CNET 25: When Marc Andreessen ruled Netscape – Video

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The big news this week from Microsoft is the release of a much improved 2.0 version of it’s Internet Explorer.
But the Internet Explorer has a long way to go to catch up with Netscape.
Three out of four people on the web, still use Netscape navigator.
Now this competition has gotten personal co founder of Microsoft Bill Gates versus co founder of Netscape, Marc Andreessen.
And who is this upstart?
Mark?
Well, he’s much younger than gates.
He’s worth more than 100 million dollars.
And he’s very, very smart.
Marc Andreessen is a very nice, intelligent guy.
Sure, cuz he’s standing right over here.>> [LAUGH] Hi.
He’s also a rich guy, owning roughly a quarter of a billion dollars in stock of Netscape.
We often go swimming in that fountain.
He’s also quite a joker.
The company culture reflects his own.
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For example, there are the Super Bowl fights, the office decorations and all over campus you’ll find his pet monster Mozilla.
That’s Mozilla.
Mozilla is what Mark calls the killer app.
Get it killer app.
Ladies and gentlemen, Mozilla.
Can you blame him for going bananas?
A year ago this place didn’t exist.
Today it’s the fastest growing firm in the digital world worth more than $100 a share before the stock split.
May I have a magic cookie.
A magic cookie.
Netscape makes magic cookies among other things, principally the most popular program for browsing the World Wide Web, Netscape Navigator.
By the way, what is the magic cookie?
When you as a new user of navigator, first access the Netscape server on the net, the server issues you a unique cookie.
Which then gets passed back to the Netscape server every time you come back.
So we know for a fact that over 10 million unique people have access to Netscape homepage.
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Which means 15 million people use his program, which he began as a student at the National Center for supercomputing barely two years ago for 100 bucks a week.
These days he’s posing for the likes of fortune and Businessweek.
Are you flustered by it or are you just bothered by all this publicity?
You hate it don’t?
Well, I just I don’t think it’s interesting beyond how it helps the company.
Which you’re an interesting guy to a lot of people.
That’s kinda scary.
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Has success changed Mark?
Well, he has five computers any computer he wants.
So does he have a corner office a penthouse with a view?
No, it’s got a cubicle like everybody else this is it.
And like some of the other programmers he enjoys a good candy bar once in a while.
The congratulatory bottles on the shelves remain on open however, and this is really cool.
Check this out.
We found this in his file cabinet.
This is every issue of digital dispatch from CNET online.
Pretty smart guy.
And you know how Bill Gates has a couple of half million dollar sports cars.
Mark drives a Mustang.
It’s a car.
It’s a Mustang.
It’s a Ford.
They’re one thing.
She was employee number two.
I was employee number three.
Yeah, what kind of a guy is he?
[INAUDIBLE] yeah $20, $30, $40, $100, $200.
We are trying to get him into long pants.
I have threatened I don’t know how many times.
Today Mark definitely wears the pants in this family as director of technology he’s responsible for keeping Netscape at the leading edge.
And he uses the net to do it.
First by spending a half hour each morning reading the news.
A lot of the computer press these days says Daily News.
So I read that I read a lot of, you know, World News, US News, business news and so on.
I read CNN.
There’s a concept.
I read the Wall Street Journal.
I read all these, These things online.
What’s Netscape secret?
Netscape secret, is in the middle of an exploding market.
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The demand for software in this market is just going, through the roof.
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