First there was a Craigslist for the rich and now, the one percent have their own social network. It's called Netropolitan and membership is open to most anyone - so long as you can foot the $9,000 registration fee and the $3,000 annual dues.
The service, similar to Facebook, was created by James Touchi-Peters, an orchestra conductor and composer that had trouble finding an online community where he could mingle with like-minded people. He said he often felt uncomfortable discussing or sharing certain topics on public social networks as it could have been seen by others as bragging.
Touchi-Peters said the high cost of admission is one way the site vets members.
Members will enjoy an ad-free, encrypted experience that is continually monitored by professional moderators to ensure a pleasant and courteous environment. Furthermore, the site won't be indexed by search engines.
Netropolitan does have some restrictions that are worth pointing out. Members must be 21 or older to join and are required to use their real names. That said, members aren't allowed to disclose the names of other members to non-members although I'm not sure how they'd go about policing this.
The "exclusive online country club" began accepting memberships today so don't expect to find your other affluent buddies posting images of their opulent lifestyle just yet. That's alright, however, as the founder believes most will join with the goal of meeting new people.