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Dianne Buckner: Okay. So now in the book you go through your whole story of how you started
your company and by the way, Kevin was a shuffle board shark in university. No. Not shark,
a hustler. You were a hustler.
Kevin O'Leary: I put myself in the last two years of Waterloo with shuffleboard with a
guy named, Paul Shapu. We never lost.
DB: But you took advantage of... You did the hustle, right? You've made like you weren't
that good until your opponent had a few drinks...
KO: No.
DB: And then suddenly, man! You were scoring it.
KO: Well, that's... One of my first partnerships that was extremely profitable. I learned that
if you have different attributes, and Paul had the ability, if those of you who know
how to play shuffleboard, he could hang every shot. In other words, if you can hang shot
off the corner, that's worth five points. You only have to do three of those and you
won the game no matter what happens. He had a unique attribute to do that, but he'd hold
that shot back. Hold it back, hold it back, until it was time to kill the competition.
Then he would send it out there, and they'd get slaughtered. So the two of us... He went
through engineering that way, and I went to just fooling around in university. It was
fantastic, but it taught me about partnerships. You have to trust your partner and we have
to...
DB: What did you bring to the partnership? He could hang the shot. What was it you could
KO: Paul wasn't that, he wasn't that really a social guy. He couldn't even ask people
to play.
DB: Oh, so you brought the charm?
KO: I just brought the... I was the marketing guy. I would go up to the drunk engineer and
say, "Would you like to play some shuffleboard? And this is my partner Paul, he's a mute."
[laughter]
DB: Alright, so now your first company though, was in television production?
KO: Yes it was. It was special event television, again a partnership with a fellow named Dave
Toms, who's still a writer. In fact, he's writing for the Blades show.
DB: Oh, yeah, yeah, The Battle of the Blades. Yeah.
KO: Battle of the Blades, he's the lead writer I think, on it. He's always been involved
with hockey, and Scott McKenzie, who's now legendary in the film business, and myself,
we created the format, Don Cherry's Grapevine which became very popular. We shot that in
Hamilton. And we ended up selling it two years in, and it was the first I actually turned
nothing into money. And it was a pretty interesting experience because we sold it for quite a
bit of money. It was the beginning of deploying that capital into the new software business.
DB: You mean you sold the format of Don Cherry's show?
KO: The whole company, 'cause we owned Bobby Orr: A Hockey Legend, Don Cherry's Grapevine,
The Original Six, and some other stuff that wasn't working. You have a portfolio of different
shows. Some worked, some didn't.
DB: So you're buddies with Don?
KO: Well, I've worked with him for almost three years, and I got to know him pretty
well. He's a very quiet guy, he lives in Oakville, and he's much different on TV than he is in
person. But he thought me something very important. If you're going to spend time making television,
make television that people watch, otherwise you're wasting your time and all the people
you're working with. So I think you have to bring it. When you go on to television, you've
gotta be... Bring your A-game and make it interesting, so that people wanna watch it.
Be entertaining, why are you there?
DB: Do you think he influenced you at all, in terms of being controversial, bombastic
perhaps?
KO: I think you learn from the input in your environment, so that's why I bring it up on
the book. I probably learned from him. He was great. I used to watch him make TV, and
he was right in front of me and he would... I remember one day, I think it was... I can't
remember what goalie it was in the league. We had him on the next night after he'd let
in seven goals, and he came on the set and Blue, the dog, barked out at him, that dog
that he's got and everybody's clapping, and he sat down and Don looked at me and he said,
"You suck."
[laughter]
KO: It was really an interesting moment, "What do you mean, Don?" "You let in seven goals,
every low shot last night, you let in. If you were on my team, I'd fire you."
DB: That sounds familiar.
KO: Yeah, it does, and I'm thinking that somehow I got assimilated into that.
DB: I think maybe you did. Okay. So then, but after the television production company,
you got started on SoftKey?
KO: Right.
DB: So remind people what SoftKey turned into.
KO: SoftKey Software Products was started in the basement of 411 Shaw Street. It was
effectively the early days of a learning company. We were a consumer software company. I had
a thesis that software would eventually lower... In the beginning we're selling the stuff for
$300 per copy, but my thesis was the price of computers would come down, and that this
would become a consumer product. And I've worked in consumer products before, I'd sold
Miss Mew Cat Food and I thought that maybe I could apply those talents to the software
business, and it ends up working. We went from zero in sales to nearly a billion when
we sold the company, and it was the same idea from the first day. My first partner was John
Freeman. In fact, he still has his fifty shares. And that company grew from basically a classic
basement story, but there was so much, I think about the journey, all the people, and the
partners, and the companies we've worked with, and the individuals that came and went. It
was... There were hundreds of hundreds and finally, we have almost 4,000 employees. I
knew them all, and I hired and fired all of them, individually.
