Reviews from Amazon

The Google story

No one with an internet connection can have missed the spectacular rise of the Google search engine in the last few years. This book tells the story of this rise - how the founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin came to top the list of young billionaires without it seems having a particular interest in making money. Thus we hear about how Google has challenged the established way of doing things in business, and the legal problems which they have faced as a result. The book is well written -no technical knowledge required - and is recommended for anyone who want to catch up with what has been happening in the computing world.

One thing that I hadn't realised was that Google make their own computers. It is recognised that the best way to get the most computing power for the least amount of money is to connect together a large number of cheaply built PC's. However this has its own problems and most organisations would go for fewer, larger computers. Google, whose business depends crucially on computing power, has faced and dealt with these problems. Maybe the idea of Google marketing 'Google PC's' isn't that unlikely. I would have prefered if this book had looked more at such ideas - what Google is likely to do in the future. It doesn't deal with the day to day running of the company (which wouldn't have been so interesting), but that means that 'Google watchers' will already know much of what it has to tell. I would have liked a bit more speculation.

Amazon.com info

Hardcover 250 pages
ISBN: 1405053712
Salesrank: 4147924
Weight:1.01 lbs

Published: 2005 MacMillan

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Amazon.co.uk info

Hardcover 250 pages
ISBN: 1405053712
Salesrank: 175634
Weight:1.01 lbs

Published: 2005 Macmillan

Amazon price £12.74

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Amazon.ca info

Hardcover 250 pages
ISBN: 1405053712
Salesrank:
Weight:1.01 lbs

Published: 2005 Macmillan

Marketplace:New from CDN$ 34.92:Used from CDN$ 2.93

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An entertaining read, but seems like Google PR ***
The Google Story covers major milestones of the company up through its recent push into China, all along the way documenting the eccentric and often unorthodox business approach of its founders: Sergey Brin and Larry Page. The tone is overwhelmingly pro-Google, the only exception being a chapter on click fraud(that mysteriously disappeared in new versions...) that questions Google's practice of charging/reimbursing advertisers. A few good lessons can be learned about entrepreneurship and venture capital, but--albeit an entertaining read, The Google Story feels more like a veiled public relations effort than a subjective and independently researched work.

An entertaining read, but seems like Google PR ***

The Google Story covers major milestones of the company up through its recent push into China, all along the way documenting the eccentric and often unorthodox business approach of its founders: Sergey Brin and Larry Page. The tone is overwhelmingly pro-Google, the only exception being a chapter on click fraud(that mysteriously disappeared in new versions...) that questions Google's practice of charging/reimbursing advertisers. A few good lessons can be learned about entrepreneurship and venture capital, but--albeit an entertaining read, The Google Story feels more like a veiled public relations effort than a subjective and independently researched work.

know effort behind success *****
I would recommend this book to young teens who are looking forward to having own business.

know effort behind success *****

I would recommend this book to young teens who are looking forward to having own business.

OK for what it is ... ***
"The Google Story" is a decent book if you are looking for a history of the historic company from an outside perspective. Many comments say that the author writes with a bit of favoritism, and I don't disagree one bit. However, the book does not intend to be anything else. The back cover proclaims "extraordinary access to Google", and it doesn't seem that way. The book offers a good history of the company and its challenges but does not go into much depth about any of them. When they won back business in London, how exactly did they do it? It seems that the light criticism of Google is written from the company's perspective. With that said, if you wish to become aware of how Google obtained their success, it's a good and informative light read.

OK for what it is ... ***

"The Google Story" is a decent book if you are looking for a history of the historic company from an outside perspective. Many comments say that the author writes with a bit of favoritism, and I don't disagree one bit. However, the book does not intend to be anything else.

The back cover proclaims "extraordinary access to Google", and it doesn't seem that way. The book offers a good history of the company and its challenges but does not go into much depth about any of them. When they won back business in London, how exactly did they do it? It seems that the light criticism of Google is written from the company's perspective.

