0:00 In August 1998, Sun Microsystems co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim wrote a one-hundred-thousand-dollar check to a company called "Google Incorporated." The only problem was, Google Incorporated didn't exist.0:13 Wait, so he wrote a check to a phantom company?0:17 He did.0:17 And the two Stanford PhD students he wrote it for, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, had to scramble to actually incorporate just so they could cash it.0:27 In our episode on the secret recipes of iconic brands, we looked at stories the press releases leave out.0:34 Well, this one...0:36 this one is ALL secret recipe.0:38 Okay, so the official story is two geniuses in a garage invent the future.0:43 You're saying it was more...0:45 accidental?0:46 Waaay more accidental.0:47 For starters, they didn't want to start a company at all.0:51 They were academics.0:52 The project wasn't even called Google at first.0:56 It was called Backrub.0:57 Backrub?0:58 Seriously?0:58 Why?0:59 Because their entire idea was based on analyzing the web's "back links." At the time, search engines like AltaVista just counted how many times a word appeared on a page.1:10 It was clumsy.1:11 Right, I remember that.1:13 You'd search for something and get a million junk results.1:17 Exactly.1:17 Page and Brin's idea was different.1:20 They thought a link from one page to another was like a vote.1:24 A page with more votes—more back links—was more important.1:28 It was a system built on reputation, not just keywords.1:32 Huh.1:32 That's so simple, but it's also...1:35 profound.1:35 It treats the web like a community, not just a database.1:39 But if it was so good, why didn't they want to build a business?1:43 Because they thought commerce would corrupt it.1:47 They wrote a paper in 1998 basically saying that advertising-funded search engines would always be biased toward the advertisers, not the users.1:57 They even tried to sell their technology to Yahoo for a million dollars.2:02 And Yahoo said no?2:03 They said no.2:04 They didn't see the value.2:05 So Page and Brin were kind of stuck with this world-changing technology that nobody would buy and that they, themselves, didn't want to turn into a business.2:16 So that brings us back to the check.2:19 Bechtolsheim sees a demo, loves it, and just writes a check on the spot?2:24 Pretty much.2:25 He said, "Instead of us discussing all the details, why don't I just write you a check?" And that hundred grand sat in a desk drawer for weeks while they figured out the legal paperwork to become a real company.2:39 That's incredible.2:40 So the company was basically willed into existence by its first investor.2:45 Which brings up the most famous part of the Google origin story for me: the motto.2:51 "Don't Be Evil." Right.2:53 And everyone thinks it's this, you know, high-minded moral philosophy.2:58 It's not?2:58 It was a weapon.2:59 It was a direct, pointed attack on every other search engine at the time.3:04 Remember that paper they wrote about advertising corrupting search?3:09 Mm-hm.3:09 "Don't Be Evil" was the marketing version of that.3:13 It was a promise.3:14 It meant, "Unlike our competitors, we won't manipulate your search results for money.3:20 Our results are pure." It wasn't about being generally virtuous; it was a specific, strategic claim about the integrity of their product.3:29 It was a business strategy disguised as a moral one.3:33 Wow.3:33 So it was less "we're saints" and more "our competitors are crooked, and we're not." That...3:39 that changes everything about how I see that phrase.3:43 It was their sharpest competitive edge.3:46 They defined "evil" as the other guy's business model.3:49 And look at them now.3:51 The irony is staggering.3:53 A company founded on the principle that advertising corrupts search now makes almost all its money—hundreds of billions of dollars—from advertising.4:03 And that's the story nobody likes to tell.4:06 The company that exists today is the very thing its founders warned against in their own academic papers.4:13 They were reluctant entrepreneurs who built a system they believed had to be shielded from commerce.4:20 But commerce won.4:21 I mean, it didn't just win, it conquered.4:24 It always does.4:25 They set out to build a library for the world, a pure index of knowledge.4:30 But that uncashed check on a desk drawer wasn't the beginning of a library.4:35 It was the down payment on the biggest advertising machine in human history.4:40 And you have to wonder...4:42 did they see that coming?4:44 Or did they just stop seeing it as evil?