DB: Well, speaking of firing, this is I guess, as I read the book I was thinking, there seemed
to be a bit of a contradiction in your persona and who you are, sort of behind the scenes,
because, just as you are on the show, when you talk about building the company you're
very ruthless in a sense. You were focused. You knew what you needed to do. You made tough
decisions. When you went to Walmart and they wanted a really low price, you were like,
"Yes, I can do that." and you made everybody do that, and you said you walked through the
office looking at people saying like, "Who do we really need here?" like people are costs,
and we gotta whack some people. So there's this very hard-*** side of you, but then on
the other hand, all the way through the book, so many times you are so grateful to people.
Like from the woman who helped you with dyslexia, to of course, your mum and your step dad and
your partners. Lavishing praise on your partners how great they are. And in some ways, you
start to come across as actually a pretty good guy.
KO: It must be true.
DB: Well, no. This is what I wondered like, who is the real Kevin, the sweetheart or the
heartless ***?
[laughter]
KO: I think you have to be both 'cause, let me say why that's not inconsistent and that
these can be, they can happen together. Think about a business, if you're an employee there
and you're working hard and you're creating wealth for the shareholders. And it's working,
the company is growing. What you concern yourself with is stability of your jobs, stability
of your pay check and making sure that you can provide for your family. If somebody is
in a business and it's not working, just like if you have a disease in your body, you've
got to get surgery and have it removed so the rest of the body doesn't die. It's that
simple. That's the way I look at it.
KO: So when I'm taking somebody out of the mix and I'm removing him from my company,
it's because I'm doing it for the rest of the employees that are staying. And I really
believe that, because you've gotta fight when times are tough to maintain stability and
profitability and economic viability of a business because many people that remain and
work there are relying on you, they're trusting you as the company's leader to make sure they're
safe. Now, if you have to take out 5% or 10% of the employees or even 15% in economic downturn,
it's still the right thing to do because there's 85% that are supporting their families on
the pay checks. So I have no remorse, I have no trouble doing it. It's keeping the overall
entity viable.
DB: You're doing it for the sake of the others.
KO: Exactly, and that's a good thing to do and I think I'm looking at that from the employee
perspective but I'm also worried about my shareholders because without capital, there
is no business. Access to capital is how you grow companies. The only reason people put
money in your hands is 'cause they trust you to have it multiplied. I find it very strange
when people say to me, "What about society? What about taking care of the baby whales?
What about saving the birch trees?" I say, "Listen, the first thing you have to do with
a business is understand its DNA is to profit, then you take your portion of the profits
that you own 'cause you're a shareholder, and you save baby whales and you save birch
trees or you do whatever you want with it 'cause it's your money. But the business doesn't
do that. The business makes money for its shareholders." And by the way as you listen
to this, would you invest in a company that I was running when you hear that? How many
would invest with me? Thank you.
[laughter]
DB: Let me ask you another question. When you did your deal with Mattel, you obviously
made a lot of money. Now some people might have said, "Hey, I've done really great here
and I'm just gonna chill out and retire and take it easy." But you are absolutely driven,
I mean I was telling them earlier, four shows, you're running the mutual fund, plus you do
like a hit with Heather Hiscox every morning on the News Network on the Morning Show. It's
like you are driven to go, go, go, go, go, go, go, achieve whatever. What is that?
KO: I just want you to know that Hit in the Morning, I have no pants on.
[laughter]
DB: He tells me that every time I mention that.
KO: It's true because I do it by Skype. I roll out of bed at 6:48, I go right back to
bed when it's over.
DB: Yeah, but why, why are you so compelled to... Like sometimes you show up at Lionel
Larry sometimes and you go, "Oh I'm really, really tired, really crispy," [laughter] why
don't you just take a break?
KO: I tried it. I retired for three years, I was forced to retirement, I was paid by
Mattel 5 million dollars not to work for 36 months and I thought that was gonna be the
best time of my life. It was the worst. I went to every beach on earth, went to every
resort, went anywhere I wanted to go and I was bored out of my mind. I like being in
business. I like working with young people. I like doing television and running mutual
funds and starting new companies. I like it, I think it keeps you alive, I think it keeps
you stimulated and keeps you young and I enjoy myself. I don't have to do anything, that's
my whole point. I want many Canadians to find themselves in my situation. That's why I wrote
this book. I'm trying to provide a road map for anybody that wants to be a great employee
or employer or just enjoy their lives. The pursuit of freedom is a fantastic thing. I
mean, the fact that I don't have to do anything makes me wanna do everything. That's the way
I look at it.
