Where Were You When Tim Cook Sold Apple's Soul?
I was never able to figure out why they were mad at me. I did not run their favorite company into the ground. It was not my fault that RIM's stock cratered from the triple digits into the teens. I did not repeatedly botch guidance. I did not go on conference calls to reassure analysts and investors that everything was just fine when it was clear everything was not. I did not stubbornly drag my feet to make management changes and then announce one of the most uninspiring moves in corporate history. Heck, I didn't even fail to bring an NHL franchise to Southern Ontario.
Yet, RIMM permabulls attacked me as if I was responsible. Unbelievably, they defended the company's former co-CEOs James Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis.
I argued that RIMM bulls should have directed all of this anger and energy at the company, not some guy who called the play-by-play of the demise from his posh perch in Southern California. I contended that all Canadians should demand Parliament open an inquiry into how Balsillie and his team handled issues such as guidance. I urged the nation my father was born in -- God's Country, Canada -- to save Potash(POT) from foreign ownership and to request that RIM, the national disgrace, pick up and leave.
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If anything, RIMM bulls should have been on my side. They should have invited me to Waterloo for all types of protests, ranging from sit-ins to hunger strikes to petition drives. Instead, they misdirected their anger and got in the way of a falling knife.
AAPL Bulls Have Lost It
I would never do something as dumb as compare Apple(AAPL) to RIM. As companies, there's simply no comparison. Similarities do exist, however, between the conduct of RIMM bulls -- some of which, shockingly, continues to this day -- and the behaviors of AAPL bulls.