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I met Leslie July 14, 2005. Wednesday, July 27, 2005, I talk to Leslie on the phone (and notice for the first time that she has a slight Puerto Rican accent, which didn't show up in her GFY posts). "You don't look Puerto Rican," I tell the tall curvy blonde. "A lot of people tell me that," Leslie says. She ran Vivid's online division for over two years until leaving last week. "The roofers are here," she complains. "They're gone to lunch now, thank God. It felt like I had aliens walking on my roof all morning. It's like a hostage situation. I don't want to leave with a bunch of people at my house." When she was a girl, Leslie wanted to become a doctor. "I'm great at anatomy. I'm good at sciences. My sister went to pharmacy school. I know all the medications and what they do. A lot of people in the industry (D$, Jen, Tina Fiore, etc), when they're sick, they come to me. I prefer the herbal approach to the chemical approach." Leslie, who's lived in California since 1983, studied Psychology in college. Then she worked in the gas industry in San Bernadino County for several years before transitioning to radio sales and marketing. "[In 1998] I was prompted to go to a fetish party by my assistant because I was way too uptight. I've always played it safe. "I took the afternoon off. I bought a crazy dominatrix outfit, stained my hair blue and wore black lipstick. I went to the Naked Hollywood party in a mansion (Leslie in the middle, with a black wig and black dress). I was freaked out. I talked to this IT (Information Technology) recruiter. I told him I was into computers. "About six months later, he calls me recruiting for IGallery. He thinks it's my dream job. I freaked out on him. 'How could you insult me like this?' "He was definitely one of the best sales people I've ever met. I never thought I'd consider such a thing. I said, I'm going to go home and talk to my fiancé (attorney Sean Erenstoft). If he thinks it's ok, I'll meet with your people. "I went to IGallery and met with Greg Dumas. I liked everybody in the office. I started (in early 1999 and left in late 2001) in content and affiliate sales and worked my way up to Affiliate Manager." Luke: "Why did IGallery collapse so dramatically?" Leslie: "How do I put it? The fall of IGallery had nothing to do with shady things. It was about not having a face representing them on the boards, shows, and overall. A few months after I left, they found themselves with very little affiliate traffic coming in. Webmasters are loyal, most of them sought me out and moved their traffic over to my new venture. There was also an issue with their stock (NOOF) skyrocketing and then dropping dramatically." Luke: "Did you know IGallery was collapsing when you made your exit?" Leslie: "Not at all." Luke: "Why did you leave?" Leslie: "When I went to work there, everybody was so happy. We all looked forward to going to work every day. We walked in the office and smiled at each other and had lunch with each other... But about a year into my job there, IGallery went public, we all got stock, and TEN (The Erotic Network) came in and they started changing everything. It went from a happy place to a sad place. A lot of people left. A lot of people got fired. TEN didn't understand the internet business. They were trying to run it like a cable company. That just doesn't work. "To me, satisfaction with the job is the most important thing. I was making a lot of money, mostly commissions. Every year, I tripled the revenue for the affiliate program. They asked me to justify how much money I was getting paid. Why do I need to justify my paycheck? It was 80% commissions. The numbers speak for themselves. I think they thought they could hire somebody for $30,000 a year and keep the same volume. They eliminated my commissions which forced me to leave. Then they realized that they can't bring someone in for $30,000 a year and get the same results. [TEN executives] Michael Wiener and Mark Krieloff have since acknowledged that." Luke: "Where did you go?" Leslie: " Paul Lesser (Ron Levi's former business partner with Cybererotica,) was always trying to hire me despite some issues between IGallery and Cybererotica, so Ron and I were not friends at this point. "I emailed Paul. Ron Levi answered my email. Ron said, I bought Paul Lesser out but I am interested in talking. "I was blown away. We'd never spoken beyond hello. I went in to talk to Ron and he was so good to me. He completely took care of me. 'We want you to come on board as an employee to run our content division.' Ron knew I was used to making more money than he was willing to pay so he set me up with a consulting deal with Jack Gallagher to in tandem handle Babenet's affiliate marketing and content department. "It went so well that I set up my own corporation and I turned Ron and Jack into clients." Luke: "How well did you know Babenet [a company notorious for its unethical business practices]?" Leslie: "I had previously socialized with Rob Gould but the first time I met Jack was in Ron Levi's office. As a consultant, I restructured and marketed their affiliate program, ran their content sales but I didn't go into their operations." Luke: "Did you do a Google search on them [which would reveal articles on Wired.com about the thieving ways of Jack Gallagher, Rob Gould and other Babenet principals]?" Leslie: "No. I trusted Ron and he set up the deal for me. Babenet had several companies. I wasn't privy to what the other companies were doing. Same with IGallery. I came in, did my job, got a paycheck and went home." Luke: "You didn't have a sense that you were working for some bad people [at Babenet]?" Leslie: "No. Babenet took good care of me and my clients, with the exception of the last payout period for which nobody got paid, including me." Luke: "So were you shocked when they lost their banking?" Leslie: "Yes, more like horrified." I have such a hard time hearing Leslie on the phone that I'm jamming my phone so far up my ear that I fear I'll suffer permanent injury. Luke: "Why did you and Vivid part ways?" Leslie: "I haven't had a vacation since 2002. During my whole time running Vivid Cash, I took three days off. I'm financially sound. I want to take time off and focus on myself and figure out where to go from here. Both the folks over at Webquest and Vivid have been great, but there's nowhere for me to move up to from where I was at running the program for Webquest. "I was so dedicated to succeeding at my job, I even lost my marriage in the process. Ron Levi warned me against doing so but it was already too late, so I had to cut my losses and move on. "I became emotionally attached to VividCash. It was my baby. We had to work harder on our tours to make it sexy and alluring without showing even one nipple. We prefer to be very softcore outside of the members section. If some kid landed on there by accident, he wouldn't get it. If everybody did what we did, we'd all be making a lot more money. So many companies are just giving it away. Why buy the cow when you can milk her for free?" Luke: "How did your family react to your working in porn?" Leslie: "I didn't tell them until the January 2004 AVN Online magazine profiled me. I left the magazine lying around in my kitchen. I came out of the shower to find my mom and dad reading AVN Online. "My parents are very conservative but they were ok with it. "If I would've told them when I first started, they would've freaked out. But after they saw that I had been doing it for five years and it hadn't changed me..."
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