DB: It's interesting 'cause your whole investing philosophy came from your mum.
KO: Yes, she was right. The cold hard truth about investing is women are smarter than
men. I'm not kidding. I think about what she said to me when I was five years old, I didn't
even know what she was talking about. She said, "Kevin, never spend the principal, just
the interest." I didn't know what she was talking about. She said, I only invest in
stocks and bonds that pay interest and dividends. I never ever, ever, ever buy anything that
doesn't send me a check every quarter because I have no assurances that it's gonna go up
in value, but I know I'm getting my divided check. So if you think about the markets in
the last decade, even 12 years now, they have not gone up at all. Zero capital gain in the
Dow, in the TSX, in the S&P. Zero in 12 years. If you had been my mother during that period
which I had been, you at least have made 6% to 8% in dividend and interest, during that
whole period of time. So I tell my guys, and we founded the O'Leary Funds on that principle,
I couldn't find a money manager in this whole country and I'd tell them that story about
my mother because she'd always say to me every week, "Never, never spend the principal, just
the interest." I'd tell them that story and they'd say, "Oh, how cute. Don't worry we'll
try to manage that way." but they wouldn't do it.
KO: They'd buy me stocks that didn't pay dividends. It'd drive me crazy. So I said, "I'll find
this... I'll set the company up myself. I have enough money to do that. I'll hire people,
I'll tell them this story and if they ever, ever, ever buy a stock that doesn't pay a
dividend, I'll fire them, because they work for me." Now I have 50 people working on this,
and we thought we'd raised maybe 50, 60 million dollars, we've raised a billion nine. 1.9
billion dollars. I'm not proud of that. I'm proud of my mother's philosophy which it turns
out thousands of Canadians also want to do. I think it's great.
DB: Now, I know your stepfather, George, you still have a really strong... You just saw
him recently, didn't you?
KO: Uh huh.
DB: Yeah, I mean you're really, really close with him, always have been, he's been a mentor.
Your mum is gone now, unfortunately.
KO: Yeah.
DB: What do you think she would have thought about this book, the fact that her son is
a published author?
KO: Well, George was a phenomenal resource in doing this because although I thought the
past was too painful, I didn't want to dwell in it. He forced me to get the facts of my
early childhood right 'cause he was there. I went through those chapters with him, it
was really hard and I'm sure he read every word, and he always... You know this thing
I thought it was gonna take me three months to write. It took me a year and a half to
get this done and I worked with lots of people on it. It's hard to write a book, because
you have to get it right. It's public record. What put in there has to be correct. And also,
I think about making sure and he would constantly read the chapters. I remember finishing a
chapter at 11 o'clock, reading it and saying, "That's great." waking up in the morning after
Heather'*** in the Morning on CBC, and I'd read it again and I'd say, "This is crap.
What happened overnight?" and you constantly rewrite, and rewrite, and rewrite. Look, I
hope people enjoy it because I worked so damn *** it. I look at it this way. If a man
could give birth, it would be to a book.
[laughter]
KO: It's that's hard.
DB: I don't know about that. Alright, well we're gonna have questions from the audience
as well, and I think if, we've got a microphone here, if people wanna step up while we're
waiting...
KO: Repeat the question, so they'll yell it out.
DB: Yeah, I guess we could do that, but we've got people who are ready to go here, Kevin.
KO: All right, who's got a question? Yes, Amanda Lang has 300 pairs of shoes.
[laughter]
S?: Size six? [chuckle]
KO: Shoot, go ahead.
S?: Hi, my name's Carrie Ann Thomas. I'm a recent entrepreneur of a media company and
I've been attending a few of the Mars seminars and my interest with you today, because your
name has come up at a lot of the investment seminars I've gone to, how do you reach out
to investors, presenting your business plan in a way that they will wanna take you seriously?
