Today I happened across an interesting speech on YouTube from the always engaging CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt. The speech was made on June 9th, 2008 at the exclusive Economic Club of Washington, D.C. and it is available below for those who wish to watch it. If you don’t have the time I compiled a rough list of statistics, thoughts and quotes from Mr. Schmidt that I related below. Incidentally, the introduction by the venerable Vernon Jordan is lengthy but well worth the time; after looking up Mr. Jordan online I am definitely going to read his memoirs – a fascinating man.
Speech Notes in Point Form:
When discussing the growth of the Internet Mr. Schmidt discussed burgeoning countries such as:
- China where over 50% of all Internet users are in their early 20s and live in rural areas
- In India mainstream Internet use is accelerating and the country is a powerhouse for mobile phone use.
He then noted some interesting stats:
- There are currently over 500 million registered domains,
- There are at least 120 million blogs with, he noted humorously, an average of only 1 reader each,
- There are 30 million photos uploaded to Google per day “in one form or another” he said,
- There are currently 3.3 billion mobile phone users,
- Every minute 10 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube,
After these introductory statistics Eric Schmidt then launched an example of the combined power of Google Sky, Google Maps and Google Street View. A dramatic presentation illustrated the immense combined power of the three Google applications and how generally inconceivable it is to imagine 100 times the power of technology that is expected 10 years from now (Moores Law).
In the following exerpts from his speech Eric Schmidt relates Google’s values based on open technology and knowledge:
- “Open beats closed and competition is better.”
- When addressing the future of the Internet Mr. Schmidt captured what is required to be successful in the present and future Internet eloquently with this quote: “The traditional model of control and exclusivity and so forth is replaced by speed and distribution.”
To round off his presentation Mr. Schmidt provided some business advice:
- He feels strongly about “establishing a principle of yes” with employees to bolster positivity.
- When hiring outside contracters Google requires them to provide a single sentence overview at the end of every week describing what was completed that week. He noted that this is more difficult than is imagined but it is a good practice for ensuring work is being completed.
- It is understood that every discussion at Google must begin with facts.
And that’s all folks. Eric Schmidt did answer some questions from the audience that were pretty interesting but my notes are spotty on that; if you are interested I suggest skipping ahead and watching that portion of the video.