about A Dot-Com Sing-Along

By ABBY ELLIN


IN the late 1990's, Steve Fishman, a journalist with no previous business experience, set out to see what the new economy fuss was all about and — oh, yes — to make $1 million along the way.

This was a time, of course, when making a million didn't seem particularly hard; all that was needed was a really good idea. Mr. Fishman was assigned by New York magazine in 2000 to set up an Internet business and to chronicle his adventures; the magazine gave him $3,000 to start. He came up with the notion of a hip-hop karaoke service, to be delivered online, and tried to make it work. The resulting book is "Karaoke Nation: Or, How I Spent a Year in Search of Glamour, Fulfillment and a Million Dollars" (Free Press, $25).

Along the way, our hero learns some business lingo (including "business plan" and "stickiness," or staying power) and meets luminaries of the music and Internet business worlds like Russell Simmons of Def Jam records.

Like so many dot-com entrepreneurs, Mr. Fishman ultimately wonders what it's all about. "I was sure passion was the new fuel of business, and would be for years to come," he writes. "But passion in businesses — for business — seemed almost unintelligible to me."

He eventually sold his concept to another company and became a thousandaire, not a millionaire.

Do we need yet another tale about that not-so-long-ago time when business leaders were regarded as rock stars and people actually enjoyed going to the office — or, for that mater, even had jobs? Maybe not. But the story can be interesting and amusing when it comes from someone who was in the trenches, has a sense of humor and writes well. Mr. Fishman qualifies on all three counts.