Customer Reviews

The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture

5 star:		(70)
4 star:		(29)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The book is excellent, although if you are a true techno-geek it will be pedestrian from a technical sense. However, for the novice it is a great overview on the history of search engines and the power they are just starting to demonstrate. I found the history of all the various engineers and technology overlaid against the backdrop of luck, economics and timing, to be a fascinating glimpse into the reality that the best technology is not usually what makes the most money.

At the core of the book though is the concept of what a search engine can do. Obviously there are as many possibilities to develop and implement search algorithms as there are creative people to invent them (Microsoft MSN, Yahoo and others have products that compete directly with, and in many cases outperform the more well known brand the book focuses on), but essentially they have the power to pull together unbelievable amounts of formerly disconnected data, and create a targeted marketing aimed at you personally.

The potential danger of all of this technology is that depending on how you set the algorithm, you no longer simply search reality, but actually create it. For example, a change in how the search engine works can drive business to some on line retailers while destroying the business of others. It can conceivably literally create trends, and promote views, all through the seemingly blind eye of the program. The problem is that these programs are anything but blind, and we are on the verge of tremendous legal battles due to the creativity of those trying to use the system to deflect traffic from the owner of a trademark, to their own competing brand, with full compliance by the folks at Google.

Overall, this book is an excellent way for the novice to understand this phenomenon a little better, and be more aware of how our world is changing. Sure, there are valid literary criticisms of the book, and the author is biased towards (seems enamored with) Google, but it is a very interesting book that is informative, and certainly not dull. Recommended.

Though I'm coming to a review of The Search a year too late, I can explain why. I bought the book on its release, very excited to read some good journalism about the hottest business topic of the day. I was sure that Battelle, who had been chronically his progress on the book on his own blog, would deliver. Halfway through the book (in a matter of three days - a possible sign pointing to its lack of depth) I'm realizing that this is not the case.

Thus far, I have two major gripes with the book. The first is the writing itself. The book is written in informal magazine style, in keeping with his roots as a "cutting edge" technology writer (having worked for Wired and Business 2.0, magazines that try desperately to be "too cool for the room").

This would be fine enough, except that Battelle has a habit of jumping around from year to year, talking about decisions made by players in Google's history before he actually introduces them. He never fully explains why it was important for Sergey Brin and Larry Page - Google's founders - to resign their chairman and CEO posts, nor does he tell the reader what their new titles are. Battelle also has a habit of reintroducing people several times, a practice which at times seems a cheap way to up his page count. His writing style thoroughly muddles however much thoughtfulness there was to his project. I considered keeping a tally of how many times he used "well" as an interjection, but lost interested after I ran out of fingers.

On page 150 he discusses a lack of managerial prowess on the part of Brin, Page and new CEO Eric Schmidt. According to Battelle, one of Google's investors, John Doerr, insisted that Intuit founder Bill Campbell come on as a leadership coach. Battelle uses an anecdote from journalist John Heilemann's GQ article on Google, which quotes Doerr as saying, "I don't know where the company would be without him." However, Battelle doesn't include any of his own reporting on what Campbell actually did. Neglecting to explain right away what this `miraculous' shift was is, in my own journalistic view, irresponsible. Not to mention that he doesn't include the actual title of Heilemann's article in either the main book or the citations.

Later in the book on page 172, he tries to play the role of not only a technology writer, and search historian, but also media theorist and critic, waxing about how Google ought to be considered a media company - not just a technology company.

In the book's final chapter, Battelle introduces the idea of having several different kinds of information contribute to "perfect search," including every tech writer and journalist's favorite idea, the blog. He bulldozes through a description of the blog and later posits that we have reached the critical mass point, "but we don't know it yet." I suspect that Battelle means that he's savvier than users and other writers and he knows something we don't, but he doesn't explain why he thinks we've reached the tipping point, nor what that means in the overall discussion of what the blog can do.

Though Battelle tries to play his book as a "history of search," it is nowhere near as comprehensive as such a book must be. It is a book that sings the praises of Google, nothing more. However, that the book is a history of Google is fine. The company certainly is interesting and large enough to warrant an historical account and Battelle ought to be forthcoming with his intent. The short discussions he does include of the company's search engine precursors such as Lycos and Alta-Vista need considerable expansion and deserve to be considered as more than also-rans, if he really wants to be considered the historian of search and not just Google's unofficial corporate historian.