With that said, if you wish to become aware of how Google obtained their success, it's a good and informative light read.

A book that is not worth a company ***
Google is one of the biggest brands in the world. Everyone of us uses it as least few times a day. Of course, a book should have been written about it. Still, the more books of american authors I read the more I see their incredible skill to worship business leaders as half-gods. This book is one of the cases - yes, these two Google guys are extremely smart and worth admiration, but not everything they do is close to divine. This style of writing eventually starts to irritate. If you do decide to read this book, skip first 100 pages, they are literally about nothing and then read every-second page - you will not miss anything because all the stories are a bit too much exagerated. Also, try not to pay attention that authors themselves constantly vary from novel-style-of-writing to pure statistics and numbers. So, to sum it up, it's worth reading only in a way I advised, otherwise it will be too much of a time waste. Google is worth admiration but this book - definetly not.

A book that is not worth a company ***

Google is one of the biggest brands in the world. Everyone of us uses it as least few times a day. Of course, a book should have been written about it.
Still, the more books of american authors I read the more I see their incredible skill to worship business leaders as half-gods.
This book is one of the cases - yes, these two Google guys are extremely smart and worth admiration, but not everything they do is close to divine. This style of writing eventually starts to irritate.
If you do decide to read this book, skip first 100 pages, they are literally about nothing and then read every-second page - you will not miss anything because all the stories are a bit too much exagerated. Also, try not to pay attention that authors themselves constantly vary from novel-style-of-writing to pure statistics and numbers.
So, to sum it up, it's worth reading only in a way I advised, otherwise it will be too much of a time waste. Google is worth admiration but this book - definetly not.

An average book about a great business story ***
Quite detailed story and insight on the google way and its unique approach to business and internet. That makes the 3/5 note, but the writer style is quite heavy, the book could have been much more compact, maybe because it targets a wide audience and not only geeks. The author is also quite "Google-biased", not much criticism inside the book, but reading it through, you feel like some critical view is missing, maybe because it has been reviewed by Google... But despite this, i recommend the book for anybody willing to know a bit more about Google and getting some insider stories.

An average book about a great business story ***

Quite detailed story and insight on the google way and its unique approach to business and internet. That makes the 3/5 note, but the writer style is quite heavy, the book could have been much more compact, maybe because it targets a wide audience and not only geeks.
The author is also quite "Google-biased", not much criticism inside the book, but reading it through, you feel like some critical view is missing, maybe because it has been reviewed by Google... But despite this, i recommend the book for anybody willing to know a bit more about Google and getting some insider stories.

Gud but not great! ****
Recently I pruchased this book expecting most of the secrets if not all to be disclosed on how did google achieve such great heights over a decade! And it didnt let me down as this book highlights how a bunch of determined grads did something which changed the world around us and mind you nothing was planned they just grabbed each and every opportunity to achieve an edge over competitors. It explains their childhood which had a vital role to play in their attitude towards the project which became a multi billion dollor company. The only reason I am giving 4* is they are just trying to potray being 100% good...no doubt thy are better off from other companies but their strategy itself is making money and also it becomes a bit boring at the end Overall good read especially for those curious about googlonomics, how they make money and why are they more succesful than other companies.

Gud but not great! ****

Recently I pruchased this book expecting most of the secrets if not all to be disclosed on how did google achieve such great heights over a decade! And it didnt let me down as this book highlights how a bunch of determined grads did something which changed the world around us and mind you nothing was planned they just grabbed each and every opportunity to achieve an edge over competitors. It explains their childhood which had a vital role to play in their attitude towards the project which became a multi billion dollor company. The only reason I am giving 4* is they are just trying to potray being 100% good...no doubt thy are better off from other companies but their strategy itself is making money and also it becomes a bit boring at the end

Overall good read especially for those curious about googlonomics, how they make money and why are they more succesful than other companies.

