Facebook’s ‘Nouveau Riche 250’, AKA T.N.R., Exchange Ideas On How To Spend Their Wealth


Nothing defines the Nouveau Riche quite like the young techie programmers, executives, and entrepreneurs of “Left Coast” California’s Silicon Valley and the wider Bay Area. The wealth and amounts of money being made by the young employees of companies like Apple, Google, and Facebook can be staggering and would make the eyebrows of most people fly right off their foreheads.

In fact, even Silicon Valley interns often make over $80,000 dollars a year.

But that’s not even a drop in the ocean compared to the money that the real Silicon Valley movers and shakers are worth. Which brings up the enviable question, “How might I spend all my vast Silicon Valley wealth?”

At Facebook, this question is relevant enough that some 250 Facebook employees created a group called “The Nouveau Riche 250,” or T.N.R., reports Business Insider.

This isn’t just any 250 Facebook employees, however, The Nouveau Riche 250, T.N.R., reportedly being Facebook’s first 250 employees, making them a unique ground floor club from one of the most successful enterprises to ever flourish on planet Earth.

And this means bank for Facebook’s T.N.R.

Bank that, with basic necessities like food and shelter taken care of, can focus on yachts, private islands, and the artwork of Banksy.

Vanity Fair reports that The Nouveau Riche 250, T.N.R., group was formed by the original 250 Facebook employees after the company went public and each found themselves swimming in millions of dollars of disposable income.

Once the Facebook employees had established The Nouveau Riche 250, the T.N.R. group had an exclusive and secret place where they could discuss their potential and significant high-end purchases, including yachts, jets, the aforementioned Banksy portraits and other art, and even their own exotic islands.

Vanity Fair also reports (“to be fair”) that The Nouveau Riche 250, T.N.R. group also discusses philanthropy.

But you won’t find a Facebook page for Facebook’s Nouveau Riche 250, T.N.R. group, as the T.N.R. 250 would prefer to fly under the Silicon Valley radar.

With its history of hippies, Haight-Ashbury, Berkeley, and generally very left-leaning ways, being a member of something like Facebook’s Nouveau Riche 250, T.N.R., group could make one look dangerously pretentious, uncool, and unhip, not to mention how discussing large purchases might clash with the Bay Area’s left-leaning vibe, putting a T.N.R. member’s social status at risk.

“If someone buys a fancy car and posts a picture of it, they get ridiculed and berated,” an anonymous Facebook executive told the New York Times back in 2012.

While the New York Times goes on to point out that Silicon Valley legends Apple’s Steve Jobs and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg were “never driven by money,” but rather motivated by their visions for what their companies could be, a Silicon Valley investor also points out that, “For every Mark Zuckerberg, there are 10 guys pretending to be Mark Zuckerberg.”

In the end, it is clear that at least the members of Facebook’s Nouveau Riche 250, T.N.R., group have options. Berated or not, they can board their yachts and sail off to their private islands.

[Image by Chris McGrath, Getty Images]

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