The story behind the success always makes for good reading. And, if such a story is presented as a drama, interspersed with daring ambition, envy, battles for control, rivalry, complaints, accusations, counter-accusations, and some humor, it will probably make for a very engrossing read. On top of all this is not a literary work - in fact, it is not a dramatization of reality. It is a chronicle of events that happened behind the scenes as in the words of the author, "the hottest business, media and technology success of our time'.
The book starts by describing the scene in 2003, where Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, address high school in Israel. They explain how Google was born.
Page and Brin were doctoral students at Stanford University. The idea Google was born, when a page is designed to remove the entire web to your computer and try to devise a program to search for it. It was a daring idea. While the exercises planned by the end of the week, could manage only a part of it even after a year. "So optimism is important," says Page of his audience, "One must have a healthy disrespect impossible ."
It was this optimism that has helped Page to persist with their plan. He kept the web download to your machine, and make it helped mine the data and make sense of it. According to the duo, it's a lot of effort, lots of night-outs, and a lot of work through the holidays.
After this brief introduction to the beginning, the story goes back to the beginning -. When the sides met Brina
Page and Brin, both PhD students at Stanford, and they have much in common. They are both from families that a high value on scholarship and academic excellence. Both have fathers who were teachers, and mothers whose job revolves around computers and technology. Computers, mathematics, and intellectual debates and discussions were part of their genetic codes, as well as their day-to-day life. It is only natural, therefore, that along with each other well, and began working together.
They also have an environment that is very conducive to innovation, experimentation, and ideas. Stanford is known for churning out several successful technology investments, including HP and Sun (Sun stands for Stanford University Network). The people at Stanford are solid in their belief that sometimes, doing business from technological innovation brings a much greater impact than writing a paper on it.
Also, at that time the two together, it was a great IT revolution događa.Voli Netscape are making waves with anywhere outside a huge IPO, and it is touted to be the next big thing. As a result, venture capital heavily skewed towards the financing of technology start-up. These circumstances create a setting ripe for research and innovation related to the Internet, and Page and Brin believes that a powerful search request is one thing that Internet users need most.
Engines prevalent at that time provided a service that was far from satisfactory. There was a lot of work - like Lycos, WebCrawler, Excite, and several others. All have fallen short. They would only show a slew of results that have little meaning searches.
At that time, another pair of Stanford is running a company are called 'Yahoo'. They devised a better search algorithm, creating alphabetical directory of websites. Also, another new search engine called AltaVista came up. Its search algorithm is based, as well as other search engines, the number of times a keyword is figured into the web page but showing results using the now popular concept linkovi.Veza, in essence, is a kind of pointer to another web page.
The idea of using links to search engines excited Brin and Page. They began to think about a whole new dimension.
comes from a family of valuable scientific research, Page and Brin looked at links as something similar citations in academic research. In academia, the operation is considered good if he had citata.Više citations, better paper. Also, not all citations are equal. Quotes from quality sources improved the paper value.
Using the analogy, the pair developed a search algorithm called PageRank. It depends, among other things, the number of links that pointed to stranici.Više web links, the higher the ranking. Also, links to more reputable web sites such as Yahoo, would carry more weight than links from lesser-known website.
At first, called Google Guys their Backrub search engine ', that is based on the links pointing back to the site. However, in the end decided they had to come up with a new name. Since it deals with huge amounts of data, they decided to name "Google". Googol is a very large number - 1 followed by 100 zeros. "Google" is actually a misspelling of "googol", something that many people do not know.
Google was first released internally at Stanford. From the outset, it is kept clean and simple home page, no flashy animations and the like. It was an instant hit in the Stanford network.
As your database grows, Brin and Page needed more hardware. While they were short of money, they bought cheap parts and assemble them yourself. They have also tried everything they could to get their hands on unclaimed machines. They did everything they could to their hardware costs to a minimum.
Initially, the duo tried to sell Google other large Internet companies like Yahoo and AltaVista. However, both companies were not able to accept Google, because, among other reasons, they did not believe that the search is a vital part of the web experience.
