I worked at ROO Media (which KIT Digital acquired) and met with Kaleil a number of times. None of us who worked there are even remotely surprised. No signs of revenue, yet we would spend like crazy and even acquire companies with magical "stock money".<p>It was the most corrupt place I have ever worked in my life. The COO was a ghost who just spent money (like staying at hotels all the time, even though he lived an hour away by train) making 400K+ at a startup with no revenue, the CEO (who Kaleil replaced) drove the company into the ground and subsequently started another startup that is now under lawsuit as well after lying to his employees and not paying them for months. Absolutely crazy stories.<p>Happy to answer any questions :)
Oh man KIT Digital was one of the stranger companies I've run into over the years. They were in the process of buying everything they could get their hands on from Broadcast streaming to social games. Had some initial conversations about them acquiring my small dev shop at the time (we were too small for it to make sense), then they became a client. Even at that point as an outsider the whole thing seemed a little off.<p>At one point I was supposed to meet Kaleil at CES and our plans kept falling through. Finally as I was waiting for my plane back to SF I got a call from his admin asking if I wanted to join him at his table for the AVN awards that night (the CES dates always butt up against the AVN (porn) awards). I ended up passing....
Have you seen the movie? There is ZERO evidence in the movie that either Kaleil or his co-founder Tom are talented or successful. They're certainly, as mikek says in his comment at <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10547832" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10547832</a>, "driven"! But that's why they were seeking success by dishonest means in the first place. As IMDB says:<p>> The process of building the business focuses on obtaining venture capital based solely on the idea, with the actual mechanics of the website seemingly almost an afterthought, or at least one left primarily to the hired help.<p>Basically they were two guys who tried to capture a lot of value without creating any, basically by world-beating levels of hustle. That describes the story of KIT Digital, too.<p>(Don't forget that Kaleil stabs his cofounder in the back in the middle of the film, too — metaphorically, fortunately.)<p>I think this is a big problem with the current "entrepreneurial" ethos: you have people out there who are really honestly creating a lot of value, and then you have people like those guys who see a big pile of money and try to scheme up a way to skim a bunch off the top, making life harder for everyone who's actually contributing.
It's sad when people who are talented and driven and successful decide that their success isn't good enough and they have to take it to the next level by dishonest means.
I wonder if Tom Herman (Kaleil's partner at GovWorks and partner at KIT) is going to get wrapped up in this too. I hope not since Tom came across as a nice enough guy in the film. <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomherman" rel="nofollow">https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomherman</a>
Watched the film in 2001, still waiting for USPS to start scanning my PO Box mail and email it to me.<p>Actually, they don't have to go that far. I'd take a simple email notifying me that I HAVE mail in my PO Box, and maybe who it's from. Would save me a trip a week probably.
I too can add another testimony to just how mad KIT Digital and ROO both were. But goodness me it gave me some stories for the diary. The C level was nuts, but everyone else, goodness they were good, hardworking people.
Wasn't that the movie with the scene where the founders are presented with deal terms and given X hours to decide and they think they can't consult with any outside people (attorneys, etc) during that time?<p>Does that ever really happen? My instant answer would be "No" if I was seriously given that restriction.