The Hot Girl Effect and Networking

The theory above is short term (get a date), when there is also the long term consideration (marry her, have kids). If you are an average joe, the chances of you having kids with a hot top model are, very frankly, very low. And we guys know that.<p>In the same way, the chance of us having a nice chat with the CEO of Goldman is fair, but the chance of him maintaining contact with us and being a friend or mentor is pretty low. You don't have the money to hang with him, you don't have the opportunities to share with him and so on.<p>So you can get a date with the top model if you're brave. You can get a coffee with the CEO if you're brave. But I doubt that anything long term will develop, unless you have true value to offer.<p>And people evaluate their actual value and see that it probably is not enough to make it worth their while approaching this person.<p>An example that I'm sure many here can identify with: How many of you have emailed Paul Graham asking him for feedback on your app or whatever? Some brave ones likely have, but how many realistically expect a relationship to develop out of that?

"Actually, I’ve found that the more successful and accomplished people are, typically, it seems like the more humble and friendly they are. Additionally, they tend to appreciate the value of networking and make an effort to meet new people."<p>Nope! This is non-evidence. Successful people who are arrogant and antisocial are by nature less likely to run into you, so you should expect your observed pool of people-you-know to be heavily skewed towards the friendliest people.<p>A similar phenomenon occurs in social network rankings: For any given person with a reasonable number of Facebook friends, their friends will be, on average, more popular than the original person (popularity defined by number of friends). Almost everyone is one of the least popular people in their own social network.

&#62;&#62;Once a girl passes a certain degree of hotness, the amount of guys hitting on her drops dramatically.<p>When a girl starts to become a hot babe then tons of guys hit on her -- its annoying and time consuming to ward off losers so she develops a "bitch shield". This defense mechanism tells guys that she is too good for them and not to bother, from this point on only the cocky guys approach who are not intimidated by the "bitch shield" (these guys look like assholes to "nice guys") - then the "nice guys" whine about how they can't get any girls. As lowlife as the PUA guides are, I still found them informative.

Here's a much better analysis of this phenomenon: <a href="http://plus.maths.org/issue51/features/rey/index.html" rel="nofollow">http://plus.maths.org/issue51/features/rey/index.html</a>, even deriving a mathematical model.<p>I think the same kind of thing holds true for attractive ideas as well: For ideas with killer potential, people tend to say "Oh, somebody surely must have implemented it, is looking into it", etc.) and not to push on. Until someone either ignorant of the idealand layout or too dogged to care takes it on and becomes successful. The history of the Valley has many examples of this pattern.

I once worked with a Teamster who didn't give a damn who you were (or how important for that matter). He just spoke his mind. Working on films, he would regularly have lunch with producers, actors, studio heads, you name it. He'd plop down at a table wherever &#38; just eat his lunch &#38; chat with whoever was there. Result? He could walk up to the "untouchables" on most shows &#38; ask about their kids, chat about a vacation, even occasionally talk about politics. He even helped defuse a disgruntled actor one day by simply asking, "hey, what the hell's the matter?" and letting him vent (much to the dismay of the cowering producers).<p>On a personal note, I befriended a power broker several years ago while discussing art. We had a lot to talk about. Now years later we still talk &#38; email fairly regularly &#38; grab lunch when in the same town.<p>Stop thinking of people as who they are or what they represent, just treat them like normal folks &#38; you'll be surprised who you might befriend.

I'm going to go ahead and say that "the hot girl effect" is not true, at least for women. The hotter you are the more you'll get hit on, guaranteed.<p>Which leaves the theory behind this interaction up for grabs :)

From the article: <i>"Once a girl passes a certain degree of hotness, the amount of guys hitting on her drops dramatically."</i><p>However, I know of a different version. If (as a guy) you are seen to date a hot girl, then the chances of you dating other hot girls goes up. They want to know what you've got.<p>I'm guessing this applies to VC as well.

This reflects something I've noticed at some conferences: the keynote speaker is often alone in the bar afterwards, looking bored because no one gets up the nerve to talk to them.

Apples and oranges. Yes, there is a "hot girl effect", but it really only applies to hot girls. People who are at the top of their fields may be friendly, but they are, by virtue of being at the top of their field, generally very busy people. Sure, they're approachable, but you can't really expect to have more than a small slice of their time unless the ideas you are bringing to the table are of significant interest to them. The CEO or top scientist is inherently busy or they wouldn't be in their position. A hot girl, by contrast, is no more or less likely than anyone else to have a full calendar. Hot girls don't automatically lose their hotness by living a relaxed, unstructured lifestyle.

People like similar people. They have more in common. Relationships between similar status people end up happiest and work out the best, on average.<p>That doesn't mean people always hit on those of equal attractiveness alone. If you have more money than the girl, then she can have more prettiness. But if she's way ahead on looks, you better be way ahead on money or something or it isn't an equal relationship.<p>What does this add up to? Simply: the edge of the bell curve is always lonely.

I have to disagree with this. I've seen the exact opposite many times, e.g. Dave McClure at the TechHub Xmas party, the poor guy was absolutely mobbed.<p>I thought this post was going to be about something different altogether, so I wrote it myself:<p><a href="http://blog.shrewple.com/post/2520650113/the-real-hot-girl-effect-and-networking" rel="nofollow">http://blog.shrewple.com/post/2520650113/the-real-hot-girl-e...</a>

I believe I first encountered the description of this phenomenon in one of Leil Lowndes' books, "How To Talk To Anyone" IIRC.<p>And I encountered the phenomenon IRL a good few years back at a convention, where I had a really nice conversation with an actress who played a major role in a prominent SF series. Apparently, I was one of a few people who'd even just stopped to ask her how she was enjoying the show: everyone else was either staff, stewards or fanbois who only wanted her autograph, photo or both.<p>I got to sit with her and her retinue later that night in the hotel restaurant: a dinner date I'll never forget.<p>The Hot Girl effect is pretty real. And if you can get past that barrier of your own fears to approach the unapproachable, yet retain your humility as you do so, the rewards can often be awesome and memorable.

Is this for real? Is there any science to support the anecdotal experience of "the hot girl effect"?

In my opinion the real problem is this creepy glorification of people for their looks or social status.<p>Guys who are obsessed with dating hot girls are really just obsessed with how others perceive them, which makes them lame to be around. Same with social climbers.

A corollary to this that I've heard from the sales end, is that one actually doesn't want to "pump buying temperature" to maximum.<p>The argument I've heard is that it's more effective to sell someone on you or your product being <i>appealing yet practical</i> rather than convincing them that you or your product are the hottest thing on the planet (but there's always the "expensive decoy product" mentioned in the link yesterday).<p>This is generalization too, of course, but it seems reasonable.

It seems like it would be a confounding factor if said hot girl had a reputation as evil incarnate, as does Goldman-Sachs.

Reminder: if you try to become friends with someone for any other reason besides you're a friendly person and like meeting people? They're going to figure you out eventually.<p>So instead of "targeting" people, I'd just hang out at the right places and get to know folks in general.

Hot girls get hit on and proposed to several times a day by eager men. That translates to about 100 times a month and 1200 times a yar. If you don't believe me go ask one. Especially Programmer girls.