In the early days, the Google guys were not sure the business model. They did not know how Google could make novac.Moto company is "Do not be evil". They believed that advertisements on Web pages were evil, and thus wanted to avoid ads on their websites. They hope that in future , other web pages you want to use your search engine, and they can get from the collection of these web pages. they are also relying solely on word-of-mouth marketing. they did not advertise at all.
Google database has grown, and they began buying more hardware and hiring more people. In the beginning, Google was financed by $ 1 million investment angel investor named Andy Bechtolsheim. In the end, though, they ran out of it and need more money.
They do not want to go public and raise money as well as many other companies failed because they had no intention save your information out in public, and they also like to have full control over the company. The only option was, therefore, seemed to approach venture kapitalista.Dvojac was convinced that they could get VC's to fund them, and yet still retain their control over the company.
they approached the two VC firms, Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia. Both companies were impressed with this idea, and were willing to fund Google. However, since they did not want to give up control, the Google guys demanded that both companies jointly invest in Google.
on Wall Street, two large VC companies will find it difficult to agree on joint investments in fledgling companies owned by several young unrelenting. However, due to the inherent attractiveness and workability of their ideas, and through the help of some of your contacts, Google guys pulled off a blast that was unheard of. They get two companies to invest $ 25 million each, and they still retain full control Googlea.Jedini the condition that the two VC's set up is to hire an experienced industry people to manage their poslovanje.Google guys agreed, hoping that they could to push such a term as the end date as possible.
As Google has progressed, several improvements came gore.Sada famous Google Doodle - an image that appears in the Google homepage to mark an important event or honor a person - began as a signal to employees that Brin and Page are away. When Brin and Page went to a party called Burning Man, they left image Burning Man in the web-site signal to employees who were away. After that, they have experimented with two replacement O is Google's Halloween pumpkin festival to mark Halloween. It was an instant hit with the Google users. Since then, the logo is often decorated with doodles to mark or honor important occasions / attractions / parties.
Google started hiring people for certain roles. An employee is dedicated to making drawings, and another to polish and improve the user design. Significantly recruited Dr.Jim Reese Harvard management operations. His responsibility was to ensure that Google is increasing the hardware requirements are consistently met. Since Google saves a lot of money buying cheap computers and installing them yourself, it is important that they be maintained, monitored and managed properly. To ensure reliability, Dr.Reeves spread data over multiple computers, manage them all from a central system, and is used to provide redundancy against system crashes businesses. By reducing hardware costs, and use the free use of Linux based operating systems over a set of those such as Windows, Google has earned for himself a reasonable price.
Google has gained more and more popular. He has won support and admiration for Danny Sullivan, editor of the influential newsletter focused on searching the Internet. It has built for himself a very loyal customer base that gave feedback on even the smallest modification in place. However, just to be a way of making money.
At that time, a company called Overture caught Brin's attention. Overture is a company that provides search results that accompanied the search Yahoo and AOL, among ostalima.Google guys liked the idea of ads based on search rather than flashy and distracting banner ads. However, there was an overture to the practice is not approved - Overture guarantee that if a company pays a certain amount of money to find a place among the ads. He went directly against their motto, "Do not be evil'.
They decided, therefore, to go it alone. They developed an algorithm for the search-based advertising on their own. In keeping with its motto, they ensure that a clear demarcation between actual search results and advertisements. As search results, ads, too, will be rangirani.Poredak advertisements should be based not only on the amount of money paid, but the number of times it is clicked. So popular ads will appear more prominently.
Prices Google ads are determined by nonstop auction process. Auctions are done for each search izraz.Frazu like 'investment advice' would cost much more than a phrase such as' food for pets. "Companies started with dedicated staff to perform Google auction. There were some nuances involved. For example," Digital cameras "will be on auction for a higher rate of" digital camera "because users googling" digital cameras "is more likely to buy one.
