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

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

#171

Post by euyyn »

georgespencer wrote: post #142
caminante wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> After a while someone realised that a group of engineers were consistently booking shitty travel around the same time, and then travelling first class the rest of the year. How's that different than having an annual travel budget? Sounds like they sacrificed to feast later instead of holding accommodations constant at "above average." I think you did a good job telling the story, but maybe I'm missing how gaming tr…

Crucial point which I didn't communicate properly: they were block booking spurious/unnecessary travel well in advance (by years).

They still had to justify that travel expense in the corporate card, which is charged when the booking is made. So their managers must not have though of those trips as unnecessary.

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

#172

Post by return0 »

throwaway40483 wrote: post #83

This is the killer quote: “No one wants to face the reality that this is an advertising company with a bunch of hobbies.” It's so brutal but (IMHO) sums up Alphabet in one sentence.

I remember Thiel repeatedly made that point.

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

#173

Post by fudgie »

VikingCoder wrote: post #170
shuntress wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't use steam to find gems. Steam is just where you go to buy them.

Why don't they let people offer curated lists, right in Steam?

They do - http://store.steampowered.com/curators/recommendedcurators/

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

#174

Post by user5994461 »

bad_user wrote: post #168
user5994461 wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're just ad distributing products. Ever tried to install an adblocker on Android? There isn't anything you can do without rooting your phone. Seriously, it should be called Addroid. Ever tried to install adblock/ublock on Chrome? only to find out that it doesn't exist in the chrome store or was removed again.

Well, actually Android is the most friendly mobile platform for ad-blockers, or other hacks. What you're complaining about is Chrome for Android, but then again Android is also the only mobile platform supported by a real Firefox implementation that has plugins, including ad-blockers. You're talking about rooting the phone, I guess you want /etc/hosts or something, but you know, even on the desktop that kind of solut…

Note: Firefox on android has only supported plugins since a few months ago.

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

#176

Post by halwa »

VikingCoder wrote: post #170
shuntress wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't use steam to find gems. Steam is just where you go to buy them.

Why don't they let people offer curated lists, right in Steam?

They do, you just need to be the owner of a Steam Group. http://store.steampowered.com/curators/

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

#177

Post by euyyn »

espadrine wrote: post #37

Contrast Google's old way of managing bets with Tesla. When Google started working on self-driving cars, they went about it academically. They did not plan a sequence of stepping stones that they could sell. They meant to have a product in an indeterminate future which should be immediately perfect and better than a human, essentially not needing a wheel. Tesla went about it with an engineering perspective. First, ca…

> They meant to have a product in an indeterminate future which should be immediately perfect and better than a human, essentially not needing a wheel.

This isn't what happened. The first iteration of Google self-driving cars, the modified Lexus', had wheels alright. What Google found and told the industry was "almost autonomous seems to be more dangerous than not autonomous at all", explained by the driver getting bored and complacent. This isn't surprising to people doing Human Factors, and while Tesla certainly made money off ignoring it, the result has already been tragic.

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

#178

Post by htrp »

sbov wrote: post #169
user5994461 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And I'm making the point that they executed well because of what they are, and were from the start. Google didn't suddenly transformed to being Google overnight the day they reached the first $1B.

How many successful companies do the exact opposite of Google? Have you done any research to determine which company succeeded: in spite of, because of, or no effect, from these models? What about the - surely - hundreds or thousands of companies that failed with Google (or not Google's) model? Trying to imitate success seems to turn into a cargo cult. For whatever reason people seem to shutoff their brains when talk…

>How many successful companies do the exact opposite of Google? Have you done any research to determine which company succeeded: in spite of, because of, or no effect, from these models? What about the - surely - hundreds or thousands of companies that failed with Google (or not Google's) model?

Do you know of any examples offhand? Definitely agree that it's a virtuous cycle of talent -> revenue - > perks -> talent

>Trying to imitate success seems to turn into a cargo cult.

Love the apt description of this.

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

#180

Post by Animats »

patio11 wrote: post #98
gph wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which does seem like sort of a loophole. Don't companies have to add perks over a certain amount to the employees pay so that it gets taxed? Wouldn't feeding an employee every day qualify? It would be sort of weird if we turn back into having sort of 'company towns' where your employer provides a lot of what you need except they pay for it. It's not just Google this would be beneficial for, even if you run a factory…

Wouldn't feeding an employee every day qualify? Meals on the business' premises for the benefit of the business are not taxable income for employees (but are a deductible expense of the business). This is a black-letter IRS regulation; https://www.irs.gov/publications/p15b/ar02.html#en_US_2016_p... Meals are a sideshow, though; healthcare is where the real action is. If work buys you a Playstation you get taxed on ~$…

The company cafeteria was once a staple of American business. They usually were not free, but were below cost. It was just easier and cheaper for everybody than getting everybody out of the building and back.

I used to work for a subsidiary of an auto company, and I got a new company car every year. But those cars were used partly as test vehicles; they were maintained at the company garage by company employees, so they had a benchmark on maintenance problems. The company could make a tax case for that not being income. This only works if your employees are using your own product.

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