Overdrive: Bill Gates and the Race to Control Cyberspace

by James Wallace

Book Overview

James Wallace brings readers up to date on the Gates saga to 1997 and reveals the inside story of the struggle to keep Microsoft on top in the World Wide Web game.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0471180416
• ISBN13: 9780471180418
• Release Date: May 1997
• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.5" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Have to read this book to know more about Bill Gates.

This is one of the best written books out there on Bill Gates and the reason seems to be the journalistic background of the author that is so well suited for this kind of biographical account. The book has numerous real life stories of not just Gates but other legends as well like Marc Andreessen. Like me, you may also find that it is hard to put this book down once you pick it up and start reading it (almost on any page, any chapter).If you are in the Information Technology field, you will no doubt thoroughly enjoy this book but it isn't written just for someone knowledgeable in computers. Almost anyone can read this book with little difficulty as the focus is not on technology terms but on the lives behind the technology and the Internet revolution. After reading this book, you will definitely catch up on the events of the last 15 years or so that have changed the world into one filled with computers and the Internet everywhere. The paper used in the hard cover edition of this book feels strange to the touch and is not the normal paper you would find in most books. It feels more like cheap paper with a strange white color and the font used throughout looks like one of the generic fonts from the eighties. This alone discouraged me from reading this book for the first few months after I had bought it. But when I finally decided to read it, I instantly moved it to the top of my reading list. If you are a budding entrepreneur wanting to topple Bill Gates' empire with some revolutionary idea that you are building in your garage or apartment, you HAVE to read this book. It is inspirational as it gets the hair on the back of your neck to stand up for most of the book and it gives you raw data to analyze and strategize how to succeed in this highly competitive market place. The same author also wrote `Hard Drive' which was a best seller prior to `Overdrive' and I plan on reading `Hard Drive' next as I am so impressed by `Overdrive'. The thing that really got me hooked on this book is the author's writing style where he keeps your attention the WHOLE time. He does it by hooking into your emotions as evidenced by his account of Bill Gates' visit to Orlando, Florida in 1993 where he gets stuck in a traffic jam. As the author reveals the cause of the traffic jam (everyone from around 100 miles all going to the Sheraton hotel to listen to Bill Gates talk) you can't help but chuckle at the hilarious situation Bill is in (since he is the cause). The book is full of several such accounts where you can't stop reading!Working on a startup company myself, I was looking around for biographical books on successful entrepreneurs to get some ideas and informaiton that I can analyze for myself and find some patterns. I then came across a few books focused on Bill Gates (this being the best) all of which I purchased immediately. I have not been disappointed. This book is headed for my long term collection. I hope that you too enjoy this book!

Don't miss this book,Gates's fans, if u had read Hard Drive

Don't miss this book if u had read James Wallace's Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the making of Microsoft empire. Because this book contain Gates's next way to mantain his empire from internet wave. Just like Hard Drive ,this book is well written: Complete and detail but still easy to read and understand. It is still the easiest to read and understand Gates's book compare with other similar book.

The Whole Story?

I enjoyed reading Overdrive and while initialy reserving judgement on a book that uses journalistic sources rather than references, appreciated alot of the connivery going on. The observation about Philippe Kahn, a long time nemesis who dared, and Bill Gates, being like matter and anti-matter trying to exist in the same space was great. The Spyglass deal on how the legal manouveurs came about to attain the Mosaic browser and the amazement captured by quotes from the Spyglass people directly involved when they found it was to be distributed "free", was one word: amazing. The plentiful quotes from all the people involved, and the detail on the deal making involved say with Java, the centrepiece of the next revolution of technology, both in and outside of Microsoft, bespeaks well of the energy this author devoted to his topic and the obvious cooperation he received from everyone involved but surprisingly, the increasingly withdrawn, Bill Gates. I think however that Wallace should have put more into his closing chapter, leaving a certain empty feeling just after closing the book. I thought a more speculative ending with more on the likely fallout of the dichotomy between Gates balancing anti-competitive restraints on unfavourable change with the favourable change, all within his control, would have been more enlightening. It is though very disturbing to me that on one heartbeat is portrayed an industry domination resting, like no other that has been attained in US business history but that is just the way indeed it has been allowed to happen. The conclusion from this book and the previous one, makes it shallow, in some way, in that it is very difficult to see anything but an imploding Microsoft, taking down financial markets, in its wake, without this one man, that may in fact be an embellishment. The moxy gamesmanship, the menacing marketing, and the obsessive determinination to beat all comers to a pulp, that Wallace has captured of William Henry Gates III, while I am sure is not the final word on this company it nevertheless is a compelling, disturbing story of either success or excess. This one I enjoyed.

Just What I've been Waiting For

After reading Hard Drive, the prequel to OverDrive last summer, I was left with a huge gap from where the book left off, to where Microsoft is now. This book fills that gap. For a perosn who really likes Microsoft, ar at least really wants to know what really happens over there in Redmond, this is a great book to read