PRIOR DOPE, THIS CEO NEEDS A VERY AUSTRALIAN SALVATION

Chris Tyler is hardly the first emancipated convict to try to reinvent
himself on these shores. Nor is he the first to be treated with suspicion.
The architectural legacy of our most famous emancipist, the forger Francis
Greenway, would never have arisen without the dogged patronage of his
governor, Lachlan Macquarie, overriding those who doubted a criminal could
ever come clean.

Tyler's Solution 6 is relying on a similar kind of patronage, from 25 per
cent shareholder Telstra and other investors whose support has wavered
recently, cutting its share price by 70 per cent. A merger with Sausage
Software may collapse, and Telstra yesterday withdrew its nomination of
executive Ted Pretty to the Solution 6 board. Just as Greenway needed
Macquarie's protection, Tyler sought yesterday to enlist patronly support
to shoo away those who doubt his integrity.

For his press conference, Tyler adopted the predictably relaxed posture of
the e-businessman, appearing in faded jeans and open-necked shirt and
perching on a desk rather than taking the podium. Indeed, he seemed almost
too relaxed. Dry-mouthed, he guzzled water. Was he ...? Could he ...?

No, he said, his marijuana experiences were a thing of the past. After his
conviction in 1985, for illicit activities at his Dark Horse Saloon in
Belle Fourche, South Dakota, "I turned my life into a different direction".

But the issue is not drugs, just as the issue facing Greenway was not
forgery. Tyler is accused of a pattern of high-risk behaviour. His
"youthful excursion" into the speculative end of the marijuana market, and
then at the speculative end of the venture capital market in North America
with his failed Lessonware company, were failed gambles. Is Solution 6
another big risk, or is Tyler being crucified for his mistakes?

He was also asked if he should have disclosed his drug conviction to Telstra.

Tyler: No.

Reporter: Why didn't you?

Tyler: I didn't.

Reporter: Why?

Tyler: I was never asked.

Whether or not this matters pivots on how you perceive the market. The
hardliners, wary of this cycle's Skase, expect something akin to a Catholic
confessional. Tyler only receives absolution by disclosing all his sins.

Tyler, whose business is to court investors, would argue that only fools
show off their warts. Hence his continuing fogginess over his dope
conviction: he can't remember the specifics of the sentence, nor the amount
he was caught with, dismissing it as "a couple of garbage bags". The drug
was not something he smoked or dealt, but "was part of the recreational
scene that I got involved with".

Solution 6 will live or die on weightier issues than the CEO's past. But
will Tyler build a technological equivalent to Greenway's sandstone legacy?

That depends on his patrons. After Macquarie left town, Greenway fell into
poverty. For now, Tyler's shareholders are relatively quiescent.
Yesterday's meeting reserved its loudest applause for the man who said:
"I'd rather a CEO who stood up and admitted to his mistakes than one who
never made any mistakes at all."