Covers the Business well, if not the Technical ****
I enjoyed this book and it gives a good account of the founding members, how they started the company, what it came from and all the major incidents the company has undergone since then, up to 2006 for my addition - no Crome or the PC operating system. The writing was easy to follow and set in a logical sequence. Covers their interests, getting initial money for the company, how they started to generate money from the search engine, floating, legal problems and Microsoft. Their products are covered, the search engine, gmail, Google print (books) and much more including were it might go with biological/genetic research in the form of data mining. What it doesn't do is give much away about the technical side of the company. Surprisingly the search works on a grid of custom built, or rather stripped down, PC's linked together the "google way". They run the Lunix operating system, customized of course, and that's about it from a technical perspective, bar numbers and distribution of computer rooms. Nothing about the techniques used or even if a programming language is used, so that was a bit disappointing for me. I would have thought they could find out a bit more, perhaps he couldn't print more. One chapter explains the concerns some people expressed on how Google searches could be linked to gmail accounts. A fair bit of details was discussed on how Google reacted to this, who they talked too, but didn't really say what, if anything, was done. The overall point of view is pretty positive on Google, problems are covered but not judged. A great read with excellent coverage of how such a large company became so big so quickly. It missed out on five stars for the lack of technical content.

Covers the Business well, if not the Technical ****

I enjoyed this book and it gives a good account of the founding members, how they started the company, what it came from and all the major incidents the company has undergone since then, up to 2006 for my addition - no Crome or the PC operating system. The writing was easy to follow and set in a logical sequence.

Covers their interests, getting initial money for the company, how they started to generate money from the search engine, floating, legal problems and Microsoft. Their products are covered, the search engine, gmail, Google print (books) and much more including were it might go with biological/genetic research in the form of data mining.

What it doesn't do is give much away about the technical side of the company. Surprisingly the search works on a grid of custom built, or rather stripped down, PC's linked together the "google way". They run the Lunix operating system, customized of course, and that's about it from a technical perspective, bar numbers and distribution of computer rooms. Nothing about the techniques used or even if a programming language is used, so that was a bit disappointing for me. I would have thought they could find out a bit more, perhaps he couldn't print more.

One chapter explains the concerns some people expressed on how Google searches could be linked to gmail accounts. A fair bit of details was discussed on how Google reacted to this, who they talked too, but didn't really say what, if anything, was done.

The overall point of view is pretty positive on Google, problems are covered but not judged.

A great read with excellent coverage of how such a large company became so big so quickly. It missed out on five stars for the lack of technical content.

Good description of Google's rise ****
I picked this up when it was going cheap in Zavvi's sale. It's a good account of the rise of Google: how they recognized search as the most crucial component of the web and made their money by adding targeted advertising to their search results. I was somewhat disappointed at the paucity of technical detail beyond some journalistic hand-waving about a "seamless blend of hardware and software at ... a massive scale", and the fact that Google's servers are assembled from commodity PCs. This, it's somewhat breathlessly announced on page 2, is "perhaps Google's best-kept secret", which sounds rather self-contradictory. However, given the general audience that the book is written for (and the many details of their architecture that really are secret - even down to the number of servers they employ), perhaps this isn't too surprising - though I'm pretty sure that even a general reader wouldn't need to be told (p35) who Midas was. There's also some degree of repetition across the chapters, which makes them read more like self-contained magazine articles instead of pieces of a coherent whole. But in general, I found this an entertaining read, and an interesting story about how Google has changed the world over the past couple of decades. On a personal note, I was also surprised to discover from this book that one of my (vanishingly tenuously linked) associates from the field of computer graphics in the early 90's had shared an office with Google's founders at Stanford. It's a small, joined-up world.

