Jordan Birnbaum

In 1995, Juno Online Services was a new, breakthrough Internet company that offered free email service to its users. Eventually, the organization expanded to offer free Internet services as well. One of the company's early key employees was Jordan Birnbaum. Birnbaum, who held an undergraduate degree in Policy Analysis from Cornell University, had been working in the financial industry at D.E. Shaw Securities, focusing initially on technology focused investment banking. Later, he was promoted into a position which required him to manage the Tokyo Stock Exchange live trade activities for Shaw. When Jordan joined Juno, he was given the title of Director of Subscriber Acquisitions, a position in which he excelled gleaning one million subscribers through a single, groundbreaking in-store distribution deal with Blockbuster Video and Blockbuster Music. From there, Birnbaum moved within the company, formulating and implementing successful marketing and revenue generating strategies, until he was named Senior VP of Bus. Dev.

In 2001 Jordan Birnbaum was presented with the opportunity to invest in Qtopia Events, a company that was dedicated to creating a unique site that included both state of the art production facilities and a live performance venue. Birnbaum was quite interested in the entertainment industry, and throughout his time at Juno, Birnbaum had privately pursued hobbies in comedy writing – and performing - and song writing. Though he didn't know it at the time he made his initial investment in Qtopia, his hobbies would come in handy when, a year later, he would move to Los Angeles to take over the management of Qtopia and re-launched it as The Vanguard, a large venue located in the heart of Hollywood, California.

While running The Vanguard Birnbaum worked on a comedy show for Richard Belzer. The two found that they had a shared penchant for political humor and decided to write and develop a new multi-media project, The Secret Beatnik Party.