The backscratching scandal is rocking Silicon Valley again! Big Deal! Even though many have used interesting puns to describe the scandal, I am not sure anything will ever change. Still it makes interesting reading. Financial Times in an article yesterday wrote, ” The hottest list in California right now is not the invitation list to this month’s Oscar bash. It is a throwback to a party that has long been over. And it is the one that nobody wants to be on. The list in question contains the Friends of Frank, a privileged 300 or so who were lucky enough to be handed shares in some of the hottest initial public offerings of the technology boom.” You can check out some of the names here. Top in my list of must reads is John Paczkowski. His column, Quattrone’s latest IPO: initial public ousting clearly wins my vote for the best title. His colleague Scott Herold gets the award for the most honest piece of writing: “As I read through the list and talked to people Friday, though, two things occurred to me. First, our sense of shame is less than our greed. And our greed is less than our yearning for a place of honor in the pecking order.”