larry page wedding

Now that the "who attended which conference this week" gossip chatter is over, we have a bigger question: Who is attending Larry Page's wedding today? As previously reported, Larry is getting married today and Searcharazzi is reporting to you live from an undisclosed location at the island location, if only in our minds.

In any case, Searcharazzi has spent the better half of the month gathering the details of Larry's and Lucy Southworth's pending nuptials, to be hosted by Richard Branson on Necker Island. A special thanks to Valleywag's spies for keeping a virtual wedding planner with all the details: Here are some of the juicier bits:

Celeb guests, why John Battelle and Al Gore won't attend, and the surprise best man after the jump...


The San Fran Chronicle first pegged the wedding date as December 8.

Lucy's sister is actress Carrie Southworth, who is married to Coddy Johnson, the field director of George W. Bush's 2004 presidential campaign , who is in turn the son of George W's Yale roommate, Clay Johnson. Oh, and Coddy's also the Prez's godson.

While it is rumored that a total of three Presidents will attend the wedding, Al Gore will not, as he will receive his Nobel Peace Prize at a ceremony in Oslo, Norway, the following Monday. While that's a better excuse than "I have to wash my hair," there are numerous reports of private planes being sent around the globe to fetch guests.

Today, the Times Online revealed that the Clintons will not be attending, as the Mrs. is in Iowa campaigning. It has been rumored that President Carter will.

The guest list of 600 also includes Bono, but not John Battelle, who will reportedly be at a friend's birthday in Morrocco. Leonardo DiCaprio and Johnny Depp will also make an appearance. Oh, and all the guests have singed confidentiality agreements.

And while Reuters says that Branson is to be the best man, Valleywag raised some questions on why Larry's brother or Sergey were passed over, if this is true.

The wedding of Larry Page, the co-founder of Google, on Sir Richard Branson's luxury Caribbean island has generated a swirl of excitement despite attempts to keep the nuptials private.

Up to 600 people were expected to witness Page tie the knot with doctoral student Lucy Southworth on Necker Island, Branson's 74-acre British Virgin Islands hideaway.

The Virgin boss's involvement reportedly even stretched to performing the best man's duties for his fellow billionaire.

Page had been labelled one of the world's most eligible bachelors, with a fortune estimated at $18.5bn (￡9.1bn). Attempts to keep details of the bash under wraps were not wholly successful, with various US newspapers and blogs reporting details from the exclusive gathering.

Technology blog Valleywag claimed that the wedding, which was scheduled for Saturday, was delayed a day after a tropical storm shook up the carefully laid plans.

Google declined to confirm whether or not its president of products had followed Sergey Brin into matrimonial bliss. A UK spokeswoman said the search giant would have "no idea" about Page's personal life.

A quick search of Google yields plenty of information about the event, however.

Necker Island, for examples, costs upwards of $46,000 (￡22,500) a night to rent. The guests were booked into the nearby island of Virgin Gorda, with wedding planners reportedly booking every available hotel room six months ago.

Lucy Southworth was first identified as Page's girlfriend in early 2006. She is studying for a doctorate in biomedical informatics at Stanford University and holds an MSc from Oxford. Page stopped working on his own Stanford PhD in computer science in 1998 to develop Google instead.

The prestigious guest list apparently included the Clintons, along with Hollywood stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Jonny Depp.

But Hillary Clinton was in Iowa campaigning for the Democratic Party presidential nomination, while husband Bill worked the crowds in South Carolina. Former Vice President Al Gore was also invited, but he was in Stockholm to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.

Valleywag's in-depth coverage of the event even ran to identifying Page's choice of portable lavatory. Royal Restrooms, it said, were contracted to provide their "regal portable restroom experience".

Royal Restrooms says its mobile units are designed to provide disaster relief � ideal if Saturday's tropical storm caused widespread disruption on Necker.

Brin married Anne Wojcicki in Ma
on your wedding day! That's one big fat whopping GOTCHA! Maybe not quite as evil as censoring search results at the direction of Chinese censors, but still, at least a little embarrassing, especially after all of last week's hoopla about Google's plans to save the world via investments in renewable energy.

Let's put aside the question of whether purchasing carbon offsets could balance out the toxic effects of this Caribbean wedding. Since Page and Sergey Brin already buy offsets for their regular jet travel, one suspects arrangements may already have been made to offset the wedding. But even if they haven't, Google's investments in renewable energy, the solar power panels in Mountain View, and the personal stake Page and Brin have in promising start-ups such as Nanosolar would likely qualify, informally, as one big offset.

But that's not the real issue. Matthews' point seems to be more along the lines of: If you're going to make a big deal about climate change, then you should live accordingly. And if you're going to state in your company's prospectus that the corporate motto is "Don't Be Evil" then you had damn well better live a life of unsullied perfection. Call it the Al Gore standard.

Taken to extremes, of course, such a stance requires that everyone who considers themselves an environmentalist or who is worried about global warming eschew all the trappings of industrial civilization and live like some kind of combination of reclusive monk and noble savage. That's a standard of straight-edge purity that few can live up to, and those who do are a pain in the ass to be around at parties. In my own life, I am presented daily with a tapestry of hypocrisies, large and small. My 10-year-old minivan gets sucky gas mileage, I use too much water when I wash the dishes, I occasionally eat farm-raised shrimp from Thailand, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. The list of my imperfections is endless.

But we all muddle through. We are inconsistent, yes. We make some bad choices, yes. But we console ourselves with the belief that we are headed in the right direction, however we define it. We aspire to do better, and that gets us through the day; otherwise we would simply collapse in a pool of existential despair, paralyzed by the realization that just by being alive, we are doing incalculable damage to the earth.

It is true that, by in effect tattooing the words "don't be evil" on their collective foreheads, Page and Brin set themselves up for inevitable failure, not to mention endless carping from critics. Maybe they should have just said, "We aspire not to be evil, even though we know occasionally we will be found wanting." Hmm, not