10 things Google has taught us
NEW YORK (Fortune) -- In researching his new book, Googled: the End of the World as We Know It, to be published next week by Penguin Press, author Ken Auletta had extensive access to the company's inner workings and reported widely on its impact on the media landscape.In a Fortune.com exclusive, he offers ten enduring lessons drawn from his journey into Google's realm:
1.) Passion wins
Startwith the words of advice -- "Don't settle" -- that Larry Page offeredthe Stanford graduating class in 2002. This intensity was revealed inthe zeal with which he and Sergey Brin inspired the entire company to"serve the user," to take more risks, to radically improve search.
Oras CEO Eric Schmidt told me: while he assumed that "Google would be animportant company; the founders always assumed that Google would be adefining company."
A moment after venture capitalist MichaelMoritz finished describing Google as "a rare" company, I asked Moritz,an early investor in both Yahoo and Google (GOOG, Fortune 500), whether he felt the same enthusiasm for Yahoo (YHOO, Fortune 500).
Hewinced, hesitated, then finally said: "Yahoo is a company I've beenclose to for a long time and feel a lot of affection and loyaltytowards. But within the first 18 months to two years of beingassociated with Google, I began to understand this was a very differentcompany than Yahoo. It was rooted in the studies of the founders.Google was built on a foundation of Larry's and Sergey's intellectualpursuits. Yahoo was built on the foundations of Jerry's and David'sinterests. And there's a big gulf between those two."
Thatdeficit of passion, he suggested, was a reason that Jerry Yang andDavid Filo chose not to be fully engaged full-time with the companythey created.
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