He couldn't quite shut up. How nice it would be if Filipowski could put up, too.

As soon as Wednesday, Filipowski will offer shares in Divine to public investors for the first time. To do so, he fired his investment banking firm and hired a new one with a greater appetite for risk--and less of a reputation to put at risk.

This was vintage Filipowski. Ignoring the advice of the experts. Writing them off as naysayers. Finding someone new to buy his vision, and pushing ahead.

One step forward--but to where?

Much has changed since Filipowski first announced Divine's public offering in December. None of it is good for Divine's IPO.

E-biz mania has petered out. The IPO market is frozen in place. The talk in the dot-com world has shifted from stock options and instant billions to layoffs and tight money.

Filipowski's own plans have tumbled, too. Originally, he talked about raising $250 million. Just two months later, he nearly doubled that, to $460 million. This would have made Divine one of Chicago's 40 most valuable companies.

Then reality set in.

In April, Filipowski cut back the size of the offering to $140 million--44 percent below his original goal. He also laid off employees, delayed plans to move into a city-backed corporate campus on Goose Island, shelved plans to spin off parts of Divine, and began focusing on established as well as start-up firms.

Not a good foundation from which to peddle stock to the public.

And yet, Filipowski now is poised to take his hard-to-comprehend company into a highly skeptical IPO market and raise $200 million to help him attack a crowded arena of dot-competition--the business-to-business sector.

Jump on in, Flip. The water's hot.

I would be more optimistic if there were something in Filipowski's track record, or something about Divine, that seemed unique and promising.

Some people look at Filipowski and see an up-from-the-streets original who has amassed a fortune and maintained his uniqueness in a world of bland.

That's all there. But buying into the Flip mystique is like buying a beautiful home and failing to see the landfill right next door.

Filipowski did build Platinum Technologies into a $968 million software and service firm--excruciatingly short of the $1 billion that he had cited as a key growth benchmark.

But he made all the classic mistakes of an entrepreneur run amok: He expanded too fast, refused to cut costs, paid top dollar for companies when he didn't have the money to spend, and failed to change strategy.

Short on cash and strategic vision, having just laid off 15 percent of Platinum's workforce, Filipowski sold when chief rival Computer Associates made a rich offer in early 1999. The $30-a-share price tag was triple the $10-a-share judgment that public investors had rendered against Platinum.

Even so, Filipowski pocketed $290 million. He soon formed an investment fund and attracted backing from tech-savvy giants like Microsoft and Dell. And he has assembled a board of directors at Divine that includes buzz-heavy celebrities like Michael Jordan and business-savvy CEOs like MarchFirst's Bob Bernard.

Significantly, Flip has wowed Mayor Richard M. Daley. He gave Filipowski the key to the city, gave his venture $14 million in tax incentives, and asked Flip to unlock Chicago's dot-com future.

Mayor Daley's endorsement and Flip's non-stop salesmanship have created the misguided impression that the future of high technology in Chicago depends on Filipowski.

But don't worry. If Flip does flop, Chicago's dot-com sector will continue building on its recent momentum.

Not that Filipowski could ever consider the prospect of failure. With Internet billionaires and a big-city mayor throwing money at him, it's no surprise Filipowski loves to call General Electric a "dead model" for doing business, and predict Divine will be one of the nation's biggest companies in 20 years.