The book that does for Silicon Valley what 'Liar's Poker' did for Wall Street.
In the last years of the millennium, bestselling author Michael Lewis sets out to find the world's most important technology entrepreneur, the man who embodies the spirit of the coming age. He finds him in Jim Clark, the billionaire who is about to create this third, separate, billion-dollar company: first Silicon Graphics; then Netscape, which launched the information age; and now Healtheon, which aims to turn the $1 trillion US health care industry on its head.
Clark is simply the hottest thing in the Valley, so great is his aura and mystique that hordes of the smartest geeks simply drop what they are doing whenever it is rumoured that he may be up to Something New.
We get the inside story of the battle between Netscape and Microsoft; we hear how Clark tries to persuade the investment bankers that Healtheon is the new Microsoft, and we get queasy as Clark pits his boat against the rage of the North Atlantic in winter.
Through every brilliant anecdote and funny character sketch, Michael Lewis gives us an inside look at the world of the super-rich.