Google's advertising policies is not without its share of problems. Once the insurance company called Geico filed a lawsuit against Google, on the basis that it allowed other companies to bid for your ime.Korisnik looking for 'Geico' will see its results of all insurance companies that made the winning bid for it. Geico claimed that Google had no right to Geico competition use search on their behalf. Google's defense was that Geico understanding of consumer behavior on the Internet is not točan.Korisnika googling 'Geico' is not necessarily just looking at Geico website. In addition, Google was not the publisher of your ads, and also has systems in place to protect trademarks. He did not allow ads contain trademarks in the heading or text. Google ended up winning the case.
also stated that the appointment of Google ads to the "Sponsored Links" seduces many users. Many users confuse ads with the actual results, and click on them without even knowing that oglasi.Ethicality this lack of clear distinction often comes into question.
s business model is set straight, innovation and new ideas flourish on Google expanded office, called the Googleplex. An employee came up with the idea of taking a person phone number, if his name and zip code entered. Others had the idea of auto-correcting typos. If, for example, misspell a famous name, Google will automatically correct and displays search results for the corrected name. If less obvious mistakes, Google comes with a "Did you mean ...?" link at the top of the page.
Google launched its Google Image Search, which is again revolutionary. Millions of images are stored in the Google database and can be downloaded at the click of a mouse.
Google guys have created the infrastructure and culture within the Googleplex that employees want to stay there for most of the day - and night. Mean while the spending on computer hardware, they spent unrestrainedly when it comes to creating the right environment for their employees. It's free meals, unlimited snacks, toys, roller hockey, scooter races, and much more. Even the buses are equipped with Wi-Fi internet connectivity, so that employees can be productive even when they're relaxed.
External events also helped Google.Dotcom crash in 2000 left a couple of very talented software developers of the unemployed, the Google access to a vast talent pool. Also, around this time, Microsoft is facing a legal dispute over its anti-competitive practices. This is a picture Microsoft is beating. Google with its "Do not be evil" motto, suddenly overtaken Microsoft as the ultimate place for software developers to be in. Creme-de-la-creme of the profession began to prefer to work at Google.
Google is also actively encourage and nurture innovation within the Googleplex. Employees are free to spend 20% of their time on innovative tasks that interest him. They do not have to worry about whether it could be profitable, or have a fear of its acceptance or workability. They thus can do just about anything that is of interest to them. The ideas are often discussed in the bulletin board at lunch. As the idea grew, to get bigger and bigger. Google also provides the resources to carry out innovation. From this culture were born several ideja.Strastveni news reader came up with the idea of providing users with more news sources are grouped together in order to analyze and understand the news better. Thus was born Google News. Interestingly, unlike Google's search results, Google News results are close at hand. This density is intended to give users as much as possible the news. The ranking is based on importance, but also a source. Another innovation is Froogle, later renamed Google Product Search, which helped users search for some products store.
Google will soon become a verb in several languages, including English, German and japanski.Puno discussion about Google launched. In addition to information on people just Google search away, there were issues relating to online stalking of individuals. Google advertising, despite the company's checks, including some obscene websites. In academia, students use Google to the advantage of the classic uses a specialized database is looked at on the one hand, and all the easy and wide access to information, on the other hand, looked like a shortcut method that encourages laziness.
for all its popularity, Google hardly spends on advertising. Marketing has happened only word-of-mouth. Google has kept her home clean and free of ads, these millions of dollars in revenue. To avoid heavy graphics homepage, which will slow down the downloading of search results. It is focused on getting customers quick results, unlike other sites that want customers to stay on your site for as long as possible. She did not have the user lock-in - no need to register in order to use Google search. Offering a premium product aimed primarily at satisfying users, Google has eliminated any need for the promotion oglašavanje.Samo it was through the sale of hats and shirts with the Google logo.
Google launched a new program, be able to draw customers to Google, and not just wait for them to find Google. Under this program, any website can register to use the Google search box in the page. It's called an affiliate program, he promised to pay 3 cents a website for each search are added to Google. Google, of course, make money from ad revenue.
Ever since they got two VC funded companies, Google guys have been under increasing pressure to hire the CEO who will manage the business aspects of the company. Google has crossed the threshold beyond which the company should go public, and VC firms are particular about the experienced business professional as well as the public face of the company before it went public. Several candidates were sent to Brin and Page to venture capitalists, but none of them managed to please Google guys.
as the pressure mounted and the time keeps running out, Eric Schmidt, CEO of software company Novell, stepped into the Googleplex met Brin and Page. He agreed to see them just because of the insistence of the top people from one of the VC business, good relationship with what he knew was important. He had no interest in meeting sve.Google boys were equally uninterested in meeting with him. They are expecting another dull and boring types who have already seen many.