KO: That's a very good question. Let me give you some really interesting information, because
I've become a student of all of the deals that were successful in six years on Dragon's
Den, and three years on Shark Tank. Let me give you the three attributes that every single
one that got financed had, every, not some, 100%. So here it is. 100% of the time when
a deal got financed, the entrepreneur or the entrepreneurs, 'cause sometimes there are
two or three people there, were able to articulate the idea in 90 seconds or less. It was so
pure and crystal clear that they could explain it to me as an investor in 90 seconds. That
it would go off like a light bulb in my head, "I get it, and I understand how I can make
money of that." That was in 100% of the cases. If you go back and look at the tape of all
the successful pitches, they always get it out in 90 seconds or less. Sometimes it's
30 seconds.
KO: Secondly, they're able to articulate, and it takes them about five minutes, why
they're the right person to execute the business plan. Why they know how to make this company
grow, and how to build it and how to make it work. That's number two. And when those
two come together, something magical happens. I've been in the room many times and watched
it, it's just like they start to sizzle like an isotope and you want to write them a check.
They become a leader in your eyes, somebody that has the potential to be successful. And
that's what happens when you're able to communicate effectively. So I say it to everybody that
wants to pitch an idea, and I do this, I practise too. I get in front of the mirror today, when
I'm pitching a new idea to my investors, and I wanna make sure that I can explain it them
in 90 seconds or less.
DB: Sizzling.
KO: And I try to sizzle like an isotope every day.
DB: Okay, alright.
KO: Thank you.
S?: And the heels, Thank you so much.
S?: Hi, my name's Hillary. I'm just wondering...
DB: You said there were three things that they all have in common.
KO: Well, the third thing was that the two turned them into leaders, the idea that they
became something more than the sum of the parts. You feel it happen in the room. It's
a magical experience. It's an aura. It's the patina of success. It's the karma. It's the
hidden secret sauce. That's the third thing. Yes.
S?: You can take this personally or not, but what would you do with second generation money?
I think of your own son, but you thrive in making the money, you've had the enjoyment
and then would you, give a lot seed money to your kid, would you not?
KO: That's if you inherit money, what do you do? I really think that it's so important
if you are lucky enough to have the right genes to end up being born rich, which is,
believe me, a wonderful outcome, I have nothing against that. But you understand that you
didn't make that money, and that some of the skill sets that are required to maintain it,
you may not have. Because, when you make your own money, you're scared out of your mind
to lose it. That's what happens. I fear losing my money. I sweat bullets every day. I sweat
every investment decision I make, trying to protect my principal. And what I find often,
is missing in the DNA of people that are just given money is they don't get that. And very
often if you go back and you look at great family fortunes, and here's some bad news,
it only takes three generations to wipe it out.
DB: "Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations" they say, right?
KO: It's awful. It means that if you don't understand the value of that capital, how
hard it was to make it, you tend to lose it. And the way the... It's a very, very simple
way that I'll give you now, that's free that will save you. Diversification of investment
is crucial. So when your family is approached to invest in a restaurant or some crazy idea,
you always say no to that, because that's often what happens. Never ever put more than
5% of the money you've inherited into any one stock or business venture. Never, under
any circumstance, ever more than 5% and never more than 20% in a sector like energy. So
if you keep that rule of diversification, there's 10 different sectors in the stock
market. So energy is one of them, bio-tech's another, for example, so never more than 5%
one stock, and never, never more than 20% in one sector, my rule's 2.5% one stock.
KO: And so, when the markets roll and they go up and down and they explode and a thousand
points down, you never get wiped out because not every stock or bond goes down the same,
and diversification saves you. And finally, get a good financial manager 'cause that's
the rules, they do. Even though you have to pay them 50 basis points, 0.5% or even 1.5%,
it's still worth it if you can't do it yourself. But sadly, over and over again I see this
happen, people lose the wealth they've been given. It's tragic. You know, money is so
hard to make and it's a crime, you should go to jail for it, if you lose it.
[laughter]
S?: Thanks.
S?: Hi, Kevin. My name is Dave. Just a question for you, many successful entrepreneurs have
had to make a lot of sacrifices, say, along the way, to achieve success. Are there sacrifices
you've had to make that you wish you didn't have to?
KO: That's a great question. And I'll... Let me answer it with an anecdotal story from
few weeks ago at Ryerson. I was giving a presentation class about 140 young entrepreneurs and one
fellow got up afterwards and he said to me, "Listen, I'm having a huge problem. I've been
living with this girl that I really love, and we anticipate getting engaged and I'm
hoping to marry her. But I'm running this business that's been successful. It's in its
second year. My salesmen now have 5 million dollars. I work 24/7, I have to. And, I just
don't get home until midnight and I go to work on weekends, too. I work every day. And
she said to me a week ago that if I don't change this, if I don't put more balance in
my life, she's gonna leave me." And I said, "Who cares?"
