We regret to inform you that a sensational, modern-day Horatio Alger story with an absurdly plutocratic taint is likely not as accurate as the headlines on your Facebook promise. Mohammed Islam, a 17-year-old senior at Stuyvesant High School, ate a $400 lunch with a New York Magazine reporter, refused to bat down rumors that he earned $72 million playing the stock market, and professed that he wanted to "have influence, like the Koch brothers." But then everyone realized this is pretty much the plot to Blank Check, and now Islam is saying that it's all been blown out of proportion. Virality, Nuanced, or whatever the Awl Tag will be.
"We expected a regular article about what we hope to do," Islam told CNBC of his profile in New York Magazine's annual list of "Reasons To Love New York".
How could a lunch of caviar and apple juice and boasts of his "high eight figure" net worth get so brutally misinterpreted?
It turns out that Islam's only made a few million. Or maybe not.
Reason #193 to *Love* New York: earning a few million dollars before you turn 18 actually makes you an embarrassment.
Update (8:14pm): actually, make that a zero-naire. Observer has the exclusive with these callow youths admitting the whole thing was a lie start to finish.
