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He's Young, He's Hot, And He's Here: By David Bank, Mercury News Staff Writer 05/16/1994 MARC ANDREESSEN is 22. Jim Clark is 50. Andreessen earned $6.85 an hour as a researcher at a university lab. Clark made millions as the founder and chairman of Silicon Graphics Inc. But the young computer programmer has changed the veteran entrepreneur's thinking about the future course of the information revolution. Andreessen convinced Clark that it is the personal computer and the Internet -- and not the television -- that will bring the information superhighway into the homes of millions of Americans. Now Clark, a bespectacled wine connoisseur, is betting a chunk of his personal fortune on Andreessen, a tall, blond junk-food addict. So what makes Marc Andreessen so special? Andreessen insists he doesn't know. But colleagues and former employers use words like "instinct" and "foresight" and "natural leader" to describe Andreessen's abilities to visualize where technology is headed, build a team and put in the long hours needed to get there. Andreessen made his reputation by developing Mosaic, the software that is unlocking the potential of the global Internet. A little more than a year after it was introduced, more than a million people are already using it. The software is being called the Internet's "killer application," the breakthrough that has begun to fulfill the vision of early computer pioneers who dreamed of linking all information in the world in a seamless web. Mosaic gives computer users, for the first time, an easy way to click quickly between related sources of information stored in different computers located around the world. And it has made it much simpler for publishers to put documents and graphics on "the worldwide web," causing an explosion of information offerings and user demand. ''He was able to integrate all this together," said Larry Smarr, director of the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where Mosaic was developed as a not-for-profit project. ''What Marc contributed was a very clean system that integrated all of these ideas, all of which have very deep lineages in the computer world." Now, Clark has tapped Andreessen, who has not yet received his college diploma in the mail, as the vice president for technology for Mosaic Communications Corp., his new Mountain View start-up company. His new mandate is to develop an upgraded, commercial version of Mosaic that will help turn the Internet into a popular, mass-market medium. The success of that effort will move the Internet even further away from its roots as a virtually free, egalitarian network without commercial content. In the future, information consumers and information providers will both pay for network use. ''The Internet is now in the middle of a transition to a full consumer network," Andreessen said. "Nobody planned it. It's thoroughly out of control. And that's a good thing." Long-term plan The company's long-term plan is to scoop the telephone and cable companies and make the Internet the operating system that delivers multimedia information and entertainment. The way Andreessen and Clark see it, it will take three to five years before the telephone and cable companies complete their new broadband networks of fiberoptic and coaxial cables. The telephone and cable companies are developing their own computer systems to deliver programming, such as 500 channels of television, video on demand and interactive games. During that time, the Internet, which already connects 20 million users, will continue to grow at an estimated 10 percent each month. By the time the new fiber-coax networks are built, the thinking goes, so many people will be used to using Mosaic to receive information that they will demand that it also be able to control what comes into the home via the cable systems. ''It will be your TV guide," Andreessen said. "This is the opportunity for us to come in below the radar screen. By the time the switched broadband network comes into being, we will already be there." Hacker's dream Andreessen has been living a computer hacker's dream since he received an electronic mail message from Clark at the end of January. ''Any way that we might be able to collaborate would be of interest
to me," Clark wrote in his e-mail. For six weeks, the two talked or exchanged e-mail nearly every day. Clark brought some employees from Silicon Graphics into the discussion. Ideas were floated and discarded for a start-up company that could make money on the coming information superhighway. The most promising possibility was the creation of an on-line network for Nintendo, the huge video game company. Clark and Andreessen even wrote white papers outlining the potential project. Then, after a bottle of expensive red wine at Clark's Atherton home, Andreessen tossed out a thought. ''Maybe the Internet already is the information superhighway," he said. At the time, Clark said, he didn't really know what the Internet was. Now he's a convert, and Andreessen has financial backing for an ambitious project, jobs for all of his college buddies, and a red 1994 Mustang. ''He's a gifted leader," Clark said. "I have that same leadership ability and it's fascinating to see that in him. He's quite willing to go after and pursue an idea. There's not many people like that." Andreessen might seem an unlikely candidate for computer industry visionary. As a kid in New Lisbon, Wis., he dabbled in computer programming, but by high school, he had exhausted the possibilities of early personal computers and lost interest. He preferred basketball. In college, he dropped out of the electrical engineering department because he said he had no aptitude for physics. He transferred to computer sciences, but cut classes as often as possible and barely paid attention when he did attend. The then-budding Internet caught his interest. He was working in a physics lab and saw scientists using computers to share ideas and documents around the world. ''It reoriented my whole thinking about technology," he said. But the Internet was still the province of researchers able to master its complex commands. ''The foundation was completely laid for someone to write a program that did everything right," Andreessen said. "At that time it seemed perfectly obvious for a bunch of hackers to actually sit down and write a program." Worked 80 hours a week Andreessen enlisted Eric Bina, a top-flight programmer at the supercomputing center. For two months, the two worked more than 80 hours a week. Andreessen lived on Pepperidge Farm Nantucket chocolate chip cookies and milk. Bina subsisted on Mountain Dew and Skittles. Andreessen attracted other programmers to the team to develop versions
for Windows and Macintosh computers. ''When I saw it, I was stunned," said Smarr, the center's director, who hadn't known about the project until he wandered into a demonstration. "I said, 'This is going to be incredibly big. We've got to let everybody know about this stuff.' " The supercomputing center distributed Mosaic free to individual users and licensed it for commercial applications. The software has been downloaded more than 250,000 times. With additional copies, Smarr estimates there are more than 1 million users. Mosaic fuels Internet Mosaic unleashed the World Wide Web, which has fueled the growth of the Internet ever since. In November 1992, the Web was responsible for 60 megabytes of information flowing over the Internet's backbone every month. Now that number has grown to 600,000 megabytes -- a 10,000-fold increase. Mosaic has made it possible for corporations to use the Web to store huge volumes of data. Photo collections, compilations of speeches and even whole libraries are now available. A flood of commercial ventures, including the local CommerceNet electronic commerce project, are possible only because of Mosaic. More changes are coming. There is a growing agreement that software such as Mosaic will play a key role in delivering multimedia information and entertainment. To do that, the software will have to be upgraded to be able to deliver full-motion video, synchronized sound and other features. Other companies are also trying to develop the next generation. At least nine companies have licensed the software and others, including Microsoft, are developing their own Internet navigators. ''There are many limitations to Mosaic," said John Gage, the chief scientist at Sun Microsystems Inc. "It's only 9,000 lines of code. But it's a brilliant synthesis." Second System Syndrome To beat competitors, Andreessen and his team have to combat Second System Syndrome, the sophomore jinx of computer programmers. The first version of Mosaic was done in obscurity, by hungry young hackers interested only in creating something "cool." Now, they've got carte blanche and sky-high expectations. Venture capitalists and other potential investors arrive daily. And Clark has quickly pushed Andreessen into Silicon Valley's spotlight to ensure that the young prodigy knows he cannot fail. Recently, Andreessen has taken to pacing the office and his apartment, the only sign that he is feeling the pressure. ''I enjoy doing things where I can't afford to screw up," he said. "And I think this thing is ours to screw up." All content © 1994 SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS
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