LIM, MARYLYN GRACE C.

OOA

            Gmail is Google’s web-based email system. This web-based email system was created by the 23^rd employee of Google who is Paul Buccheit. He was also the one who suggested the famous motto, “Don’t be evil.” Paul Buccheit thought of this line when he was in a meeting that was about company values. He was thinking something really different from the usual ones. He also thought that it should be something that it’s hard to change. So he thought of the line, “Don’t be evil.”, because at that time, their competitors are exploiting the users. They would trick the users by putting advertisements on the search results and people actually won’t realize that the link was an advertisement. Paul Buccheit said that Google is different from their competitors. They wouldn’t do such thing to their users. I think that motto somewhat wants to warn their competitors to stop doing it to their users.

            Paul Buccheit created Gmail all by himself and he was able to finish the first version of Gmail in just one day. After building the first version of Gmail, Paul Buccheit thought of creating a better email program than the first version of Gmail. He also thought of the idea of having a search button through your emails because during that time he gets over 500 emails a day. And he was having a hard time looking for emails. So he thought that having a search button would make it better and easier. He made it just like Google search. But the only difference was that it was mad for emails. At first, Paul Buccheit do the all by himself, later on Sanjeev Singh started working w/ him then later on, another person named Jing Lim helped them improved it.

            When they launched Gmail, many people thought that it was a joke because that day was April 1 and it was April fool’s Day so most of the people didn’t believe it. They thought that it was just a joke and they also thought that it was impossible to happen. After launching Gmail, Paul Buccheit worked on another project called Adsense. Adsense was a content-targeted ads and he was also able to finish it in just one evening. At first, people thought that it’s impossible to happen but Paul Buccheit proved them wrong. After that, more people took over the project and make it into a real product.

            I admire Paul Buccheit because he was a great creator. He was able to create things because he just tries out ideas even if some of the things won’t work. And sometimes when something interesting caught his attention, he will do some side projects on it. For me, being an ordinary employee doesn’t mean that you can’t create a product that will be a big bang in the world. I think the difference in startup and starting w/n a company is that in startup, you will think of what product are you going to do but when you are starting w/n a company, you tend to focus only on your company’s product and thinking of a way on how to improve it or maybe you could think of creating something that will be useful for your company using your company’s resources.

            In the world of IT, we should think what other people will think of your product. You can’t just produce a different product or add features into your existing product because some people won’t like it. Some people are narrow-minded. They are thinking that new things are impossible to happen. But even if some people think that new things are impossible to happen, you should at least try doing something new and interesting because you don’t know maybe you’ll get lucky and your product will be a big hit. You can learn a lot of things even if things don’t work out. You don’t have to be a startup founder just to learn something new, even if you’re a normal employee you can learn so many things. The only thing that you should do is to be open-minded.

LIM, MARYLYN GRACE C.

OOA

            WebTV is a thin client for surfing the web, using a television as a display. The difference between WebTV and on personal computer is that personal computer uses a computer monitor as a display while a WebTV uses a television as a display. WebTV was created for people who can’t afford to buy their own personal computer.

            Steve Perlman was liberal arts major. He was a hobbyist and this was his engineering background. He loves to read magazines about technologies. That’s where he gets his knowledge in software, hardware, networking and material science. Having this knowledge he was able to build a computer when he was 16 and ha was able to designed graphics display on it. After that, he was able to design a software-based modem when he was in college. His professor gave him an F for his project because his professor doesn’t believe that Steve Perlman’s project would work. Steve Perlman his professor wrong. He builds the software-based modem and emailed his professor using it saying. “This email is being sent to you on the modem that I designed at Columbia.”

            After college, he started his first startup which was Catapult Entertainment made a modem for Sega and Nintendo games that would modify the execution of the games. After Catapult Entertainment, settle for a while then he started his second startup which was WebTV. They were able to got Sony to manufactures their product. And they got it exclusive for a year. At that time Philips also wanted to manufacture but Steve Perlman already accepted the offer of Sony, so they told Philips to wait after a year before they could manufacture WebTV. They were able to raise more money, but for some reason, they just about to run out of money. During that time, Steve Perlman didn’t tell it to his employees because he didn’t want his people to panic. With that reason, they started to talk to some investors and VCs. Steve Perlman was able to find one VC firm, Brentwood Venture Capital. Jeff Brody put in $4.5 million for the WebTV. After the signing of paper, Steve Perlman got a certified letter from Sony saying, “After due consideration, we’ve decided not to proceed w/ you in deploying this product.” So Steve Perlman just accepts the offer of Philips of manufacturing their product.

            After a while, they build a consultant, Spencer Tell of Asia Pacific Ventures, who had done a lot of deals with Japanese companies. This consultant had a personal relationship with the CEO of Sony who was Idei-san. Steve Perlman told the consultant to investigate the letter sent by Sony. After the investigation, Steve found out that the reason why Sony didn’t continue the deal was because they thought that it won’t be a successful product. Spencer told the CTO to reconsider it, so they decided to get on a private jet to the office of Steve to get the demo. After testing it, there was one website that the CTO went to that didn’t work. It was a Japanese character so the website didn’t work. One of his engineer, integrated Japanese language support into the code, so by the time when demoed it again, the browser could run English and Japanese characteristics. So they were able to get the deal with Sony. Now that they have 2 companies who manufactures they’re product. They were able to raise their money up to $35 million.

            With this story, I learned that you don’t have to be a computer major just to be able to build software and hardware. Just like Steve Perlman, he was liberal arts major but he was able to build a computer, a software based modem and WebTV that made him famous. I also learned that, in a startup, the founders should get along and they should have a common visions, because if they don’t get along, there will be so many problems that they won’t be able to face and I think the company won’t be able to survive it that happens.