John Battelle knows search. His blog on the topic has become a standard of sorts in an industry that evolves by the minute (almost) and his book on the topic is as comprehensive as it is insightful. He does an excelled job at looking back at the evolution of the search field from its early days, going into greater detail about Google, and delving some into Yahoo!, Altavista and A9. Yet, he cleverly manages to keep the book fresh by not just sticking his head in the past, but posing interesting philosophical questions throughout the book.

After doing a fairly comprehensive assessment of the evolution and current state of the industry as of the publishing of the book, almost the entire last two chapters of "The Search" are devoted to the exploration of the possible avenues Google specifically and the search domain at large will likely be taking. This part of the book is bound to be fascinating to SEO/Internet Marketing professionals as well as to the average web user.

If you want to learn more about Google, I suggest you pick up "The Google Story", published shortly after this book. The truth is it will only save you from reading just a couple of chapters on the mega-successful search company in this book. Otherwise, there is not that much overlap between the two books. If you haven't read either one, I'd say start here, and if you feel like it, move on to "The Google Story". That for sure will wet your appetite for knowledge on the Search Engine topic.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. It was well written and provided enough information to keep me glued to it. However, I was really hoping to find out more about Google than what would be possible from Google's own PR machine. The early search engine history and the development of that technology is probably the more fascinating part of the book. Which is ironic, since the book is supposed to be primarily about Google. My guess is that the author sacrificed the ability to write about more intriguing and behind the scenes happenings at Google for the almost unlimited access to the founders and the top managers.

Overall, this is a pretty good book, but a hard-nosed investigative reporter would probably have come up with more intriguing content.

This book gives a great overview of the past, present and future of search. Given the dominance of Google in the web and in culture, it is tempting to forget the companies that preceeded Google, and did a damn fine job in their own right. This book describes long forgotten search engines like AltaVista, Excite, Overture, and how their missteps allowed Google to overtake them as the dominant search engine. Read about how Yahoo changed their focus to being a media company, and by doing so, forever altered the landscape of the internet. Apart from the history of search, the bulk of the book focuses on Google, and gives a particularly interesting insight into the culture and inner workings in of the company. I spoke to a director at Google right before I read the book, and the book complemented what he told me really well.

Last but not least, the last chapter, 'The Perfect Search' was just fascinating. It relates so well, because it is essentially summarizes all the frustrations I ever had when searching, and describes how the perfect search is already becoming a reality in many ways, slowly but surely.

All in all, a great read that changes the way you look at search.

Less than five years ago, two PhD. candidates, Sergey Brin and Larry Page launched their own search engine. Naming it Google, after the name of the largest known number, it has literally changed the face of internet searching as we know it. Gone are the days of multiple hits for basic search inquiries. With Google's page-ranking system, the searcher gets to see the most relevant searches listed first.

This book does a remarkable job of telling Brin's and Page's story. From humble Silicon Valley students to the owners of the most prosperous company in the world, Brin and Page have changed the playing field for the entire internet. While many companies died out during the dot com days, Google survived and flourished. One of the oddities of Google's success is that they have achieved all of thier miraculous growth without a real working marketing plan. They have let the sheer influence and size of Google do the talking, and it has worked extremely well.

Today, Google has become a household name. People constantly say "I've Googled this", or "I've Googled that". And they're right. With Google's method of search, it makes it very easy for the user to type almost anything into the search box and get back a near-perfect response. But we haven't made it to the "perfect search"; the idea of retrieving exact results for a specific search. With the way Google is going, it wouldn't be surprising if they solved this enigma.

I read this book for a Master's degree course in library science, and I was fascinated by it. Brin and Page got to live everyone's ultimate dream; find something that will make you insanely rich. I use Google almost extensively in my own research, and I've been extremely pleased with the results. I was fascinated with the story of Google's unheard of rise from a small company being housed in a college dorm room to a giant that employs thousands of people. I highly recommend this book. Google is a one-of-a-kind company, and their story is truly remarkable. Read this great book and discover how the brainchild of two students turned into one of the world's most profitable companies.

This is an extremely insightful book on the concept of search in the information age. The internet is ubiquitous with loads of information and billions of users. The problem is to match our information needs and the source in this vast ever expanding ocean. The book is about bridging the gap and also making money in the process.

The book starts with an explanation of our intentions to find something and how we find it. The methodology of search based on ideas like crawling , indexing and retrieval linked to key words initially looks simple. However the need for the huge amount computational power and storage to run search engines is mind-boggling. On the other hand to make search really contextual and interactive with inclusion of text, audio and video wherever necessary is not a simple task. The search for such technologies seems to have just begun. At best we have reached 5% of what we need to achieve says the author.

