SOCRATES' SAID, "KNOW Thyself." Steve Wynn has gone Socrates one better, "Know Thy Market." This past February, I wrote about my impression of the Wynn Hotel. I couldn't see value in the hotel; with few more visits, maybe I was mistaken. I think I understand now, Steve Wynn didn't build the place for the likes of me.

My out-of-town guests want to see all the new things in Las Vegas, and of course, the first place they want to see is the new Wynn Hotel. By now, I've been to the Wynn Hotel more than a dozen times, and on each visit, I quiz my guests for their opinion of the hotel.

All my friends enjoyed the quiet atmosphere of the hotel. They liked the restaurants, and unlike me, didn't think they were too expensive. The women loved the color schemes and fabrics. The men liked the dark wood and the feel in the sports book. A photographer friend believed the overwhelming use of the color red was to attract the Asian gambler. Some friends that stayed at the hotel, they loved the decor, and once again, the fabrics and the color schemes were a big thing. When I first heard all this, I thought, who cares about color schemes, wood and fabrics, what about White Tigers and Volcanoes?

Everything in the hotel has a big cost attached to it, and now, maybe I see why. Walk around the Mirage, Bellagio, or NY NY hotels, there are crowds of people just gawking and bumping into each other, all to get a look at the free exhibits or attractions. There are NO free exhibits or attractions at the Wynn Hotel. Could this be by design? You can walk anywhere in the Wynn, and not feel the swarming, teeming crowds of the other hotels.

After building four hotels with glitz and flash, Steve Wynn has a hotel for the people he now wants to serve. These are children of a new generation, they prefer things I will never understand, they want a different experience, even from the last new Las Vegas, built by Steve Wynn just a few years ago.

Who knows, maybe Steve Wynn is the new Socrates. He certainly knows Thy Market.