Overdrive

James Wallace

Description

Praise for Overdrive: Bill Gates and the Race to Control Cyberspace

"James Wallace offers many tales of . . . temper tantrums, antitrust tussles with the Justice Department, and general dirty tricks Microsoft has allegedly played on its competitors." -The New York Times Book Review

Praise for James Wallace's Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire

"A stupendous success story. This is the most informative book yet on Bill Gates and Microsoft." -the Washington Post

"Remarkable . . . This book will make you wonder why you didn't buy Microsoft stock when it went public." -The Wall Street Journal

"An engaging, almost classic tale of a boy who finds power in gadgets and then won't let go." -Los Angeles Times

Sujets

• Information Technology
• Computers
• Informatique
• James Wallace
• Overdrive
• Overdrive (homonymie)
• Bill Gates

Informations

• Publié par: Turner Publishing Company
• Date de parution: 02 mai 1997
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780471358176
• Langue: English

Extrait

Overdrive
Also by James Wallace
Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire (with Jim Erickson)
Overdrive
BILL GATES
and the
RACE TO CONTROL CYBERSPACE
James Wallace

John Wiley Sons, Inc.
New York Chichester Weinheim Brisbane Singapore Toronto
Design by Jane Tenenbaum.
Copyright 1997 by James Wallace.
Published by John Wiley Sons, Inc.
All rights reserved. Published simultaneously in Canada.
Reproduction or translation of any part of this work beyond that permitted by Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act without the permission of the copyright owner is unlawful. Requests for permission or further information should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley Sons, Inc.
This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering legal, accounting, or other professional services. If legal advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional person should be sought.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wallace, James
Overdrive : Bill Gates and the race to control cyberspace / James Wallace.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 978-1-62045-801-3
1. Gates, Bill, 1956- 2. Microsoft Corporation-History. 3. Businessmen-United States-Biography. 4. Computer software industry-United States-History. I. Title.
HD9696.C62G3379 1997 338.7 610053 092-dc21 97-4464
[B]
10 987654321
To Jackie Lincecum, for second chances, however brief .
Contents

