Battelle, John 1965-

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BATTELLE, John 1965-

PERSONAL:

Born 1965. Education: University of California at Berkeley, B.A., 1987, M.Jour., 1992.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Federated Media, Inc., 323 Pine St., Upper Unit, Sausalito, CA 94965. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Entrepreneur, journalist, professor, and writer. University of California at Berkeley, Graduate School of Journalism, visiting professor and director of the business reporting program. Wired magazine, cofounder; Standard Media International, founder, publisher of Industry Standard and TheStandard.com; Federated Media Publishing, founder and chairman. Involved in the launch of more than thirty magazines and websites internationally. Founding sxecutive producer of the Foursquare conference on intellectual property-leveraged industries.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Named "Global Leader for Tomorrow," World Economic Forum; finalist for Entrepreneur of the Year, Ernst & Young.

WRITINGS:

The Search: The Inside Story of How Google and Its Rivals Changed Everything, Portfolio (New York, NY), 2005.

Columnist for Business 2.0.

SIDELIGHTS:

John Battelle has spent his career as a journalist, professor, and entrepreneur. He is the founder of several well-respected magazines in technology-and business-related fields, such as Wired and Industry Standard. He has been successful enough in his ventures to win awards for his entrepreneurial efforts, and in 2005 he decided to turn his sights to examining a developmental brainstorm of others—search engines, most notably Google. Battelle's research was published as The Search: The Inside Story of How Google and Its Rivals Changed Everything, a book which explores the ins and outs of search engines—their history, how the technology works, possible implications of search technology, and the Wall Street milestone of Google's enormous initial public stock offering, among other things. In his research, the author interviewed Google's founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, as well as the founders and executives of several of their competitors and a total of 350 people in the high-tech world. Battelle talks in The Search about early search engines and how they differ from Google. He also identifies Google's innovative methods, and examines the phenomenon that Google has become in the years since its inception, becoming so prominent and widely used that the word ultimately became a common verb—to "google" someone or something is to search for information on the desired topic.

Critics found much to praise in The Search. Richard Pachter, discussing the book in the Miami Herald, referred to Battelle as a "gifted writer and journalist" and praised the author's ability to remain "nongeeky and jargon-free" when creating this "surprisingly entertaining and engaging" work. Entrepreneur contributor Mark Henricks observed Battelle's "well-grounded conclusions," while Ben Elgin, in a Business Week article, noted the "compelling" nature of this "worthwhile read." An Economist contributor paid Battelle the compliment of referring to him as "Silicon Valley's Bob Woodward," and though the critic was not impressed by the information about other search engines, The Search was still viewed as a "great book." Booklist reviewer Mary Whaley was impressed with the perspective provided by Battelle and felt that the author's work made for "an excellent, thought-provoking book." Miami Herald critic Pachter summed up by calling The Search "a real find."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, September 15, 2005, Mary Whaley, review of The Search: The Inside Story of How Google and Its Rivals Changed Everything, p. 14.

Business Week, September 19, 2005, Ben Elgin, review of The Search, p. 144.

Economist, September 17, 2005, review of The Search, p. 86.

Entrepreneur, November, 2005, Mark Henricks, review of The Search, p. 24.

Library Journal, September 1, 2005, Carol J. Elsen, review of The Search, p. 155.

Miami Herald, December 15, 2005, Richard Pachter, review of The Search.

New Statesman, October 24, 2005, Kenneth Cukier, review of The Search, p. 54.

USA Today, September 12, 2006, Russ L. Juskalian, "Google's Evolution Makes a Great Story," p. 6B.

Washington Monthly, September, 2005, Markos Kounalakis, "Search Lite: You May Think Google Is Powerful Today, but It's Still Only Using 5% of Its Brain," p. 50.