The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story
, subject: Jim Clark and Silicon Valley entrepreneurship.
Michael Lewis's Jim Clark story interests David as a portrait of restless company-building and late-1990s Silicon Valley.
About the book
Published in 1999, Lewis's reported portrait follows Clark's restless search for the next company, using his ventures and automated sailing project to examine the culture and capital of the internet boom.
Why read it
Best if you want a portrait of Jim Clark and the kind of Silicon Valley founder who keeps moving from one company-building chase to the next — a book David says he can't recommend enough and keeps circling back to on the show.
Key themes
- Restless Company-Building
- The New Economy As Setting
- A Founder David Keeps Citing
Evidence and original sources
The host says he can't recommend enough reading Michael Lewis and states he would buy this book.
- Bill Gates (Overdrive) — David connects The New New Thing to the earlier Founders episode about Jim Clark.
- Sidney Harman (Founder of Harman Kardon) — David says he covered this Michael Lewis book on Jim Clark in an earlier Founders episode.
- The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story — The episode is devoted to Michael Lewis's The New New Thing and uses it as the main source throughout, covering Jim Clark, Netscape, Silicon Graphics, and Healthion/WebMD.
- No Better Time: The Brief, Remarkable Life of Danny Lewin, the Genius Who Transformed the Internet — David says Episode 24's events occur at the same time as The New New Thing, the book covered in the previous Founders episode.
- A Truck Full of Money: Coding, Mania, Love, Genius: The Life of an American Entrepreneur — David draws a thematic parallel to a previous Founders episode on The New New Thing by Michael Lewis, about Jim Clark and the new economy.
- Jim Clark (Silicon Graphics, Netscape) — David notes he first covered this book on Founders episode 23.
Unofficial listener-built companion, not affiliated with or endorsed by David Senra or Founders Podcast.