High stakes, no prisoners
High Stakes, No Prisoners is a sharp, brilliant insider's account of the way Silicon Valley really works: the sharks, powerful incumbents, and old-boy networks who play hardball all the time and the geniuses who make the products that have changed the world. Charles Ferguson started Vermeer Technologies and turned his very cool, very big idea into FrontPage, the first software product for creating and managing a website. A mere twenty months after starting the company, he sold it to Microsoft for $133 million, making a fortune for himself and his associates. FrontPage now has millions of users and is bundled with Microsoft Office. But getting there wasn't always fun. High Stakes, No Prisoners is the book about the Valley and reflects Ferguson's unique experience not only as a successful entrepreneur but also as a policy analyst, computer industry consultant, and academic. Reveals A Great Internet Success Story High Stakes, No Prisoners is a highly personal account of what it really takes to win as a high-technology startup, especially in the Internet industry, where any speed below warp nine doesn't get you to takeoff. From securing venture capital to getting both the strategy and the technology right, from dealing with Microsoft's power to working with some of the quirkiest, smartest people on the planet, it's all here. The Valley story has never been told with this much depth and honesty.
Stats for nerds
18recommend
35mentions
21people
2007–2026years
74% recommend23% neutral3% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- It may have been, I never used it, but it was also a very early, innovative (at the time) product made by a company called Vermeer.
There is a truly fascinating, and even inspiring, book about the company and the sale of FrontPage to Microsoft: https://www.amazon.com/High-Stakes-No-Prisoners-Internet/dp/...
- We need more knowledge sharing on the topic of negotiating with VCs. Charles Ferguson's book was good, followed by the Venture Hacks blog from AngelList, https://www.amazon.com/High-Stakes-No-Prisoners-Internet/dp/...
What we have here is a rare thing - an unvarnished account by an insider of what it took to make a deal with the VC sharks during the dawn of the Internet Age and come out of it with something you could take to the bank. You wont find many other tech business books giving such a detailed account from start to finish. Though it is lacking on the technical side, the view from the 'money guys' is pretty detailed. It is pretty amazing to realize the whole arc of the story is only about two years.. To then leverage his proceeds into some constructive social documentaries like 'Inside Job' is a great second act.. - One of the best things about FrontPage is the book that Charles Ferguson wrote about starting it, building it, and selling it to Microsoft: High Stakes, No Prisoners: A Winner's Tale of Greed and Glory in the Internet Wars.
- Documentary director rather than TV showrunner, Charles Ferguson was the founder of Vermeer which created FrontPage, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Ferguson_(filmmaker)
He also wrote one of the best startup failure-and-recovery books, "High Stakes, No Prisoners", https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2719001
- OK, you're a minority shareholder in a company and the founder screws you on the exit. This does happen. It can be perfectly legal. There's an illuminating and apropos anecdote about Steve Jobs and Pixar in Charles Ferguson's High Stakes, No Prisoners that I haven't seen printed elsewhere that might even be true.
Do you ever invest in one of his ventures again?
The idea that the investor is at fault if he gets hoodwinked is logic of the con man though: the mark is equally at fault!!!
- I highly recommend Charles Ferguson's "Computer Wars" on this topic, as well as his other book (about startups and the early Web), "High Stakes, No Prisoners."
