What Would Google Do?

November 24, 2008
This scattered collection of rambling rants lauding Google's abilities to harness the power of the “Internet Age” generally misses the mark. Blog impresario Jarvis uses the company's success to trace aspects of the new customer-driven, user-generated, niche-market-oriented, customized and collaborative world. While his insights are stimulating, Jarvis's tone is acerbic and condescending; equally off-putting is his pervasive name-dropping. The book picks up in a section on media, where the author finally launches a fascinating discussion of how businesses—especially media and entertainment industries—can continue to evolve and profit by using Google's strategies. Unfortunately, Jarvis may have lost the reader by that point as his attempt to cover too many topics reads more like a series of frenzied blog posts than a manifesto for the Internet age.

March 2, 2009
Verdict: A well-indexed and thought-provoking survey of how the Internet-and specifically Google-have changed the business landscape, and what companies must do to keep up. Highly recommended for public, academic, and business libraries. Background: Jarvis (interactive journalism, Graduate Sch. of Journalism, CUNY; founding editor, Entertainment Weekly) argues that services and industries can no longer survive as exclusive gatekeepers of information. Google and the Internet have irrevocably changed market expectations-customers now want and expect control over the choices they make. Google dominates the new advertising marketplace through its highly successful business model as developer of freely available information platforms focusing on client interaction. Jarvis demonstrates how businesses can flourish by focusing on customer and client dialog and defining the scope of their services and products within niche markets. [See LJ Talks to Jeff Jarvis.-Ed.]-Robert L. Balliot, Bristol, RI

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2009
Jarvis, columnist and blogger about media, presents his ideas for surviving and prospering in the Internet age, with its new set of rules for emerging technologies as well as industries such as retail, manufacturing, and service. We learn that customers are now in charge, people anywhere can find each other and join forces to support a companys efforts or oppose them, life and business are more public, conversation has replaced marketing, and openness is the key to success. Jarvis other laws include being a platform (help users create products, businesses, communities, and networks of their own); hand over control to anyone; middlemen are doomed; and your worst customer is your best friend, and your best customer is your partner. Jarvis offers thought-provoking observations and valuable examples for individuals and businesses seeking to fully participate in our Internet culture and maximize the opportunities it offers. It is unclear what role Google played, if any, in the preparation of this book, which provides excellent advertising for the company.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)