Preface

Prologue: Prelude to War

1 The Road Ahead

2 The Trustbuster

3 Internet 101

4 Bachelor Tycoon Takes a Wife

5 The Davids vs. Goliath

6 The Sleeping Giant Awakens

7 Nothing but Net

Epilogue

Index
Preface
This project began with a request in the spring of 1996 from publisher John Wiley Sons to update my previous book Hard Drive , which I wrote with Jim Erickson. But it quickly became apparent that so much had happened since the publication of Hard Drive in 1992 that another book was needed to fully tell the incredible story of the rise of the Internet and how Microsoft responded.
As was the case with Hard Drive , Microsoft did not cooperate with research for this book. The company was not pleased with Hard Drive , which had been cited by U.S. District Court Judge Stanley Sporkin in rejecting the antitrust consent decree negotiated in 1994 between Microsoft and the U.S. Justice Department. As a result, Microsoft spent many more months in court before Sporkin s ruling was overturned.
While Microsoft officially refused any help with this book, some of its employees and executives agreed to off-the-record interviews. Their names are not used in this book, but they know who they are and I would like to thank them for helping me tell this story.
My most special thanks, though, goes to my editor, Hana Lane, at John Wiley Sons, who offered hope and encouragement and whose life expectancy was probably shortened considerably because of the number of deadlines that I failed to meet.
This book would not have been possible without the tireless efforts of several others at John Wiley Sons, including Marcia Samuels, managing editor, Elizabeth Doble, director of production, and, finally, Gerry Helferich, the publisher, who never lost his cool and gave the book his full support all along the way.
Many people outside of Microsoft were interviewed for this book, and I would like to single out a few for the hours they spent talking with me: Bill Joy, Eric Schmidt, Rob Glaser, Jeff Lill, Dave Thompson, Tim Krauskopf, and Mike Tyrrell.
I would also like to thank Jim Erickson, my co-author on Hard Drive , who provided help with interviews. Jim is now a reporter for Asiaweek in Hong Kong.
Thanks, too, goes to J. D. Alexander, publisher of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer , the newspaper where I work as a reporter. J. D. graciously allowed some of the newspaper s photos to be used in this book.
When I began Overdrive, I was doing research for a book about Philippe Kahn of Borland International. That project got sidetracked by this one but not before Philippe had given me about 50 hours of his time for interviews. Those interviews yielded invaluable insights and information about the computer industry, and relevant material from those interviews with Phillipe is included in this book. I am in his debt not only for his help but also for the kindness he showed me, especially when I had to tell him I was going to stop work on his book so I could write another book about his bitter rival, Bill Gates.
Finally, I would like to thank two very dear people in my life, Linda Moore and Jackie Lincecum. Linda helped me to survive a couple of very dark times during the writing of this book. And Jackie worked tirelessly to transcribe interviews, even though she had a full-time job. More important, she gave me her love, friendship, and support, without which I would have lost my way.
James Wallace
Seattle, February 1997
PROLOGUE
Prelude to War
Ringmaster Bill Gates was growing increasingly testy. Under the enormous white tent that had been erected on the lush green lawn of Microsoft s campus for this crazy circus known as the Windows 95 launch, a dress rehearsal for what was to be the greatest show on earth was going badly. After several weeks of unprecedented hype, the day that the entire planet seemed to be talking about was only hours away, and this was the last opportunity to work through the launch-day script.
The next morning, August 24, 1995, more than 2,500 journalists, industry big shots, and special guests, along with friends and family of Gates, would fill this cavernous tent to hear Microsoft s chairman deliver a now familiar sermon on why Windows 95 would change the world. Millions more in 42 U.S. cities and in major capitals around the world would watch on closed-circuit television from satellite feeds. Microsoft was spending more than a quarter of a billion dollars on the biggest and noisiest product launch in the history of the computer industry-hell, this was the biggest marketing extravaganza for a consumer product ever, outstripping the hoopla over New Coke or the first Super Bowl. But a series of minor technical glitches during the final run-through were making Gates nuts.
Probably the only person or thing Gates was not yelling at was comedian Jay Leno, who had been paid some of those marketing bucks to be the surprise guest at the Windows 95 party. Poor Leno. The square-jawed Tonight Show host was trying to learn how to use a computer before the next morning. At least Gates was showing some atypical patience with Leno, explaining where to position the mouse and how to click it.
But some troublesome equipment was not so fortunate. C mon! Gates yelled in disgust at one point when the onstage computer began to act up. He angrily picked up the mouse pad and threw it on the podium. Not far away, a reporter for USA Today , who had been given behind-the-scenes access to Gates during the pressure-packed hours before the launch, hurriedly scribbled notes.
You ve got the wrong screen set up here, Gates snapped at a technician.
By early evening Leno had had enough.
I came illiterate, Leno quipped about computers as he walked out of the tent. Now I m leaving virtually retarded.
The others who remained in the tent did not escape Gates s wrath, especially when his TelePrompTer conked out. But it was not until he watched a special promotional video that had been prepared for the next day s show that his anger finally exploded.
This video makes no sense! Gates shouted at Brad Chase, the marketing manager for Windows 95.
Gates was especially upset about a scene in which an interviewer playfully asked an executive if Windows 95 would improve his sex life. Although the line in the video got a laugh from the sparse crowd in the tent, Gates was not amused. He was dumbfounded that anyone would try to link Windows 95 with people s sex lives. (No one dared tell Gates, of course, that the quarter billion dollars his company was spending to hype Windows 95 had already linked it with everything under the sun.)
We are supposed to be making serious points here! he heatedly told Chase.
Gates decided to watch the video one more time. Long before it was over, the dour expressions that washed across his face, which by now was beginning to show the strains of a very long day, gave the verdict away.
I d rather have nothing than have that! Gates complained as he walked away for an interview with an anchorwoman from the BBC.
The interview was to be the last of his media appearances this day. They had started that morning, nearly 12 hours earlier, around 8:30 A.M. , when Gates had done the first of what would be 14 television interviews over three hours. That brought his total for the week to 29, including Today, Good Morning America , and Larry King Live. After he had finished the last of those, Gates had explained their value to the reporter from USA Today as he walked back to his office for lunch, in Microsoft s Building 8.
I have to ask, he told the reporter, is it worth six minutes of my time? Well, each of those shows has 50,000 to 100,000 viewers. So it s time well leveraged.
Well-leveraged time. It was a concept of media relations that Gates had learned a year or so earlier from his pal Warren Buffett. The two were at a party thrown by mutual friend Meg Greenfield, editorial page editor of the Washington Post and, like Gates, a Seattle native. Gates was playing croquet on the lawn of Greenfield s house on Bainbridge Island, across Puget Sound from Seattle, when he overheard Buffett talking about how he had handled the media during the Salomon Brothers trading scandal. Croquet mallet in hand, Gates walked over to Buffett.
Did you hire a media adviser? Gates asked.
No, Buffett told his friend. You just ca