Planet Google: One Company's Audacious Plan to Organize Everything We Know
Sep 2008 · Simon and Schuster
4.2star
27 reviewsreport
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288
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About this ebook
Based on unprecedented access he received to the highly secretive "Googleplex," acclaimed New York Times columnist Randall Stross takes readers deep inside Google, the most important, most innovative, and most ambitious company of the Internet Age. His revelations demystify the strategy behind the company's recent flurry of bold moves, all driven by the pursuit of a business plan unlike any other: to become the indispensable gatekeeper of all the world's information, the one-stop destination for all our information needs. Will Google succeed? And what are the implications of a single company commanding so much information and knowing so much about us?
As ambitious as Google's goal is, with 68 percent of all Web searches (and growing), profits that are the envy of the business world, and a surplus of talent, the company is, Stross shows, well along the way to fulfilling its ambition, becoming as dominant a force on the Web as Microsoft became on the PC. Google isn't just a superior search service anymore. In recent years it has launched a dizzying array of new services and advanced into whole new businesses, from the introductions of its controversial Book Search and the irresistible Google Earth, to bidding for a slice of the wireless-phone spectrum and nonchalantly purchasing YouTube for $1.65 billion.
Google has also taken direct aim at Microsoft's core business, offering free e-mail and software from word processing to spreadsheets and calendars, pushing a transformative -- and highly disruptive -- concept known as "cloud computing." According to this plan, users will increasingly store all of their data on Google's massive servers -- a network of a million computers that amounts to the world's largest supercomputer, with unlimited capacity to house all the information Google seeks.
The more offerings Google adds, and the more ubiquitous a presence it becomes, the more dependent its users become on its services and the more information they contribute to its uniquely comprehensive collection of data. Will Google stay true to its famous "Don't Be Evil" mantra, using its power in its customers' best interests?
Stross's access to those who have spearheaded so many of Google's new initiatives, his penetrating research into the company's strategy, and his gift for lively storytelling produce an entertaining, deeply informed, and provocative examination of the company's audacious vision for the future and the consequences not only for the business world, but for our culture at large.
As ambitious as Google's goal is, with 68 percent of all Web searches (and growing), profits that are the envy of the business world, and a surplus of talent, the company is, Stross shows, well along the way to fulfilling its ambition, becoming as dominant a force on the Web as Microsoft became on the PC. Google isn't just a superior search service anymore. In recent years it has launched a dizzying array of new services and advanced into whole new businesses, from the introductions of its controversial Book Search and the irresistible Google Earth, to bidding for a slice of the wireless-phone spectrum and nonchalantly purchasing YouTube for $1.65 billion.
Google has also taken direct aim at Microsoft's core business, offering free e-mail and software from word processing to spreadsheets and calendars, pushing a transformative -- and highly disruptive -- concept known as "cloud computing." According to this plan, users will increasingly store all of their data on Google's massive servers -- a network of a million computers that amounts to the world's largest supercomputer, with unlimited capacity to house all the information Google seeks.
The more offerings Google adds, and the more ubiquitous a presence it becomes, the more dependent its users become on its services and the more information they contribute to its uniquely comprehensive collection of data. Will Google stay true to its famous "Don't Be Evil" mantra, using its power in its customers' best interests?
Stross's access to those who have spearheaded so many of Google's new initiatives, his penetrating research into the company's strategy, and his gift for lively storytelling produce an entertaining, deeply informed, and provocative examination of the company's audacious vision for the future and the consequences not only for the business world, but for our culture at large.
Ratings and reviews
4.2
27 reviews
A Google user
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February 20, 2010
Stross' review of Google provides excellent insight into the corporate culture of the search giant. Google is unlike any company today. It's vision to organize the worlds information is a task that seems impossible, yet if anyone can do it, it will be Google.
Stross presents a balanced analysis of Google's strengths (creativity, innovation, the ability to solve any problems, capital), and weaknesses (forgetting the concerns of end-users, strategic errors in web video, news and social networking).
Please be aware, however, that Stross' writing style is a little ADHD. He jumps around from topic to topic and his chapters are very loosely arranged around a theme. As long as you can keep multiple story lines and details mentally organized, you will enjoy this book.
A Google user
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July 6, 2009
An amazing book which is not only well organized and systematic, it also leads the reader from one theme to another much like a master storyteller would in a novel.
An excellent read which helped me understand the intricacies like the walled garden, walled universe as well as Google Book Search and Google Earth!
I highly recommend everyone to read this quickly for a good understanding of the search engine that affects our life online in a significant way.
A Google user
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April 13, 2009
Worth the read. Even before the paint dries on this book, the very day I go to explore book search is the day Google announces it has settled its lawsuits with the publishers [13 Apr 2009] and while the book states on page 107 that "it had indexed about 1 million volumes" today, it has indexed 7 million. Wow - Google is really moving out fast.
About the author
Randall Stross writes the New York Times column Digital Domain and is professor of business at San Jose State University. He is the author of several critically acclaimed books, including The Wizard of Menlo Park, eBoys, and The Microsoft Way. He lives in Burlingame, California.
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