Just witnessed the most disastrous keynote event — Sarah Lacy of BusinessWeek interviewing Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg. Wasn’t that interested to begin with, but Lacy was an embarrassment to herself. Flirting with Zuckerberg. Cutting him off left and right, then insulting him when he looked puzzled. Repeatedly turning the conversation back to herself. Bringing up semi-private moments from the past. Getting facts about his life wrong. Teasing him about his age. At one point she compared herself to Leslie Stahl of 60 Minutes (“I feel you, Leslie!”)
Zuckerberg has become an artful dodger, dancing around many of her transgressions politely (rendering everything he said pretty banal). Between the two of them, it felt like a high school TV journalism class gone horribly wrong. Except that it happened in front of thousands of people.
I walked out halfway through. Outside, in the halls, everyone was talking about the debacle, re-hashing the worst moments.
Update: The interview was such a disaster that c|net has an article about it. Wired has another. Whoa – Lacy’s video response. She seems oblivious to just how bad she really was, tries to blame the crowd and the “mismatch.” So it’s confirmed – Lacy is on another planet.
Here are the notes I had taken up to the point I walked out anyway (not juicy).
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