When he entered Schmidt, his biography is projected on the wall, and his strategy in Novell Open criticized. Schmidt said back fiercely, and there began a heated debate that went on for a long time. After he left, Schmidt realized he had no intellectual debate of this kind in a long time. Brin and Page also found Schmidt to be refreshingly different from the other candidates people Capital razgovarali.Venture know that Schmidt could make deft balancing act of giving business structure and direction of the company, while at the same time ensure that the freedom that Brin and Page, so he wanted to remain unchanged.
Soon, Eric Schmidt made the CEO of Google. He put all his experience in the game and looked the most mature. He knew when to push, when you agree, when you back off, and when the discussion. He still gave the Google guys a lot of leeway. He realized that they created the culture of innovation that Google would be wise to change. All that was intended to do was build a business and management structure of the strategy and culture, Brin and Page have been so carefully built.
It is, of course, points of disagreement between Schmidt and the Google guys. It took a lot of assurances from Schmidt persuade Brin and Page in the price that the company payroll system, which is based on free software, necessary repairs. Schmidt wanted to buy packaged software, Oracle, which he believed was a necessity, given the size of Google and the rate of expansion. Brin and Page, however, there was no merit in paying thousands of Oracle when free software is available.
There have been instances when Brin and Page made their way doggedly. There was once a violent bid war going on between Google and Overture through AOL's search business. Google finally won the AOL offering guarantees in the amount of one million dollars. Schmidt was concerned about it, as well as of the balance is quickly shrinking. Brin and Page, however, went on with the job, because they firmly believed that the search and associated advertising companies such as AOL is well worth the risk. In the end, turned out to be the right decision.
Despite this, Google has also signed an agreement with Yahoo to provide its search results. She also signed a $ 100 million deal AskJeeves.com, a competitor, to ensure that the search-based advertising. It showed the maturity and confidence on the part of Google to get involved in the competition.
In April 2004, Google has promised to launch an email service that is promised will be significantly better than the existing e-mail services. Brin and Page knew that, with plenty of e-mail service is already functioning, the new e-mail service must be much better able to succeed. Google Mail or Gmail, they believed, was far superior.
Gmail's unique features include easy retrievability through Google like search for e-mail, 1 GB of free storage, which is several times the storage space of the existing e-mail service, a unique way to present a series of emails, like the conversation. Gmail was first given to 1,000 opinion leaders for testing. They are then able to give Gmail a limited number of people on Call basis. This is a Gmail kind of exclusivity that is much desired item.
, however, just as everything seemed to be going well, Gmail ran into trouble. Google's plan for the ads in Gmail are similar to those in Google.Oglasi to context-specific, based on the content of e-mail. This announcement led to a color and a cry among privacy groups. Law suits have been threatened, and there were calls for the closure Gmail.Problem was to scan e-mail. It was thought that by reading every e-mail, Google was violating the privacy of individuals. It is also feared that safety issues could arise because of the huge space for storage and later a long period of retention e-mail.
clean Google reputation by then he beats the first put.Vrijeme could not be worse, as Google is soon to go public. Brin and Page, who had expected a positive impression of what they believed was a superior product, were stunned. They hoped that the protests were just a passing cloud, and that things will calm down soon. They explained that scan e-mail address is automatic and will not be informed about the content. They explained that each e-mail service provider e-mail scans e-mails to show themselves, as well as for virus detection.
As time passed and more and more users started using Gmail, they began to find the experience very zadovoljavajući.Loš publicity began to die down slowly, and eventually became a big hit Gmail.
When it came time for Google to go public, Brin and Page wanted to play his way opet.Tipično IPO in the U.S. is done with the help of large investment banks. These banks are not publicized by using what is called a road show, help stock prices, a guaranteed minimum amount for a company. However, there was a conflict in the objectives of the investment bank and the issuing company. While the investment bank would like to be undervalued stocks, so that it rises in value and investors dobiti.Tvrtka favorite, on the other hand, wanted to be a price as high as possible, in order to raise the maximum possible amount.
Google did not want investment banks call the shots. They were willing to pay only half the cost of investment banks are usually required, and they wanted to dictate terms in the IPO. IPO would like to be egalitarian - anyone could investirati.Najmanji number of shares only 5 Prices will be based at the auction, just like Google ads. They felt that the time shows wrongly transfer data only to select few. To make things fair, they released all the relevant information on the Internet for all to see.
