Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 463 posts

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#121

Post by bzbarsky »

yuhong wrote: post #105
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They still do it: https://get.adobe.com/reader/ (Checked today, Windows 10, while using Edge. Default checked on this page is to also install Chrome.) It's worth noting that Sundar Pichai's claim to fame at Google, prior to Chrome itself, was getting the Google Toolbar installed on everyone's PCs whether they wanted it or not. The CEO of Google isn't just a fan of software installation dark patterns like this, he's t…

Google Toolbar was one of the better browser toolbars AFAIK though.

That's a pretty low bar.

But in terms of the ethical question, we're now talking about how if I break into your house to steal all your unhealthy potato chips that's better than if I break into your house to steal your money. The fundamental problem is breaking into your house.

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#122

Post by bzbarsky »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #96
bzbarsky wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the people who ended up with Chrome installed and set as their default browser because they installed some other application (like Flash) were using Chrome willingly, right? Yes, Google was doing that sort of thing for Chrome distribution for a while. They've stopped since, which is better than nothing, I guess. [Edit: apparently they haven't stopped, according to ocdtrekkie's comment! Or maybe they have started…

They still do it: https://get.adobe.com/reader/ (Checked today, Windows 10, while using Edge. Default checked on this page is to also install Chrome.) It's worth noting that Sundar Pichai's claim to fame at Google, prior to Chrome itself, was getting the Google Toolbar installed on everyone's PCs whether they wanted it or not. The CEO of Google isn't just a fan of software installation dark patterns like this, he's t…

Huh. I hadn't realized they were still doing it. :( Thank you for checking that!

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#123

Post by jackcosgrove »

GCA10 wrote: post #57

Big companies seem to step in the same puddle, every time they try to set up one of these "breakthrough incubator" projects. They pick fascinating projects. They hire lots of smart people and give them great autonomy. But they inadvertently set up incentives that lead to the repeated creation of LINS (lavishly impractical non-solutions). And then the plug gets pulled. I think the key problem is that the research team…

"I'm not sure how to fix this."

I'd say it's an unsolvable problem, and that's good!

What breakthrough projects are good at is pushing the envelope and inventing whole new technologies. These technologies are then experimented with by smaller firms a few years later, and the winners of this scramble bring the technology to market.

This is a spaghetti against the wall kind of market research; I think it's impossible to solve the problem of how to identify a new market and win it over. You can definitely have an informed approach that reduces risk, but it's not a technical problem that can be systematically solved.

There will always be risk where there is reward. If it was possible to systematically identify new business opportunities, there would be many more players in the entrepreneurship business, and commensurately lower profits. In fact, an "informed approach" can sometimes lead you to discount real opportunities as too pie-in-the-sky.

We need different risk propositions to make an economy with more niches for different kinds of people. I don't think the difficulty of identifying new breakthrough businesses (presumably with breakthrough profits) is a problem at all.

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#124

Post by RandomOpinion »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #118
Periodic wrote: post #11

So many companies try to emulate how Google works. There are multiple books, hundreds or thousands of articles. People speculate on the perks, the review structure, the hierarchy, the autonomy. However, when other companies try to imitate Google they always fail because they're missing a crucial piece: Billions of dollars in ad revenue Google doesn't work the way it does to be successful. It works that way because it…

This is exactly correct. If you have a printing press that is dumping a couple of billon dollars into the basement every quarter in spite of what you're spending, you have the luxury of trying all sorts of novel things from a business perspective. That said, the margins on the search advertising business are shrinking, and have been for years now. You can cover for that by eliminating profligate spending and then eve…

>When that happens, Google is going to have to start rewarding operational efficiency gains at least as strongly as they currently reward popular science project type gains. And then it will be very interesting to see how they change and if the era of "but Google offers its employees ..." will be over.

One has only to look at Microsoft to see an example of what might happen. Things were very carefree there as well back in the '90s during their heyday when growth seemed limitless.

It's also interesting to contrast Google / MS with Amazon, where Bezos has kept a tight rein on operational efficiency all along. They probably won't suffer as much when they reach their growth ceiling.

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#125

Post by tzakrajs »

MrZongle2 wrote: post #85
VeejayRampay wrote: post #46

That Porat person is a serious contender for buzzkill of the year. Google makes tons of money with ads and spends it on geeky experiments to try to push a futuristic envelope (and create an environments where they can sell more ads, like a self-driving car) we'll all benefit from eventually and she gets to be the person that locks the toys away because "financial discipline".

Buzzkill? Sure. But she also sounds like one of the few responsible adults in the place with a hand on the purse-strings, whose job is to ensure that there is an Alphabet and Google in 10 years, shiny toys be damned.

There will be an Alphabet or a Google in 10 years but it will look eerily similar to the aging behemoths of Silicon Valley today that take paltry swipes at different markets while their main revenue source slowly dwindles (up until the point they are bought by a holding company).

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#126

Post by forgottenpass »

draw_down wrote: post #58

It's funny to me that investors and biz press are surprised that Brin & Page meant what they said in the 2004 letter.

Ideals like that are the sort of thing you expect companies to abandon after a few years. And the idealism has been draining from google for years. It barely exists anymore beyond internal-facing perks and their cult-ish belief that their shit doesn't stink.

That letter also included the famous "don't be evil." Does anyone really think that in a few hundred years time, people aren't going to look back and laugh at the feeble rationalizations that have currently taken hold to convince otherwise clued-in people that the most pervasive surveillance apparatus in the world isn't at least a little bit evil?

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#127

Post by tzakrajs »

cooper12 wrote: post #31

I'm no businessman, but does anyone else feel this will kill a lot of potential innovation? Not every project pays dividends immediately, and some are worth pursuing even at a long-term loss. (imagine if we all had fiber today and bandwidth was ridiculously abundant. Just how different would the internet be, just as when electricity became abundant?) Also I understand that Google is a business, but the need for a bus…

Not only this but people come and apply at Google because of the moonshots, not the ad business.

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#128

Post by user5994461 »

matwood wrote: post #68
Periodic wrote: post #11

So many companies try to emulate how Google works. There are multiple books, hundreds or thousands of articles. People speculate on the perks, the review structure, the hierarchy, the autonomy. However, when other companies try to imitate Google they always fail because they're missing a crucial piece: Billions of dollars in ad revenue Google doesn't work the way it does to be successful. It works that way because it…

Reminds me of Valve's no manager management style: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-04-27/why-there... When you have a lot of money, a lot of things work because you have a lot of money. You often see the same thing with people trying to emulate pro-athletes training methods. A genetically gifted pro-athlete can often succeed in spite of their training, and not necessarily because of their training.

I think you and the parent commenter are missing a critical points.

These companies were successful because of what they were, and they continue to be successful because of what they are.

It is a virtuous circle living on money, people, management and many more characteristics that go together.

Re: Google Makes So Much Money, It Never Had to Worry About Financial Discipline

#129

Post by johan_larson »

VeejayRampay wrote: post #46

That Porat person is a serious contender for buzzkill of the year. Google makes tons of money with ads and spends it on geeky experiments to try to push a futuristic envelope (and create an environments where they can sell more ads, like a self-driving car) we'll all benefit from eventually and she gets to be the person that locks the toys away because "financial discipline".

More control was pretty much a given as the company grew. When an operation is small and doesn't do anything particularly important, you can be casual about a lot of things. It just doesn't make sense to formalize everything. But once the operation is big and doing important things, control and visibility and process become increasingly important.

Something like this was going to happen. Hurray for Google for doing it before rather than after some major disaster or embarrassment.

Post reply on HN