Research Catalog

The code : Silicon Valley and the remaking of America

Title
The code : Silicon Valley and the remaking of America / Margaret O'Mara.
Author
O'Mara, Margaret Pugh, 1970-
Publication
  • New York : Penguin Press, 2019.
  • ©2019

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TextUse in library JFE 20-3831Schwarzman Building - Main Reading Room 315

Details

Description
496 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations; 25 cm
Summary
  • "The epic human story of how, out of a small patch of land in Northern California, high tech re-created America in its image, for good and for ill. Long before Margaret O'Mara became one of our most consequential historians of the American-led digital revolution, she worked in the White House of Bill Clinton and Al Gore in the earliest days of the commercial Internet. There she saw firsthand how deeply intertwined Silicon Valley was with the federal government--and always had been--and how shallow the common understanding of the secrets of the Valley's success actually was. Now, after almost five years of pioneering research, O'Mara has produced the definitive history of Silicon Valley for our time, the story of mavericks and visionaries, but also of powerful institutions creating the framework for innovation, from the Pentagon to Stanford University. It is also a story of a community that started off remarkably homogeneous and tight-knit and stayed that way, and whose belief in its own mythology has deepened into a collective hubris that has led to astonishing triumphs as well as devastating second-order effects. Deploying a wonderfully rich and diverse cast of protagonists, from the justly famous to the unjustly obscure, across four generations of explosive growth in the Valley, from the Forties to the present, O'Mara has wrestled one of the most fateful developments in modern American history into magnificent narrative form. She is on the ground with all of the key tech companies, chronicling the evolution in their offerings through each successive era, and she has a profound fingertip feel for the politics of the sector and its relation to the larger cultural narrative about tech as it has evolved over the years. Perhaps most impressively, O'Mara has penetrated the inner kingdom of tech venture capital firms, the insular and still remarkably old-boy world that became the cockpit of American capitalism and the crucible for bringing technological innovation to market, or not. The transformation of big tech into the engine room of the American economy and the nexus of so many of our hopes and dreams--and, increasingly, our nightmares--can be understood, in Margaret O'Mara's masterful hands, as the story of one California valley. As her majestic history makes clear, its fate is the fate of us all."--Dust jacket.
  • When O'Mara worked in the White House of Bill Clinton and Al Gore, she saw firsthand how deeply intertwined Silicon Valley was with the federal government, and how shallow the common understanding of the secrets of the Valley's success actually was. She tells the story of mavericks and visionaries, but also of powerful institutions creating the framework for innovation. It is a story of a community that started off remarkably homogeneous and tight-knit and stayed that way, and whose belief in its own mythology has deepened into a collective hubris that has led to astonishing triumphs as well as devastating second-order effects. -- adapted from jacket
Subjects
Bibliography (note)
  • Includes bibliographical references (pages [417]-483) and index.
Contents
  • Introduction: The American revolution -- Act one: Start up. Arrivals ; Endless frontier ; Golden State ; Shoot the moon ; Networked ; The money men ; Arrivals ; Boom and bust -- Act two: Product launch. Arrivals ; The Olympics of capitalism ; Power to the people ; The personal machine ; Homebrewed ; Unforgettable ; Risky business -- Act three: Go public. Arrivals ; Storytellers ; California dreaming ; Made in Japan ; Big Brother ; War games ; Built on sand -- Act four: Change the world. Arrivals ; Information means empowerment ; Suits in the Valley ; Magna Carta ; Don't be evil ; Arrivals ; The internet is you ; Software eats the world ; Masters of the universe -- Departure: Into the driverless car.
  • Introduction: The American revolution -- Act one: Start up -- ch. 1. Endless frontier -- ch. 2. Golden State -- ch. 3. Shoot the moon -- ch. 4. Networked -- ch. 5. The money men -- ch. 6. Boom and bust -- Act two: Product launch -- ch. 7. The Olympics of capitalism -- ch. 8. Power to the people -- ch. 9. The personal machine -- ch. 10. Homebrewed -- ch. 11. Unforgettable -- ch. 12. Risky business -- Act three: Go public -- ch. 13. Storytellers -- ch. 14. California dreaming -- ch. 15. Made in Japan -- ch. 16. Big Brother -- ch. 17. War games -- ch. 18. Built on sand -- Act four: Change the world -- ch. 19. Information means empowerment -- ch. 20. Suits in the Valley -- ch. 21. Magna Carta -- ch. 22. Don't be evil -- ch.23. The internet is you -- ch. 24. Software eats the world -- ch. 25. Masters of the universe -- Departure: Into the driverless car.
Call Number
JFE 20-3831
ISBN
  • 9780399562181
  • 0399562184
LCCN
  • 2019003295
  • 40029275568
OCLC
1057306457
Author
O'Mara, Margaret Pugh, 1970- author.
Title
The code : Silicon Valley and the remaking of America / Margaret O'Mara.
Publisher
New York : Penguin Press, 2019.
Copyright Date
©2019
Type of Content
text
still image
Type of Medium
unmediated
Type of Carrier
volume
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages [417]-483) and index.
Local Note
AUTH: UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON.
Other Form:
Online version: O'Mara, Margaret Pugh, 1970- author. Code New York : Penguin Press, 2019 9780399562198 (DLC) 2019006563
Other Standard Identifier
40029275568
Research Call Number
JFE 20-3831
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