Good description of Google's rise ****

I picked this up when it was going cheap in Zavvi's sale. It's a good account of the rise of Google: how they recognized search as the most crucial component of the web and made their money by adding targeted advertising to their search results. I was somewhat disappointed at the paucity of technical detail beyond some journalistic hand-waving about a "seamless blend of hardware and software at ... a massive scale", and the fact that Google's servers are assembled from commodity PCs. This, it's somewhat breathlessly announced on page 2, is "perhaps Google's best-kept secret", which sounds rather self-contradictory. However, given the general audience that the book is written for (and the many details of their architecture that really *are* secret - even down to the number of servers they employ), perhaps this isn't too surprising - though I'm pretty sure that even a general reader wouldn't need to be told (p35) who Midas was.

There's also some degree of repetition across the chapters, which makes them read more like self-contained magazine articles instead of pieces of a coherent whole. But in general, I found this an entertaining read, and an interesting story about how Google has changed the world over the past couple of decades. On a personal note, I was also surprised to discover from this book that one of my (vanishingly tenuously linked) associates from the field of computer graphics in the early 90's had shared an office with Google's founders at Stanford. It's a small, joined-up world.

"We gotta zig cos they think we're gonna zag" ****
This book is written as a testament to Google and all they've achieved in the last decade. As someone of a slightly cynical nature I found myself viewing a lot of this book with a fair amount of scepticism. Are Google really this good? Did they really have such a clear vision from the start? Do they never do evil? However, in the end I found this book incredibly enlightening and inspiring. The Google vision is a strong one that stands against conventional thinking and drives the company to produce a quality product and a creative culture. This shines through in both the book and also the products they create. I came to realise not just that I use many of their products on a daily basis but also understand why I find them so appealing and useful. The book is well written, very comprehensive and very informative on the different aspects and characters of Google. I have learned many things while reading this book and it has challenged me in a number of ways to improve what I do. It has also left me galvanised in my belief that free thinkers can achieve massive success when they don't give in to the pressure to conform.

"We gotta zig cos they think we're gonna zag" ****

This book is written as a testament to Google and all they've achieved in the last decade. As someone of a slightly cynical nature I found myself viewing a lot of this book with a fair amount of scepticism. Are Google really this good? Did they really have such a clear vision from the start? Do they never do evil? However, in the end I found this book incredibly enlightening and inspiring.

The Google vision is a strong one that stands against conventional thinking and drives the company to produce a quality product and a creative culture. This shines through in both the book and also the products they create. I came to realise not just that I use many of their products on a daily basis but also understand why I find them so appealing and useful.

The book is well written, very comprehensive and very informative on the different aspects and characters of Google. I have learned many things while reading this book and it has challenged me in a number of ways to improve what I do. It has also left me galvanised in my belief that free thinkers can achieve massive success when they don't give in to the pressure to conform.

An inspiring read *****
This is an inspiring read about two young Stanford Institute of Technology students who took on the world - and won. Through a stunning power of belief, they decided one day to download the whole Internet and to use thousands of computers to store the data and so build the quickest and most reliable search engine of its time. Sounds simple, doesn't it? One of the chapters is called "A Healthy Disregard for the Impossible" and that just about sums up the attitude and philosophy of the google founders. This book (both descriptive and analytical) should be read by those at corporate level and also those who are thinking of lighting the creative entrepreneurial spark that awaits inside them. In fact, I would go as far as to say that this is actually bordering on being a self-help book, such is its power to motivate.

An inspiring read *****

This is an inspiring read about two young Stanford Institute of Technology students who took on the world - and won. Through a stunning power of belief, they decided one day to download the whole Internet and to use thousands of computers to store the data and so build the quickest and most reliable search engine of its time. Sounds simple, doesn't it?

One of the chapters is called "A Healthy Disregard for the Impossible" and that just about sums up the attitude and philosophy of the google founders.

This book (both descriptive and analytical) should be read by those at corporate level and also those who are thinking of lighting the creative entrepreneurial spark that awaits inside them.

In fact, I would go as far as to say that this is actually bordering on being a self-help book, such is its power to motivate.

David Vise

The Google story