The Search : John Battelle

Hi,

This week, Google celebrates its 9th birthday.
Rise of every company spawns a number of books written about it. First it was IBM, then Microsoft and Apple... and now it's time of Google. Earlier, I had written about The Google Story. Last week, I read another book related to same subject.

The SearchBy: John BattelleNicholas Brealley Publishing

This book is not just about Google, but about the search economy at large. Nevertheless, Google features in each and every chapter and most of the discussion revolves around the rise of company so far and its future prospects. Battelle begins with a background of search before Google. Next, he describes the lives of Google founders: Larry Page & Sergey Brin and their days at Stanford and the first days of the company. This is followed by rise of Google rise and its historic IPO. The book concludes with a discussion about the search in future, and the impact it would have on our day-to-day lives.

The book is certainly worth a read because unlike other books, it dares to ask some uncomfortable questions about the most-loved company of our age. It is ironical that Google hoards information about the world is very reticent when it comes to sharing details about itself. Also, the way Google compromised its search results to exclude the links that offended Chinese govt has not gone down well with many of industry experts.

[Book] The Google Story

Well, in the week beofre last I did a cumulative travel of 2500 kms, in 60 hours. The journey would have been lonesome, if not for a couple of books. Here are my comments abt one of them.

The Google Story
By David A ViseMacMillan Publication

Google is something that each one of us uses extensively. But how many of us have ever paused a bit to wonder about the search engine itself? if you have, then this book is for you.

It begins with some concise background info abt the Google founders, Larry Page & Sergey Brin; their camradierie at Stanford, the founding of Google in a garage and its rise to a $80-billion behemoth. The book ends at August 2005.

It makes for a fairly interesting read.... I say "fairly"interesting, and not "highly" interesting, because I am not quite happy with the writing style of author. It is something like those history textbooks that we survived in our school-days.. there are no dialogues and very few exciting moments. In short, the book lacks the passion, the intensity which is associated with anything that is Google.

Still, I would recommend the book as it does provide some little-known facts about this highly reclusive company.