From the cofounder of Netscape and the inspiration for Michael Lewis's bestselling The New, New Thing , comes a thrilling insider's account of the race to beat Microsoft for control of the Internet. Netscape was a tiny start-up company that ultimately revolutionized business and communications for the entire world. Jim Clark tells the fascinating story of how he, Marc Andreessen, and a core group of programmers turned an esoteric computer program into a visionary new technology used by millions. Challenged from the start by competition, a seemingly bottomless pit of expenses, and a need for secrecy from the roving eye of Microsoft, Clark's programmers spent days at a stretch in front of their computer screens, rushing to produce their revolutionary Web browser under the enormous pressure of time. Clark vividly re-creates the tense, thrilling atmosphere of the start-up company in a nail-biting tale of drama and suspense. Netscape Time is also an inspiring manual for anyone who wishes to take advantage of the endless business possibilities of today's technology. Indeed, Clark, the only person ever to found three multibillion-dollar start-ups, is perhaps more qualified than any businessman today to show how it's done. As a business book, as a reflection of our technology culture, and as a purely enjoyable read, Netscape Time is perhaps the most significant book about the rise of the Internet ever to be published. Sitting at your desk, not getting much done, you finally give in to the temptation and click onto www.coolwaytokilltime.com. Little do you know, as you check on the price of cattle futures in Bolivia, that you have Jim Clark to thank for this wonderful research tool and time waster. Clark didn't invent the Internet (that was the Pentagon, looking for an inscrutable way to transmit classified information--or Al Gore, if you can believe him) or even the World Wide Web (that was a Swiss researcher named Tim Berners-Lee). Nor did he invent the first Web browser with a graphical interface; that was a pair of University of Illinois computer geeks named Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina. What Clark did was team up with Andreessen to create Netscape, and their first product, Netscape Navigator, made the Net more universally accessible than it had ever been. It also made a lot of people really rich, a fact Clark dwells on in perhaps too much detail. The story of Netscape alone is thrilling enough, but Clark also gives tremendous insight into the real way American business operates nowadays--the speed, the risks, and the hatred for rivals ( lots of hatred, mostly for Microsoft and Bill Gates.) Most of the book covers the founding of Netscape Communications, but there's an epilogue, too, discussing the merger of Netscape with America Online, the ongoing battle with Microsoft, and, most important, the impact the Web has had on everyday life. Clark makes a sound argument that Netscape had a lot to do with that. Oh, and did you know it made him rich? --Lou Schuler This book captures the drama of Netscape Communications' phenomenal success. The heroes are author Clark, one of the cofounders of Netscape, and a small band of programmers who set out to write a better Internet browser than Mosaic, on which many of them had worked for minimal pay and little official credit. The villains are the owners of Mosaic and Microsoft, who had a vested interest in maintaining the status quo (despite arguably inferior software) and who put roadblocks in Netscape's path. Within 15 months of Netscape's founding, its initial public offering of stock valued the company at $2.2 billion. But the Netscape success story closes on a sour note: at the time of writing, a Justice Department investigation against Microsoft that was prompted by Netscape had not reached its conclusion, and Netscape had agreed to merge with America Online because it feared being pushed out of business by Microsoft. Throughout, Clark stresses the competitiveness of most of the computer industry (with the notable exception of Microsoft) and the need to improve products constantly and rapidlyAin his words, in "Netscape time."AA.J. Sobczak, Covina, CA Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. Leave the arguing over who "invented" the Internet to the politicians! Certainly no one will dispute the role of the folks at Netscape in turning the Internet into the pervasive medium it has become. Journalists Joshua Quittner and Michelle Slatalla have already chronicled Netscape's rise in Speeding the Net (1998), and in Competing on Internet Time (1998), Professors Michael Cusumano and David Yoffle documented the battle of the browsers that was waged between Netscape and Microsoft. Now, though, we get the story firsthand. While Marc Andressen is the brains behind Netscape and CEO Jim Barksdale provides the motivational leadership, the company was Jim Clark's idea, and he supplied the entrepreneurial drive that turned a bunch of hackers and programmers into mil