It was two years ago this week (June of 2006) that I decided to leave my day-to-day operations post at AOL. I negotiated a peaceful exit from the company and agreed to stay in the spot of President of the AOL Audience based business until December of 2006. (As an aside, my last quarter as head of the ad-based business, we grew almost 50 percent year over year.) :-) I wanted to “get on with my life and do new and interesting things.” It has been 18 months since that set of announcements and time does fly when you are having fun.
In that short period of time, I have been playing offense with my life and have felt a rush of adrenaline and have had a highly productive set of experiences. Here is a short list:
MOVIES
I entered this industry by producing the film ”Nanking” and the film “Kicking It”. Both films premiered at the Sundance Film Festival; showed at Tribeca and Silverdocs; both went into theaters and were bought respectively to show on television by HBO and ESPN; and both are available on DVD and for rental. Both films were shown globally as well with “Nanking” becoming the best-selling documentary in China’s history.
I coined the term “Filmanthropy” and have been a leading advocate of movies that matter and can right a wrong and activate social good via volunteerism and charitable giving.
I have founded and am soon launching a new business that aims to fix the broken distribution model for independent films and that will help filmmakers and their causes. Stay tuned for more information about this major development. The new company is a mashup of technologies and business practices that I believe can revolutionize indie films for Web 2.0. As Howard Beale said, “I am mad as hell and I am not going to take it anymore!”
SPORTS
We have had a lot of fun with the Washington Capitals. We won the Southeast Division Championship in dramatic fashion. We signed Alex Ovechkin to a record-setting contract and he repaid us by winning every major individual award including MVP. Our rebuild program worked and our team is positioned to be really good for a long, long time. We hope and dream of winning a Stanley Cup in the future. The Washington Wizards also made the playoffs again and the Washington Mystics missed a playoff spot by one game last season. Business is quite strong for all of the teams and the Washington Capitals are experiencing the most dramatic business growth in our 34 year history.
WEB 2.0 BUSINESSES
I have become Chairman of two very hot Web 2.0 companies both of which I have made investments in and have become very active. The first is Revolution Money which is positioned as “PayPal meets Mastercard without the high fees”. We have raised significant amounts of outside venture capital to grow this company and I have high hopes that this firm will emerge as a major financial services company. The second company I chair is Clearspring Technologies, the leading widget platform and sharing syndication company. We recently closed on a major round of outside venture capital financing here as well and this company is a rocket ship with more than 125 million monthly uniques and more than 12 billion views per quarter.
I also became an angel investor with investments or board of director positions in the following companies:
Algentis
Animal Attractions
Beacon Capital
Capital Acquisition Corp
Bridgevine
GridPoint
LaunchBox Digital
Mahalo.com
MediaBank
Mobile Posse
ObjectVideo
PodShow
Qloud
TidalTV
My plate is truly full with exciting, growth-oriented Web 2.0 companies. I love startups and believe several of these companies in my portfolio of investments will become big breakout hits. It is hard to believe that in 18 months, I have made 16 investments.
BOOK PROJECT
I have decided to write a book about self-actualization and happiness. I am refreshing some research here and hope you will take the Happiness survey. Click here. I hope to finish the book within the next 12 months.
PHILANTHROPY
I have remained very active with local charities and even this month, we will be bringing in the US Trials of the Homeless World Cup to Washington, DC. Our family charitable foundation is sponsoring 100 homeless people and their coaches and mentors to come to Washington, DC, to play in the trials; attend the local opening of “Kicking It” at the E Street Theater; and then go see DC United play the LA Galaxy. Look to this blog for more information about this innovative charitable set of events scheduled for the last weekend in June.
FAMILY MATTERS
My dad passed away at 94 years old last September and fortunately I have been able to spend more quality time with my family since I left AOL active management. My children are interning with some of my startups this summer and overall, we are all healthy and happy.
Two years ago, I started closure on one episode of my life (my career at AOL) and embarked on a new adventure, my second or perhaps third act in life. So far so good.
