A college where in order to get in you have to show you've been diligent on grades, extracurriculars, and testing for 18 years straight. Ofc exceptions to this, like Trump; but most of the student body of such a college would fit this description. That's a good college.
PT just doesn't like the world that these people ended up creating after being enointed elites, which in parts I agree with.
Trump extremely clearly got in as a nepo kid, so I'd discard him in this argument.
Personally, I find PT's argument sincere that good colleges do measure something important -- even if you disagree with his takes and arguments. I agree with you that his point lost cohesiveness when Bari asked him. He prevaricated -- to a random point on Democrats -- when asked because he didn't want to spell out "Yes, actually, prestige does matter a lot." Something that most, including the hosts of this great blog, agree on tacitly.
Yeah, I actually think PT is sincere in his take that prestige actually does matter and so does school as a measure of IQ and ambition, even if you disagree with him -- but I think his larger posse has translated that message to "you shouldn't go to college and build a B2B SaaS instead. Like Patrick Collison!" Which is harmful and dumb.
Haha... it's crazy. And I have friends at META who've been trying to help, and they themselves get in a customer support hell as well. It's wild. $1.9T company.
I have been locked out of my account for 5+ months -- and customer support has been a Kafkaesque nightmare. I am still locked out. (Oh, and I've spent $1M+ in paid META ads...)