Monthly Archives: December 2011

Breaking The Email Habit

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It is addictive; like slot machines. Read this very important article from the Guardian.

We are so over connected.

At times – I know I feel overwhelmed. I have 5 email accounts – a personal account which I have had since 1992; a Washington Capitals account – which I have had since 1999 and a Washington Wizards account which I have had since last season. I also have an email account at Revolution Growth Fund and one for my Charitable Foundation.

I literally receive and try to respond to now more than 600 emails per day – every day – 7 days per week; 52 weeks per year.

But I also get email at Facebook – which to be honest – I hardly read or respond to; and comments on my blog; and stacks of physical mail as well. I read tweets on Twitter too. And I blog.

I could do nothing but react and respond to you all. No meetings; no sleep – no work; just read and respond to mail and requests.

For the Caps sometimes – I literally get the same folks emailing me at my personal account; my Washington caps account; then to be safe – they send me the message at Facebook mail; and then leave the message as a comment on my blog. And for good measure – they then go to other blogs and leave comments that they have sent me the following email and expect me to respond .Ok. Ok. Ok. I got it.

I apologize to several of you about the comments section on my blog – we are redoing a bunch of sites and crafting a local network – and the comments section are undergoing a redesign; I think we are now good to go again on comments on my blog; I know to a couple of folks – leaving messages on my blog is considered a birth right – and I apologize for this inconvenience – as you all know – I read and respond to my email so that outlet for you was still intact.

In the New Year – I will have to reconsider how I handle this avalanche of communiques to me; I too have to break the cycle of email addiction. Thank you.

5 years ago this week I retired from AOL

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I was concerned that I would have nothing to do – I was terrified of leaving the company that employed me for almost 14 years.

In that 5 years since I retired from AOL I have:

Acquired the Washington Wizards and Verizon Center; and spent more time with the Washington Capitals and Washington Mystics;

Made 3 films; “Nanking”;” Kicking It”; and ” A Fighting Chance”; I am working on a 4th film now too;

Founded SnagFilms; and acquired indieWIRE;

Helped to start Revolution Money- served as its chairman; sold the company to American Express; now I serve on board of directors of American Express;

Authored a book – “The Business of Happiness”;

Invested in and became Chairman of Clearspring Technologies; still serve on their board;

Invested in and serve on board and as Vice Chairman of Groupon; the company went public last month; it has a $14 billion market cap;

Made 15 angel investments in some great start ups; all told; these startups and the companies that we sold have a combined value approaching a billion dollars;

Became a partner in Revolution Growth Fund 2 – a $ 450 million ” speed up capital” fund ; focused on East Coast startups; partnered with Steve Case and Donn Davis on this NEW fund;

Bought a house – sold 2 houses;

Worked with more than 400 charities via my Family Foundation; and Monumental Sports and Entertainment Foundations and SnagFilms;

Serve on the board of directors of Georgetown University.

It has been a nonstop hectic 5 years – some of the best and most productive and enjoyable years of my career and life.

Retirement from a corporate career is nothing to be afraid of. Onward. Thank you.

As mentioned yesterday…

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When we get good goal tending; which we did;

And we play well on special teams; which we did;

And we score on the power play – which we did;

And we get scoring from the core group – Ovechkin, Semin and Backstrom; which we did.

We win games. We get two points.

I liked the new lines – I thought it spread out the scoring opportunities well.

I also liked the fore check and the aggressive play by us. Lots of energy!

A good home win. Another sell out as well; I am eternally grateful to you all.

Congratulations to Mike Knuble for playing in his 1000th NHL game. We are proud of you. It was a sweet family moment to watch.

Go Caps!

Wizards preseason game 2

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Better. More effort. More team work; and more discipline.

We have a 15 man roster. We think it best to have a very deep bench and a maxed out roster because of the compressed schedule this coming season.

There will be injuries and slumps; we think it best to keep 15 players to start the season.

We were up by as much as ten points last night near half time. We looked good.

When we stuck to our system and we played team defense – we looked as advertised – young and athletic and long and competitive.

At games end – in crunch time – we reverted to individual play– we allowed several uncontested three point shots by the Sixers; and we took too many long distance shots too early into the shot clock on our own.

Maturing as a team is key for us – learning to rely on each other – and working the shot clock will come with time; going hard to the basket and drawing fouls will also get established by our team.

I was happier with our performance – and it was great to see a full complement of players. Jan Vesely will heal up; Nick Young will get into game shape – we will be ready for our home opener on December 26th. Thank you and hope to see you all at the home opener, too.

Great New Way to Watch SnagFilms

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SnagFilms just added a new distribution partner — Western Digital. Now you can watch SnagFilms on your television via Western Digital’s WD TV Live Media player — state-of-the-art connected TV devices that let you stream hundreds of SnagFilms titles, on demand, for free. A great new partnership. Read more here. It’s part of SnagFilms’ effort to put films wherever you are — online, mobile and on your TV.