively by wealthy people. The website has a sign-up fee of $9000 (US dollars) and an annual fee of $3000 for renewing one's membership.

Contents

Death after two months

After only approximately two months the site was deemed a failure.

Distinguishing features

Touchi-Peters founded Netropolitan Club so that wealthy people could have a place to network with other wealthy people, and share their activities as well as discuss their first world problems without alienating poorer people or engendering a backlash. With this goal in mind, the Netropolitan Club had the following distinguishing features:

  • High membership fees ($9000 to join, $3000 to renew annually), that served to automatically filter out people who are not wealthy.
  • Members were required to be over 21 and to use their real names.
  • There was no third-party advertising. Members were to be able to post in an upcoming Classified Ads system, but were not allowed to solicit from other members in private messages.
  • The entire club was inaccessible to the public Internet. Efforts were made to enhance privacy and security, and names of members were not revealed to the outside world.
  • Activity was monitored to protect members from abuse or unpleasant situations, and there were Member Services Associates available online to help members at any time.

    • Media coverage

    Netropolitan Club has been covered in International Business Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Express Tribune, NPR, Inc., and the Huffington Post. A CNN commented that it sounded like "an elaborate ruse in an age when Facebook, Twitter and a host of other social networks are free", and Russia Today reported a Facebook user as saying "$9000 for a crappy Wordpress Social Network. Must say a great scam and I can't stop laughing - I hope this guy make a bundle off of these suckers".

    References

    Netropolitan Club Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA