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6. How did getting an AOL spam change your life?
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The year was 1996. I had left the law firm so that I could file a malpractice claim against my employer (I won), and I was seeking new employment.
Finding another law firm that would take on a biker as their paralegal was not easy, so I was doing side jobs for friends and even for State Farm Insurance (since I could do things they couldn't by law).
I had my 2400 baud modem, AOL, and some basic Internet knowledge. I was trying to figure out a way to make money using my computer, when one day I happened to read some AOL spam telling me I could make millions selling porn on the Internet for a simple $50 investment.
Times were tight, so my then girlfriend gave me $50 and I responded. The company was Elecnet Internet Services (EIS), and essentially he was giving free hosting, free content, and a sub-sub-sub-domain. He would keep 50% of whatever you made.
Back then, everyone had a paysite, and everyone's site had a "friends" page where they would have recip links to every other paysite out there. The first task you would do is to approach the owners of these other established sites and ask if you could trade links. If they agreed (most did) you would get the linking info, and then send it into the owner of EIS, and he would put the links up for you since no one had FTP access.
I went out and did as instructed, however, it soon got to the point that he was not putting these recips up in a timely manner and I was getting concerned that perhaps I was doing something wrong. So I made numerous attempts to contact EIS, and eventually asked for a phone number so I could call and talk to him. He responded by calling me.
After a few minutes of talking to him I knew that he had more work than he could handle on his own, and I saw the job opening I had been seeking.
I suggested that perhaps he should let me do the grunt work, and I would let him set the price. If it turned out that it wasn't worth it to me, or if he wasn't satisfied with my production we could part ways with no hurt feelings. He decided that he would rather give me some incentive and gave me 10% of the company. I soon took over as the affiliate manager, even though there really wasn't really a title like that back then.
The rest is history.