Indeed, reading his wikipedia page, it's curious that those dudes perceived this particular author as an authority on the things they wanted to know about.
Don't underestimate the ability for money to insulate you from needing common sense. Everyone is nicer to you, everyone humors your oddities, and everything remotely laborious you can just pay someone to do. And if you're a raging asshole with the maturity of a 15 year old well into their 30s, that's no obstacle.
The money will be the reason people don't _walk away_ sooner, but you can rationalize it as them being shallow and only interested in your dough when they finally do, and never need to gain that particular self awareness. There's always more people to churn through.
