iPod debuts – eBay buys Paypal – San Jose Symphony shuts down – Friendster founded in Mountain View – Following a massive fire during its construction, Santana Row opens for business in October
New Year’s Therapy: Death of My Dotcom
Exodus, Metricom, At Home swallowed bitter bankruptcy medicine. Formerly unshakeable companies Intel, Cisco, Applied Materials and Hewlett-Packard mouthed the new L-word [layoffs, that is]. As the tech ripple started taking other industries down with it, support suits slipped off the edge as well. Fat Palo Alto tech law firm Cooley Godward blew out 85 members of the world’s favorite profession, and San Jose’s Ernst & Young office farted out 10 percent of its bean counters. Magazines like Industry Standard set new velocity standards for freefall, and newspapers, from big chain-owned dailies to independent weeklies like this one took paper cutters to their page sizes and employee rosters. Leonard Niles, Jan. 3. 2002
Best Laid Plans
Al DeGuzman’s hair is cut almost down to a clean shave, and his face is pale and puffy. … Craig Wormley, DeGuzman’s other attorney, said that the young man’s degenerating spirit might have more to do with a tape that was played on Thursday, the second day of his trial. The 20-minute recording was made by DeGuzman the night before his arrest. On it, he speaks of the destruction he intended to cause at De Anza College, and how, before ending his own life with a bullet, he would use guns and homemade bombs to kill “at least 20 humans.” Alex Ionides, April 18, 2002 [DeGuzman made good on his threat to take his life Aug. 8 while serving a sentence for the De Anza plot.]
Broad Embrace
Actually, the early reviews are good for the landslide winner of California’s historic recall election. No less an authority than Jerry Brown, who was the last California governor of any particular interest to the public and who created Gray Davis by making him his chief of staff, says of the advent of Arnold: “There is a refreshing note to all of this.” Schwarzenegger, the maverick Democratic mayor of Oakland notes, “ran against special interests, said he’ll do right by the people and has shown unprecedented goodwill with bipartisan appointments to his transition team.” Bill Bradley, Oct. 30, 2002
