I am reprinting a comment that was made on my blog by sean park (http://parkparadigm.com) because it gives a different macro perspective on the whole thing:

Fwiw, I think this - like the recent mega-exchange mergers, like the pass-the-parcel wave of private equity "secondaries" (you buy my company, I'll buy yours) - is one more example of a fundamental flaw in our economy's current systemic asset allocation model which simply stated, concentrates too much capital with too few people. And if the returns were good, you could say so what? But they aren't really.

Study after study shows that smaller, more focused pools of capital are where the really interesting returns are to be found. But finding the gems in the coal is hard (and a problem not yet solved strangely enough) and there is no incentive for the folks allocating most of the world's long term capital to try that hard. Just give it to Blackstone, KKR, KP, Sequoia, NEA, etc. - they'll probably do a decent job and even if they don't I won't get fired (or even questioned) for chosing them. Interesting, the one segment of "alternative" investments where market diversity, innovation (ie new managers) and discipline has been a bit higher is the hedge fund world. I think this is a timing thing in that performance horizons are shorter than the career cycles of the LPs and so (some) creative destruction happens.
and it goes on if you want to read the rest