Burn Rate - by Michael Wolff (Paperback)

About the Book

This wickedly funny chronicle of Wolff's rags to riches adventures as a fledgling Internet entrepreneur exposes an industry powered by hype, celebrity, and investment dollars.

Book Synopsis

From the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Fire and Fury and Siege: Trump Under Fire--Michael Wolff's wickedly funny chronicle of his rags-to-riches-to-rags adventure as a fledgling Internet entrepreneur exposes an industry powered by hype, celebrity, and billions of investment dollars, and notably devoid of profit-making enterprises.

As he describes his efforts to control his company's burn rate--the amount of money the company consumes in excess of its income--Wolff offers a no-holds-barred portrait of unaccountable successes and major disasters, including the story behind Wired magazine and its fanatical founder, Louis Rossetto; the rise of America Online, perhaps the most dysfunctional successful company in history, and the humiliating inability of people such as Bill Gates to untangle the intricacies of the Web.

From the Back Cover

Michael Wolff's wickedly funny chronicle of his rags-to-riches-to-rags adventure as a fledgling Internet entrepreneur exposes an industry powered by hype, celebrity, and billions of investment dollars -- and notably devoid of profit-making enterprises.

As he describes his efforts to control his company's burn rate -- the amount of money the company consumes in excess of its income -- Wolff offers a no-holds-barred portrait of unaccountable successes and major disasters, including the story behind Wired magazine and its fanatical founder, Louis Rossetto; the rise of America Online, perhaps the most dysfunctional successful company in history; and the humiliating inability of people such as Bill Gates to untangle the intricacies of the Web.

Review Quotes

Kurt Andersen columnist at The New Yorker Burn Rate is the real deal: a smart, thoughtful, funny, knowing, clear-eyed, candid and altogether exhilarating insider's chronicle of the new media business -- that is, the new media "business." If there's more honest and entertaining book on the digital revolution, I haven't seen it.

Amy Cortese Business Week Burn Rate is a hilarious and frightening account of the life of an Internet startup.

Deborah Stead The New York Times Burn Rate has a terrific feel for the crazy deals, the characters and the clashing bicoastal cultures of the Internet.

Michael Lewis author of Liar's Poker and Trail Fever Burn Rate is a delight to read. Michael Wolff shows that, in addition to a great deal of junk, the Internet may yet produce literature.

Peter Martin Financial Times Wolff has given us the best account of both the lure and the frustration of the Internet.

Peter McGrath Newsweek ...the alternately hilarious and appalling story of Wolff's efforts to take his small Web publishing company into the big time by courting investors.

About the Author

Michael Wolff writes a weekly column about media for New York magazine and is a founding columnist of the Internet business magazine The Industry Standard. He is the creator of the bestselling NetGuide and the thirty-title series of NetBooks. He is the author of White Kids and the coauthor of Where We Stand, which became a multipart PBS television series. He lives in New York City.