The Modern Medicis

Have you heard of Green Day?

Can I go see them? replied my daughter.

She knows when I ask her about a band I don't know, they usually are at some event I am attending, Yes, Green Day will play at Dreamforce this November. They will follow the path of Foo Fighters, Red Hot Chili Peppers and others I am more familiar with who have played at the event.

OK, so most software conferences have a band evening. Dreamforce is no different in that sense. Where it is different is musicians seem embedded in the sessions. So, you see Neil Young on stage between keynotes. You see will.i.am mingle with the audience. You see D.A. of the indie band Chester French in purple trousers on a panel with the CIO of Manpower in a grey suit.

That’s Marc Benioff’s touch. He is a benefactor to all kinds of music genres.

He is similarly generous to authors.  He kindly wrote a foreword to The New Polymath. I requested he consider writing one for the Karl-Heinz Streibich book I worked on this summer. Had one delivered a few weeks later.

He is good to chefs, entrepreneurs and many other creative professionals.

He follows the footsteps of his mentor at Oracle. If you heard Larry Ellison's keynote at Oracle OpenWorld last year, it was about social analytics at the 2012 London Olympics. But the sub-text was about athletic excellence - he was fluent about many of the elite athletes there. If you listen to him talk to Charlie Rose about America's Cup, its again about athletic excellence supported by technology excellence in sailing.

You have to admire the engineering that went into his Katsura House- among other things to make it earthquake proof. His taste in Marchettis, Bentleys and Edward Greens.

Both support all kinds of charities. But they also support plenty of creative types and entrepreneurs and excellence. The Medicis were the Godfathers of the Italian Renaissance. Marc and Larry are modern day ones. Not everyone may like them but you have to admire their patronage of many a skill.