ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book was born
two and one half years ago. I aspired to profile a company at the
epicenter of the digital revolution, a company whose rise would
also tell the story of how “new” media disrupted “old,” and offer a
glimpse into the future of media. Google was my chosen vehicle, but
the company was reluctant to cooperate. Google’s founders and many
of its executives share a zeal to digitize books, but don’t have
much interest in reading them. They worried that cooperating on a
book was an “inefficient” use of their time. I made the argument
that my task was to understand and explain what they do and how
they were changing the media world, and that they should look upon
my project much as they look upon search. If my book was good, it
would rise to the top of search results, becoming a common
reference. After months of my kicking at the door, they opened
it.
I could not have told
this story without their cooperation. I made many weeklong visits
to the Google campus in Mountain View, conducted a total of about
150 Google interviews, including 11 with CEO Eric Schmidt. I
recorded each of these interviews; names and dates are contained in
the endnotes. With the sole exception of one vice president, I
interviewed everyone I asked to see, including Sergey Brin and
Larry Page and Google directors, often more than once. With the
blessing of his superiors, David Krane, who was one of Google’s
early hires, orchestrated and attended most interviews. He was a
fountain of historical facts, and not once did he interrupt or
intrude on an interview.
I was frequently
asked by Google employees whether they would like this book. I
always said that if I did my job there would be things that would
displease them. No one at Google saw this book before publication.
I am grateful to Google for its willingness to risk transparency. I
am also grateful to about 150 individuals outside Google who
granted interviews, many of them representatives of traditional
media.
At Penguin Press, Ann
Godoff has championed this project and been an irreplaceable
partner on this as on previous books. Nick Trautwein lent his
appreciable surgical skills to the editing of this book and stayed
on top of everything. I am grateful to the rest of Ann’s team,
including her competent assistant, Lindsay Whalen; the marketing
team assembled by Tracy Locke, especially the ever-industrious and
cheerful Sarah Hutson; to copy editor Susan Johnson, who
meticulously pored over every syllable; and to attorney Gary
Mailman, who carefully vetted this book.
This book began at my
journalistic home, The New Yorker,
which published my initial 2007 magazine piece, “The Search Party.”
Editor David Remnick bestows on his writers the luxury of time, a
keen editorial eye, and a sense that he is in the managerial dugout
cheering. The editorial support writers receive at The New Yorker, from senior editors who read and
comment on galleys to fact checkers who exhaustively exhume every
sentence to copy editors who meticulously smooth prose—and from my
longtime editor there, Jeffrey Frank—fills me with
awe.
Lisa Chase gave a
careful and close initial reading of the manuscript and reminded me
what a gifted editor she is. Lawrence Lessig read the manuscript
with the care he brings to legal briefs, and his comments were
acute. Barry Harbaugh meticulously fact checked the manuscript. I
wrestled for months to come up with a title. It took my friend Nora
Ephron about thirty seconds to cut through my morass and suggest,
“Googled.” Another old friend, Milton Glaser, who designed the
jacket of my first book, volunteered to design this jacket, and did
so overnight. Kenneth Lerer offered valuable advice, as did his
business associate, Jonah Peretti. I have received generous help
from many other friends, including Tully Plesser, Susan Lyne, and
John Eastman. My agent, Sloan Harris, has been a stalwart; you want
him in your foxhole. Amanda Urban, as always, was my most demanding
and provocative reader.
These are the folks
who share credit; any blame is all mine.