The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison
by Mike Wilson · first published 1997
47% recommend53% neutral
Why HN recommends it
An inside look at Oracle's rise and the management style of its founder, Larry Ellison. It offers a worthwhile, entertaining account of the company's early history and aggressive tactics.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
A recent Forbes listed Larry Ellison as the fifth richest man in the world, and the second richest active player (behind Bill Gates of Microsoft) in the technology world. Oracle Corporation, of which he is founder and CEO, is the fastest-growing software database company in the world. Oracle software allows people to withdraw cash from an ATM, make an airline reservation and hook up your TV to the Internet. Ellison began Oracle with a $1,200 investment and doubled its sales in eleven of its first twelve years. He is also a daredevil sportsman with a 78-foot yacht and a number of fast jets. Mik
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…the Age of Amazon Wallace, James and Jim Erickson (1992) Hard Drive: Bill Gates and Making of the Microsoft Empire Walton, Sam with John Huey (1992) Sam Walton: Made in America Wilson, Mike (1996) Difference between God and Larry Ellison: Inside Oracle Corp POLITICAL ECONOMY / THEORY / ECONOMIC HISTORY Arrighi, Giovanni (1994) Long Twentieth Century Braudel, Fernand (1979) Civilization & Capitalism 15th-18th Century, vol. 3: Perspective…
on “Ask HN: What are the must-read books about economics/finance?” ↗If you want to read about Larry Ellison's personality and his management style, you should read - "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison: Inside Oracle Corporation; God Doesn't Think He's Larry Ellison". (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/181369.The_Difference_Bet...) It's one of the best books written on him and the way he managed Oracle…
on “Larry Ellison Will Step Down as CEO of Oracle, Will Remain as CTO” ↗…Empires is pretty good: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accidental_Empires Where Wizards Stay Up Late - on the creation of the Internet The Soul of a New Machine - On computing in the 70's and 80's The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison - On the rise of Oracle (also has the best title) Masters of Doom - A history of id Software What The Dormouse Said - How the 60's counterculture influenced computing The New New Thing - Follows Jim…
on “Ask HN: Good Books on the History of Technology?” ↗If anyone wants to read more about Ellision, you should read The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison: God Doesn't Think He's Larry Ellison https://www.amazon.com/Difference-Between-God-Larry-Ellison/...
on “Watching Larry Ellison Become Larry Ellison (2014)” ↗…James and Jim Erickson (1992) Hard Drive: Bill Gates and Making of the Microsoft Empire Williams, Sam (2002) Free as in Freedom: Richard Stallman's Crusade for Free Software Wilson, Mike (1996) The Difference between God and Larry Ellison: Inside Oracle Corp
on “Ask HN: Computer Science/History Books?” ↗'The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison[0]', Mike Wilson. It's a worthwhile read, and I think the joke is funny. [0] - God doesn't think he's Larry Ellison
on “Oracle justified its JavaScript trademark with Node.js–now it wants that ignored” ↗…books quite helpful, inspiring even. Here are a few I can remember now. I'll add some more later. Books Founders at Work Coders at Work Hackers and Painters iCon: Steve Jobs The Google Story The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison The Masters of Doom The First $20 Million Is Always the Hardest Bringing Nothing To The Party Kindly add to the list. Thanks.
on “Ask HN: Best Books about Startups” ↗…challenger position, which is the case for all the examples I cited? No. They acted like a big gorilla from the top. Oracle too is crazy aggressive. In one of the books I mentioned, but not by name, is "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison is that God Doesn't Think He Is Larry Ellison." Fantastic book. Go read it. It is absolutely possible to find exceptions. There are few absolutes. But I do believe that challengers to #1 who publicly…
on “Tech Leaders Don't Win By Saying They'll Crush Somebody” ↗For anyone interested in learning more about Larry Ellison and Oracle, I'd highly suggest "The difference between god and Larry Ellison (god doesn't think he's Larry Ellison)." Oracle is a 150 billion dollar company, similar in market cap to Intel. Once you've read histories on these people, it suddenly makes sense that Warren Buffet…
on “Watching Larry Ellison Become Larry Ellison” ↗(Why'd you delete the bit about "best HN pitch ever" -- that was hilarious). On your point about Military / Govt applications. This Larry biography: "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison: *God Doesn't Think He's Larry Ellison" This book is an insanely amazing read. Apparently, the CIA was one of their first clients, and Oracle was named after a failed CIA project (the book hints that…
on “Oracle Buys NetSuite for $9.3B” ↗Founders at Work was a good one. Some that I really liked (not all biographical per se, some more non-fiction, and many non-SV related): ------------Tech------------ "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison" (Oracle, Ellison, the birth of the DB) "The New New Thing" (about Jim Clark, netscape, SGI, what became webmd) "In the plex" (Google) "The Nudist on the Late Shift" (kind of like founders at work,…
on “Entrepreneurial Habits” ↗Interesting quote: "[...] Ellison’s relationship with his own cats was remarkable enough to deserve two mentions in his 1997 biography The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison (subtitle: “God Doesn’t Think He’s Larry Ellison”). Ellison’s biographer, journalist Mike Wilson, relays a story told to him by Ellison’s first wife, Adda Quinn. When Ellison’s cat Yitzhak died, Quinn…
on “Larry Ellison’s Cat Island” ↗For those not in on the joke, there's a biography titled "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison: God Doesn't Think He's Larry Ellison". https://www.amazon.com/Difference-Between-God-Larry-Ellison/...
on “Entrepreneurs Aren’t a Special Breed – They’re Mostly Rich Kids” ↗…offense but you're just injecting a trendy opinion without knowing anything about the man's history. Ellison was notorious even in the '90s-'00s and never made any real effort to hide it. The book "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison: God Doesn't Think He's Larry Ellison" (yes, that's its actual title) came out all the way back in 2003, the title being a quip that had already been circulating for many years by that time.
on “Larry Ellison: vast AI surveillance can ensure citizens are on best behavior (2024)” ↗I've recently read "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison *God Doesn't Think He's Larry Ellison" and while it was published over 10 years ago, this sounds exactly like a lot of things that happened in the book. The Oracle corporate culture seems to basically…
on ““Stop reverse engineering our code”” ↗