In the Plex : How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives by Steven Levy (2011, Hardcover)

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In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives

About this product

Product Identifiers

PublisherSimon & Schuster
ISBN-101416596585
ISBN-139781416596585
eBay Product ID (ePID)127332731

Product Key Features

Book TitleIn the Plex : How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives
Number of Pages432 Pages
LanguageEnglish
Publication Year2011
TopicIndustries / Computers & Information Technology, Web / Search Engines, E-Commerce / General (See Also Computers / Electronic Commerce), Business
GenreComputers, Biography & Autobiography, Business & Economics
AuthorSteven Levy
FormatHardcover

Dimensions

Item Height1.3 in
Item Weight22.4 Oz
Item Length9.2 in
Item Width6.1 in

Additional Product Features

Intended AudienceTrade
LCCN2010-049964
Dewey Edition22
eBook FormatContent Package
Reviews"Almost nothing can stop a remarkable idea executed well at the right time, as Steven Levy's brisk-but-detailed history of Google, In the Plex , convincingly proves. . . . makes obsolete previous books on the company." -Jack Shafer, The San Francisco Chronicle, "Levy is America's premier technology journalist. . . . He has produced the most interesting book ever written about Google. He makes the biggest intellectual challenges of computer science seem endlessly fun and fascinating. . . . We can expect many more books about Google. But few will deliver the lively, idea-based journalism of In the Plex ." -Siva Vaidhyanathan, The Washington Post, "The most comprehensive, intelligent and readable analysis of Google to date. Levy is particularly good on how those behind Google think and work. . . . What's more, his lucid introductions to Google's core technologies - the search engine and the company's data centres - are written in non-geek English and are rich with anecdotes and analysis. . . . In The Plex teems with original insight into Google's most controversial affairs." --Andrew Keen, New Scientist, "The most comprehensive, intelligent and readable analysis of Google to date.  Levy is particularly good on how those behind Google think and work. . . . What's more, his lucid introductions to Google's core technologies - the search engine and the company's data centres - are written in non-geek English and are rich with anecdotes and analysis. . . . In The Plex teems with original insight into Google's most controversial affairs." -Andrew Keen, New Scientist, "The wizards of Silicon Valley often hype their hardware/software breakthroughs as 'magical' for the products' ability to pull off dazzling stunts in the blink of an eye. And true to the magicians' code, these tech talents rarely let mere mortals peer behind the curtains. . . . That's what makes Levy's just-out tome so valuable." -Jonathan Takiff, The Philadelphia Daily News, "Dense, driven examination of the pioneering search engine that changed the face of the Internet. Thoroughly versed in technology reporting, Wired senior writer Levy deliberates at great length about online behemoth Google and creatively documents the company's genesis from a 'feisty start-up to a market-dominating giant.' The author capably describes Google's founders, Stanford grads Larry Page and Sergey Brin, as sharp, user-focused and steadfastly intent on 'organizing all the world's information.' Levy traces how Google's intricately developed, intrepid beginnings and gradual ascent over a competitive marketplace birthed an advertising-fueled 'money machine' (especially following its IPO in 2004), and he follows the expansion and operation of the company's liberal work campus ('Googleplex') and its distinctively selective hiring process (Page still signs off on every new hire). The author was afforded an opportunity to observe the company's operations, development, culture and advertising model from within the infrastructure for two years with full managerial cooperation. From there, he performed hundreds of interviews with past and current employees and discovered the type of 'creative disorganization' that can either make or break a business. Though clearly in awe of Google's crowning significance, Levy evenhandedly notes the company's more glaring deficiencies, like the 2004 cyber-attack that forced the removal of the search engine from mainland China, a decision vehemently unsupported by co-founder Brin. Though the author offers plenty of well-known information, it's his catbird-seat vantage point that really gets to the good stuff.   Outstanding reportage delivered in the upbeat, informative fashion for which Levy is well known." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review), "Levy is America's premier technology journalist. . . . He has produced the most interesting book ever written about Google. He makes the biggest intellectual challenges of computer science seem endlessly fun and fascinating. . . . We can expect many more books about Google. But few will deliver the lively, idea-based journalism of In the Plex ." --Siva Vaidhyanathan, The Washington Post, "An instructive primer on how the minds behind the world's most influential internet company function." -Richard Waters, The Wall Street Journal, "The rise of Google is an engrossing story, and nobody's ever related it in such depth." -Hiawatha Bray, The Boston Globe, "Dense, driven examination of the pioneering search engine that changed the face of the Internet. Thoroughly versed in technology reporting, Wired senior writer Levy deliberates at great length about online behemoth Google and creatively documents the company's genesis from a 'feisty start-up to a market-dominating giant.' The author capably describes Google's founders, Stanford grads Larry Page and Sergey Brin, as sharp, user-focused and steadfastly intent on 'organizing all the world's information.' Levy traces how Google's intricately developed, intrepid beginnings and gradual ascent over a competitive marketplace birthed an advertising-fueled 'money machine' (especially following its IPO in 2004), and he follows the expansion and operation of the company's liberal work campus ('Googleplex') and its distinctively selective hiring process (Page still signs off on every new hire). The author was afforded an opportunity to observe the company's operations, development, culture and advertising model from within the infrastructure for two years with full managerial cooperation. From there, he performed hundreds of interviews with past and current employees and discovered the type of 'creative disorganization' that can either make or break a business. Though clearly in awe of Google's crowning significance, Levy evenhandedly notes the company's more glaring deficiencies, like the 2004 cyber-attack that forced the removal of the search engine from mainland China, a decision vehemently unsupported by co-founder Brin. Though the author offers plenty of well-known information, it's his catbird-seat vantage point that really gets to the good stuff. Outstanding reportage delivered in the upbeat, informative fashion for which Levy is well known." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review), "The most comprehensive, intelligent and readable analysis of Google to date. Levy is particularly good on how those behind Google think and work. . . . What's more, his lucid introductions to Google's core technologies - the search engine and the company's data centres - are written in non-geek English and are rich with anecdotes and analysis. . . . In The Plex teems with original insight into Google's most controversial affairs." -Andrew Keen, New Scientist, "Almost nothing can stop a remarkable idea executed well at the right time, as Steven Levy's brisk-but-detailed history of Google, In the Plex , convincingly proves. . . . makes obsolete previous books on the company." --Jack Shafer, The San Francisco Chronicle, "Steven Levy's new account [of Google], In the Plex, is the most authoritative to date and in many ways the most entertaining." --James Gleick, The New York Review of Books, "Dense, driven examination of the pioneering search engine that changed the face of the Internet. Thoroughly versed in technology reporting, Wired senior writer Levy deliberates at great length about online behemoth Google and creatively documents the company's genesis from a 'feisty start-up to a market-dominating giant.' The author capably describes Google's founders, Stanford grads Larry Page and Sergey Brin, as sharp, user-focused and steadfastly intent on 'organizing all the world's information.' Levy traces how Google's intricately developed, intrepid beginnings and gradual ascent over a competitive marketplace birthed an advertising-fueled 'money machine' (especially following its IPO in 2004), and he follows the expansion and operation of the company's liberal work campus ('Googleplex') and its distinctively selective hiring process (Page still signs off on every new hire). The author was afforded an opportunity to observe the company's operations, development, culture and advertising model from within the infrastructure for two years with full managerial cooperation. From there, he performed hundreds of interviews with past and current employees and discovered the type of 'creative disorganization' that can either make or break a business. Though clearly in awe of Google's crowning significance, Levy evenhandedly notes the company's more glaring deficiencies, like the 2004 cyber-attack that forced the removal of the search engine from mainland China, a decision vehemently unsupported by co-founder Brin. Though the author offers plenty of well-known information, it's his catbird-seat vantage point that really gets to the good stuff. Outstanding reportage delivered in the upbeat, informative fashion for which Levy is well known." -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review), "Steven Levy's new account [of Google], In the Plex, is the most authoritative to date and in many ways the most entertaining." -James Gleick, The New York Review of Books, "[Steven Levy] spent much of the past three years playing anthropologist at one of the Internet's most interesting villages and set of inhabitants -- the Googleplex and the tribue of Googlers who inhabit it. . . . A deep dive into Google's culture, history and technology." --Mike Swift, San Jose Mercury News
Dewey Decimal338.7/6102504
SynopsisWritten with full cooperation from top management, including cofounders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, this is the inside story behind Google, the most successful and most admired technology company of our time, told by one of our best technology writers. Few companies in history have ever been as successful and as admired as Google, the company that has transformed the Internet and become an indispensable part of our lives. How has Google done it? Veteran technology reporter Steven Levy was granted unprecedented access to the company, and in this revelatory book he takes readers inside Google headquarters--the Googleplex--to show how Google works. While they were still students at Stanford, Google cofounders Larry Page and Sergey Brin revolutionized Internet search. They followed this brilliant innovation with another, as two of Google's earliest employees found a way to do what no one else had: make billions of dollars from Internet advertising. With this cash cow, Google was able to expand dramatically and take on other transformative projects: more efficient data centers, open-source cell phones, free Internet video (YouTube), cloud computing, digitizing books, and much more. The key to Google's success in all these businesses, Levy reveals, is its engineering mind-set and adoption of such Internet values as speed, openness, experimentation, and risk taking. After its unapologetically elitist approach to hiring, Google pampers its engineers--free food and dry cleaning, on-site doctors and masseuses--and gives them all the resources they need to succeed. Even today, with a workforce of more than 23,000, Larry Page signs off on every hire. But has Google lost its innovative edge? With its newest initiative, social networking, Google is chasing a successful competitor for the first time. Some employees are leaving the company for smaller, nimbler start-ups. Can the company that famously decided not to be evil still compete? No other book has ever turned Google inside out as Levy does with In the Plex ., Written by Steven Levy, In the Plexis the story of the most successful technology company of our time, it is an inside look at how Google succeeds.
LC Classification NumberHD9696.8.U64G6657

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  • To date, the best book on Google - with a wide margin

    I've read practically all the books on Google published by serious writers. This one surpasses them all with flying colors. Steven Levy is in a league of his own - he's the oldest fox in the tech jungle. For this project he got deep access to the G-machine. The interviews are jaw-dropping, with fresh scoops in every chapter. I've read this twice and will read it again. By far, one of the best books on any web company ever published. Only downside - Google is re-inventing itself every year. So part of the content will get old in a year or two. Anyway - it's a grab.

    Verified purchase: YesCondition: Pre-owned