Seating Chart for President Obama’s Silicon Valley Tech Titans Dinner

Posted on February 19, 2011 | 7 Comments

While I was reading this story in the Mercury News about President Obama’s dinner yesterday with a number of Silicon Valley tech titans, an odd thought occurred to me:   Boy, I’d hate to make the seating chart for that dinner!

How do you prioritize Larry Ellison, Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Eric Schmidt, Reed Hastings?  Who gets to sit near the President?  Who has to sit far away?

So when  saw this photo in the paper, I thought I’d add some value and turn it into a seating chart for your interest and amusement.  In the end, having Obama sit between Zuckerberg and Jobs wasn’t that surprising, but the structure among the rest is still fun.  (Bear in mind the dinner was held at Doerr’s house, so he and his wife were the hosts.)

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7 responses to “Seating Chart for President Obama’s Silicon Valley Tech Titans Dinner”

  1. Walter Underwood | February 19, 2011 at 9:17 am | Reply

    Reed Hastings is between Ellison and Hennessy.

    Thanks for filling in Ann Doerr, I couldn’t figure that one out. In fact, I haven’t seen any news report list her at the table.

    This post has really confused the adbots that are trying to target your site, by the way.

  2. Dave Kellogg | February 19, 2011 at 9:27 am | Reply

    Thanks Walter. I have fixed my picture. By defaulting to assume that the table was symmetric it made it easy to leave someone out on the top side. The asymmetry means, btw, that no one gets to sit directly opposite Obama creating two seats of equal value on the top (Doerr and Ellison) as opposed to one. Interesting.

    I don’t get your comment on the adbots and would love to understand.

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  4. Piers Hollott | February 22, 2011 at 12:53 pm | Reply

    Back in the days of Camelot, of course, the King had a Round Table constructed, so that his knights could all be seated equally close to him; which makes absolutely no sense, of course, unless he were sitting in the center of the table. Leaving design requirements ambiguous can be problematic; strict egalitarianism brings its own problems.

  5. Walter Underwood | February 23, 2011 at 9:15 am | Reply

    I saw some ads on your page for seating at sporting events, etc., probably keying off “seating chart”. I don’t see them now.

  6. Dave Kellogg | February 24, 2011 at 7:38 am | Reply

    From a reader to me via email:

    The US Military has considered the subject carefully, though not with tech titans.

    see http://www.ushistory.org/betsy/images/p600_60.pdf

    Some nuggets: ambassadors are ranked by time of service. other high embassy officials are ranked by their ambassador’s time of service. governors are ranked by date their state was admitted to the union, except in their own state. very detailed ranking for everything from dod officials to church officials in appendix d. also note that when you are approved for promotion, you do not yet sit with the higher ranking folks, but if you are “frocked” (officially approved to wear the insignia of the higher rank but not yet receiving the pay) you sit in between…

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