[laughter]
KO: It's so hard to get a business, as successful as yours, and it's so easy to get another
girlfriend."
[applause]
DB: You are such a romantic!
KO: Just think about this, 'cause clearly, I hope I didn't cause any discord in that
relationship, but I look at it this way...
[laughter]
DB: You ended it!
KO: She's the wrong girl! This guy's a winner! He's a winner. Who wouldn't wanna hang with
him during his journey to success?
S?: So you would've left the girl, too?
KO: Oh, yeah.
[laughter]
KO: We're talking about business here, buddy. You're trying to find your way to freedom.
Freedom is getting wealthy. Once you're free you can do anything you like. So his pitch
should have been, "Look, honey, here's the plan. It's gonna take me three more years
to make this work and when I sell it, we, collectively, are going to be rich, and you
can do whatever you like. So, hang in with me." and if she says no, you know what to
do.
[laughter]
DB: You don't wanna talk about the sacrifices you personally have made?
KO: Well, of course I've made sacrifices.
DB: You missed time with your kids...
KO: Yes. Look, there's no question that the downside is, I really believe that there's
no balance when you're an entrepreneur. You've got to focus a 110%, but you're doing it for
a very noble cause. You're doing it so that you can be free. Who doesn't want that? I'm
not sure I'd change anything in my life. Look, I've given lots of sacrifices. Thank you for
that question. It's a tough one to answer.
S?: Hi, my name is Sandra Mitchell and my question is, if you had a business where your
salespeople had a guaranteed access to their customers three to five days a week, and were
willing and able to provide a product that they appreciated and made a difference not
only to them personally, but to their community, but you made a profit on it, but it was a
public company. How would you maximize the connection that your salespeople have with
your customers, especially if they have an entrepreneurial nature and would appreciate
being rewarded for making a difference for their customers, which they will be doing
one-to-one, the only contact person that they have sometime within the next year in the
GTA.?
KO: Are you from this planet?
S?: I am.
[laughter]
KO: I'm just... Look, I think you sound like you've got a pretty Utopian situation there.
I mean, if customers really have unlimited access and my salespeople have unlimited access
to my customers, that's a beautiful situation. That sounds like a good business. I don't
know what it is, but that sounds like I like to invest in it. 'Cause it's really hard,
I mean, salespeople are competing with other salespeople to get time with the customers.
I'm not sure what's you're talking about, but maybe we can talk about it over a drink,
or something.
S?: Actually, I am a one-to-one salesperson with Canada Post and we are becoming mechanized...
KO: So you're not from this planet after all.
[laughter]
DB: Whoa. No. Actually, we are becoming mechanized but there will... The only excepting when
they're off sick and someone is covering, or they're on vacation. You will be having
one person going to your house.
KO: That's interesting.
DB: What are you getting at, though?
KO: So you're saying that the Canada Post, because it's got a monopoly, could become
a private... I like where you're going with this. I would love...
S?: I was in sales before I started.
KO: I would love to see Canada Post go private. I really would.
S?: Oh well, or...
KO: I would. Yeah, because look, I think you could bring a lot efficiency and cost savings
to the model if you were private. There's a lot things that the private sector would
do better than the government, but unfortunately we need the Post. It's an imperative service.
I still use it.
S?: Thank you. Can I quote you?
KO: Yes, absolutely. But you're the backbone of business. We still need mail. We're try
and do a lot with e-mail, but the truth is, we need physical delivery and it's a core
service. That's why you can't go on strike anymore.
[laughter]
S?: We only went on for like a half a day and I got locked out.
KO: Hey, listen, if you want to be a monopoly, you can't go on strike. It's that easy.
S?: And you know what? We didn't. We were locked out.
KO: I get it, I get.
DB: All right, next question.
[chuckle]
S?: Thank you.
DB: Good one though. Thank you.
S?: Hi Diane, Kevin, my name is Sam Finan. I'm a student going to the University of Toronto.
Two questions for you. Firstly, would you ever do business with a family member or somebody
who you're a close friend with?
25:30 KO: No, never.
S?: Alright, that was short and sweet.
25:34 KO: That's a very, very bad, bad, bad, bad, bad idea.
S?: Really?
KO: Yes.
S?: Okay.
KO: You have to separate the emotional ties of friendship from business. You really do.