Some aspects that I found really interesting in this book are :

- Excellent non technical approach to explain the working of search engines
- Outline of the rise ( and fall) of several companies grappling with the technology of search
- Biography of Google and to some extent other search engines, Yahoo in particular
- The business model of Search - making Billions through millions of transactions, a few cents at a time.
- The strategic importance of Search in the next years and the need to assume leadership in this vital business/technology

Apart from technology and business the book is also a lively read with some interesting episodes and litigations.

Highly recommended.

The idea of making billions of dollars on a business based on searching online indexes is inconceivable, except when you consider how the Internet has changed the business world. This concept is so vague that it is difficult even to consider, let alone write about. Yet author John Battelle has done a thorough, entertaining job of identifying how this attempt to pin down cyberspace works, and how two graduate students turned their mathematical challenge into Google, the fastest growing company in history. While this is primarily a corporate biography, Battelle does not pander to the company's billionaire founders. They are portrayed as authoritarian geeks with few warm qualities. But they are also shown as visionary engineers who turned their killer application into a business that successfully defied Wall Street when their company went public. This is a great story, which is why we recommend it to technology fans searching for meaning and to business readers who want to understand the future of search technology. Or as Google says: search and you shall find.

I started searching the Internet when it most mostly for scientific data and governmental information. I paid by the minute and it wasn't uncommon to charge $300 to my credit card for one month of very slow connection speeds and websites that were only "Text!" Nothing was in color and so much of what we now take for granted, like flash animations and live interactions, was only in the dreams of developers.

John Battelle succeeded in captivating my entire attention from the time I started reading his book, until late that evening when I finally had to put it down and accept the fact that I finished reading it. "The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture", authored by Battelle, is clearly written by someone who could be considerd one of the forefathers and early architects of the Internet.

I hope that my review, based on my own personal opinion, will inspire you to read this wonderful book if it seems to meet your interests. With so many books about the Internet and the "Web" on bookshelves, taking the time to find the best of the best is worthwhile. I personally felt that Battelle wrote the most compelling and exciting book, of this genre, that I've ever read.

I consider myself to be an expert "Googler"-or perhaps I should say I am a "Googlex"? Whatever the case, "The Search..." will explore almost every imaginable aspect of Internet searching and way beyond. Google and its rivals are likely a part of most everyones lives. But we are about a million miles away from the peak potential of the Internet Search Engine Power (ISEP)that is potentially available. Battelle actually had me emotionally excited when I started to think of the endless possibilities of the future and how only a tiny portion of the potential of GOOGLE has been utilized. It reminds me of when a teacher told me that I would likely only use about 15% of the capacity of my brain. In a similar sense, my former teacher would say that GOOGLE is only at 1 or 2%-perhaps even less.

I really think that to tell you too much more about the book would take away from the joy and energy you will experience when reading this book. It's not one of those books that you'll read a part of a chapter and then go about your business until a later date. You won't want to stop reading and you'll likely learn a great deal more about GOOGLE, its Rivals, and "Searching" in general.

I hope that at least a portion of this review was helpful to you. It was a pleasure to write a review about a book that was intelligently written, but also to be considered an easy read. Thanks again and ENJOY READING-no matter what you choose to purchase today or at another time.

Peter Cannice
Scottsdale, Arizona

EMAIL HORSEPETE@AOL.COM

John Battelle did a really nice job here. I bought the book, so obviously I expected it to be reasonably good, but Battelle's analysis easily surpassed my expectations.

Without ever losing focus or getting off course, Battelle covers the technical and business history of search. One of the most interesting aspects of the book is the constant comparing and contrasting of the technical and business decisions of the various technology companies and how they led each of them to success, failure or a particular spot in the market.

A lot of this book is dedicated to the market leader in search, Google, its very interesting leaders and the quirks that make it unique. Battelle's analysis of the oft-controversial Google is even-handed and insightful, letting you make your own judgement of the company.

The rest of "The Search" speculates intelligently on the future of search both as a business and as a technology. Battelle gets a lot of good input on this front because of his access to prominent people in the search industry he's gotten working at Wired Magazine. He makes a lot of Amazon's own A9 search product and really lays out the different paths search firms are taking to target the future.

This book is really well done from start to finish. It'll make search interesting and instill a genuine interest in watching the search industry like a horse race. Highly recommended.