Also, to maintain control, they issued two types of shares - Class and Class B. Class shares for ordinary investors, carrying one vote each. Class B shares are for themselves, carrying ten votes each, and gives them absolute control.
as the date of issue of shares closer, skepticism began to emerge about Google dionica.Cijena Bend - $ 110 - $ 135, about 150 times higher than the earnings per share, it is considered too high. It was the fear that after the stock issue, Google employees will their stock options and leave the company. To make matters worse, Playboy magazine published a very informal and casual conversation about Brin and Page. This interview was taken much earlier, but it is timed to cash in on all the publicity surrounding Google. Besides being a violation of SEC rules, it also sowed the seeds of doubt in the prospective investor opinion about the seriousness of the guys at the top of the Google hierarchy.
Google venture capitalists, which is a lot at stake, had to step in. It was decided that the Playboy article will be annexed to the Google registration documents, avoid injury quiet period. Also, venture capitalists decided to retain all shares of Google were planning to sell - a signal that the expected stock price to increase. Finally, Google's IPO is completed and the stock went to $ 85 per share. Currently trades at $ 530 per share.
Google keeps going from strength to strength. He won the AOL-European business almost under your nose Yahoo, AOL has purchased millions of dollars of guarantees, after almost a Yahoo deal is consummated with AOL u.Sporazum is by Sergey Brin. Sergey Brin responsibilities are mainly involved making an offer, cost cutting and handling issues related to culture and motivation. Larry Page, on the other hand, was involved in more hands-on work. He also supervised the employment of workers, and identify innovative projects that showed the most potential. Eric Schmidt, CEO, for his part, took care of business. He is to ensure that projects were on schedule, and that deadlines are met. He also takes care of finance, accounting and other systems.
innovations kept coming. Google Suggest guessed what you wanted to search. Google Desktop is a comprehensive solution for searching your computer. Google Video Search and Google satellite map come up. Google Scholar was introduced to the pursuit of scientific članaka.Popis just kept getting longer.
In the meantime, all of this, Google began the ambitious project to digitize all the books in major libraries and make them available to Google users. Beginning with the University of Michigan, a few libraries are selected. The books were scanned using technology that is gentle on books and do not affect them. After scanning, this book will be available in a format that will not allow copying. For books still in copyright, users will only see snippets of pages.
to get the support of publishers, Google has come up with a compelling value proposition. It will cover the cost of scanning and indexing books in exchange for the right to be able to display them in search results. Then he would present them in a form that will not allow copying. It will also provide direct links to bookstores, from which books could be bought. So, Google has been in effect, giving the user a taste of the book content and lures him to buy it. It was eventually won the support izdavača.Projekt called Google Books.
In the future, we might see Google uses its massive computing power to research in the field of genetics. Already, Google has removed the map of the human genome, and is exploring opportunities to biologists. Millions of genes, in combination with loads of biological and scientific data are a combination that only the Google power, processing capacity and storage space can be made.
The book is extremely well written. From the very beginning and the end, the author ensures that the reader is kept interested and enthralled. And he does it so you do not use dramatizations. Until just a logical sequencing of events, occasionally shifting his focus on supporting characters, and just as eloquently describes the Google phenomenon evolved, the author gives the reader every reason to continue reading knjige.Likovi Larry Page and Sergey Brin are sketched lijepo.Knjiga is written like a novel, so that the reader never dosadi.Autor should also be given credit for its neutrality. Although generous in his praise for the general, Google and its founders in particular, it is also critical of these occasions, as an unprecedented interview with Playboy.
, on the other hand, the author sometimes goes to the level of detail that tests the patience of readers, such as a detailed description of the Burning Man festival. Also, certain characters such as Charlie Ayers, the chef, are given undue importance. While it is understandable that a chef in residence Google has created a whole new food culture and helped to motivate employees, devotes an entire chapter to it and including one of his recipes in it are neither necessary nor justified.
All in all, the Google story takes you on a journey - a journey in time the biggest internet success stories to date. It is a journey that will be absorbed, and this is one you enjoy.
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