But that’s what Lewis does in “The New New Thing” (Norton. $25.95), dwelling for pages on the voyages of the good ship Hyperion. This is because the computer-controlled boat was the obsession of his subject: Jim Clark, the former chairman of Silicon Graphics who went on to start Netscape and, in the mind of Michael Lewis, became singlehandedly responsible for the Internet, the New Economy and the internal-combustion engine. OK, Lewis doesn’t give Clark credit for the last. But his relentless hyping of his subject is an annoying leitmotif.
True, Netscape was a pivotal com- pany and Clark is an important figure. And if his new company, Healtheon, becomes a success, he will be even more worthy of attention. But Lewis’s coverage of Healtheon reflects Clark’s surprising lack of interest in the workings of the firm he founded in 1996 to Internetize the health-care industry. (Already chasing the next new thing, Clark leaves the implementation to others.) Fascinating issues arise from the nature of such an enterprise: Lewis, however, explores mainly hiring, stock options and financing arrangements.
Nothing by Michael Lewis is boring, though; he has a natural talent for spinning hilarious scenes and uncovering wicked details. These skills work to strange effect here; they undercut the hagiography and, perhaps unintentionally, skewer the merry wealthmaker Clark. Here’s a guy who reaps more than a billion bucks while hardly paying attention–and makes his official residence in Florida so he can duck state taxes. When his plane drops down to his Plainview, Texas, hometown, he makes his mom drive to the airport to see him. Clark’s also a hypocrite: Lewis credits Clark for initiating the Justice Department antitrust suit against Microsoft by siccing lawyers on Bill Gates for monopolistic practices–but Clark hopes to create an even bigger monopoly himself, by forcing every patient who buys a prescription drug or visits a doctor to pay a fee to Healtheon. And for all Clark’s talk about how he wants the Internet to empower the little guy, his new new company, myCFO, is an effort to provide financial services to the superrich, with the goal of creating a “cartel” so that multimillionaires like him will get even more power. By the end of “The New New Thing,” this reader, at least, was hoping not only that Jim Clark’s new company would fail but that his yacht would run aground.
Michael Lewis, though, is still appar- ently in awe of his subject, giving us a wink and a nudge when Clark talks about building an even bigger boat. It’s enough to make those of us who love New New Things nostalgic for the old ones.