That's absolutely crucial, because you'll end up making a lot of bad decisions down
the road. Look, I have friends that I do business with, but when 9 o'clock comes in the morning
it's business.
S?: Fair enough.
KO: I've actually litigated some of my friends in the past.
[laughter]
KO: And we're still friends.
DB: Really?
KO: Yes, because they understand the difference. But I would not... Look, putting family members...
Nepotism is a disease in a business. You can always hire a better manager than your uncle's
son's, brother or cousin.
[laughter]
DB: What's the other part of your question?
S?: My next question is, does the O'Leary Funds offer any summer internships for students?
[laughter]
KO: We do hire, actually O'Leary Ventures, which Alex Kenjeev runs here. He runs my venture
business, hires... We had three or four interns this summer and they had a really interesting
time. Look, you hang with me, crazy stuff happens. Trust me.
[laughter]
S?: I'll keep that in mind. Thanks.
KO: Yes, talk to Alex.
S?: Hi, my name is Sonia Thompson. I do have two questions. I hope there's enough time.
I hope I word this correctly, where can one go with an idea to discuss it? Are there creative
think tanks? Okay, this may sound crazy, but I think it'd be great if someone invented
a way of reading in the bathtub and not having your glasses fog up. I mean I know, anyway...
KO: That does sound crazy.
[laugher]
S?: Do you know of a creative... I don't know if you're the right one to ask.
KO: I always point people to the one platform I know works and that's Dragon's Den. I mean,
we look at all kinds of crazy ideas because we don't think they're all crazy. So dragonsden.com,
put an application in. The show is gonna be back in the 7th season. Every year it gets
bigger. Every year there's more ideas. And you know the thing about Dragon's Den now,
you should think of it as the American Idol of venture capital because even if you don't
get funded, millions of people see your product or service and sales go up if it's already
got distribution. So people are coming on that show now just to get exposure.
DB: I know, but to get on the show, people generally have to have something.
S?: Yeah, that's what I mean. I just meant even discussing.
DB: You have to have a prototype or a business plan or whatever, so I mean there are...
KO: Aren't you Miss Negative tonight?
[laughter]
DB: I'm so mean. I'm the mean one, Kevin.
S?: I guess I meant, yeah, as you were saying...
DB: Yeah, but if you wanna develop...
S?: To generate ideas.
DB: Yeah, there's lots of resources to do that sort of thing. I mean they have all those
idea labs and what do they call them, incubators and so forth. I'm sure if you go online and
you're looking in business idea development, you can find lots of resources, even like
your local Chamber of Commerce. I'm sure people can put you in touch with the sort of people
that could help you with that.
S?: And my other question is more specific. I know on Dragon's Den, a lot of time an idea
is rejected nearly on the basis of the evaluation is crazy, blah, blah, blah.
KO: That's a good enough reason to reject it.
S?: Of course, I accept that. But do you ever follow up with an idea privately, maybe later
with the person, 'cause you thought the idea itself was good? Does that ever happen?
KO: No, if the person was such an idiot to try and oversell it at a crazy price, I don't
want to follow up with him. Because I know there's a thousand more deals coming. There's
a million deals in the naked city and I'm going see 100 more tomorrow.
DB: But you haven't done that, Kevin, but I know some of the other Dragons have done
that.
KO: I think they're crazy.
S?: But haven't you gone... I know Arlene went back and got in business with somebody
and Jim has even called people...
KO: I rest my case.
[laughter]
S?: Thanks for...
DB: And you've never been part of those...
KO: No, never.
DB: After the Den deals?
KO: After I say no, they're dead to me. I don't even think about them anymore.
DB: Okay, Alright, next question.
S?: Hi, thanks for taking my question. I noticed that you seem to use the word cockroach a
lot on your show.
[laughter]
S?: So I had a question, I heard you on the radio show, Q, earlier this week and there
was question that came up there, that came again tonight where you get asked something
along the lines of, how do you feel that people seem to see you as very belligerent?
KO: No, I'm not belligerent.
S?: Well, yeah you come back with the answer, "But is telling the truth belligerent?" But
that's not really a complete answer, because what about the use of the word 'cockroach'?
Is there a utility to name-calling outside of the entertainment industry and reading?
KO: The reason cockroach works is, it sort of depicts that business in the pecking order
where it stands. So the way I look at it is if I say, "Look, you're the cockroach of this
industry. You're nothing. You haven't got any sales yet. These are all facts. And I
think it's being a little graphic, but factual. You're a cockroach. What's wrong with that?
It should be motivational. I think I'm encouraging you."