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Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

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Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#471

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is the parent comment overgeneralizing? The generalization jumping out at me is the grandparent's "all corporations are right-leaning by nature". The position of "corporations' executive decisions and internal culture can evolve separately" appears to be the nuanced one.

The 'left' (as opposed to Liberals) are anticapitalist. HN's brainworm infested "anytime someone calls something racist it's leftist" has very little to do with political theory or history. The left is anticapitalist _by definition_. Any movement not associated with unionization or anticapitalism is not leftist, but either right or liberal. If the majority of Google workers were leftist it would be structured like Mo…

How is this comment downvoted? It’s true.

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#472
Seems like Larry and Brin have re-created Soviet factory in full.

> The best way for a man to advance in the Communist hierarchy is to make speeches constantly at party and public meetings. [1]

* Workers' councils * Factory committies

Google in 1930 -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3draTawRFas

[1] https://books.google.pl/books?id=mNexJrn4wmgC&pg=RA4-PA4&lpg...

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#473
post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google throws away obscene amounts of money on non-adtech things. Some of those are pretty interesting and useful for humanity. You can say, well, those don't count, because Google isn't making money from them! But if you take that route, you also have to exclude all the startups working on "interesting" problems that don't and won't make money. You're left with a very small set of companies. I wouldn't be surprised…

Google is an ad company with delusions of grandure. It's nothing more, until it finds a way to turn a profit on its other ventures. (Just like those startups - realistically, until they turn a profit, they're just in the exploratory stage.)

Bell labs? Xerox PARC?

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Don't get me wrong. Google is still the best workplace with top notch pay, but as it's got big, it's also morphed into a typical big corporation with typical corporate politics. Sorry but I cannot stand that level of internal koolaid. I guess you also think that Google got the "smartest" people? There are literally thousands of companies working on problems way more interesting and with more stakes and upsides for…

> It is maybe the best place to work if you have no sense of ethics, want to take it easy, work 9 to 5 and maximize your money. Hey, that's me to a t. Google is not actually that great for that. The pay is average and they make too much of a song and dance about helping people, even if you're working on ML used to ferret out dissidents in China. The good companies for 9 to 5 casual evil are small >50 man shops which…

There are also huge federal contractors (defense, etc.) that the average consumer can't name because they aren't on anything the public comes in contact with.

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay is well above average. Regardless of what HN spews, Google foundationally made search and mobile more accessible around the world. I don't know what "great" company you work for but it's hard to top that for impact.

> Pay is well above average Depends on what you mean by average. When I talked to google I was looking at L5 for just over 300k with stock and bonus. In Evil Inc I was making well over over 500k all cash for the same job description.

Your location / interviews must have not been favorable. Most L5s pull more than that. Also the equity refreshes are far greater than other companies.

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#476
post #305

First. Thanks to HN for not demanding phone numbers: anonymity allows to say things that cannot be said. Second. Many googlers read HN. In some sense, HN is the extension of the internal forums. CNBC made a good summary and I can comment on each bullet point. Larry and Brin probably stopped attending because nothing important is said on TGIFs. More people -> more leaks -> less interesting information -> less attenden…

>> Don't get me wrong. Google is still the best workplace with top notch pay, but as it's got big, it's also morphed into a typical big corporation with typical corporate politics.

Such comments is what changed at Google. There are other excellent places to work at these days, like Microsoft (also Amazon) if you are interested in large scale cloud services and not advertisement.

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay is well above average. Regardless of what HN spews, Google foundationally made search and mobile more accessible around the world. I don't know what "great" company you work for but it's hard to top that for impact.

Yes Google did make search and mobile more accessible while helping itself to a big pile of money. Stop pretending that they did it out of the goodness of their hearts. Hate to break it to you but Google is just like any other business.

Oh so ? What's wrong with earning money ? What's wrong with having good impact while making money. That is what sustains impact and not a flash in the pan. Get off your high horse and respect what they have achieved. Businesses won't survive without money. HN's favorite browser Firefox gets a 300 million donation from Google. Without this Mozilla will slowly die. Of course you wouldn't mention this. Google money is now against your narrative right ? Also Google pulled out of the DoD contracts. Hate to break it to you none of your other businesses had the balls or people to do that.

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question: (you're on a throwaway, what's the harm in answering me, right?) What is there to buy into about pronouns? If my first name is Stan, named after my dad also named Stan, and my middle name is Jason, and my dad abandoned my family when I was young so I prefer people to call me Jason, you'd have no problem calling me Jason and be understanding that calling me Stan is a sore point, right? What if I don'…

Names says nothing about a person while he/she describes an aspect of you. A person who wants to use the wrong pronoun is like a fat person wanting people to call them thin. Of course calling fat people fat is not very nice, the same can be said about missgendering people, but it is very hard to call fat people thin so you try to avoid the subject. So if you look like and behave like a man then people will call you a…

"in most cases"

What is the issue, that you are claiming grave consequences exist for making an innocent mistake, and that's happened to you enough times to generalize?

...or are you saying you are unwilling to behave in an expected manner once you understand the expectations?

...in the latter case, do you find yourself frequently disagreeing with other people about who looks and behaves like a man/woman? Or are you just disagreeing about whether to honor their preferences?

Edit/addition: There was a time when people claimed a man with long hair or a woman with short hair was indistinguishable from the opposite sex.[1] Which pronoun do you use in that situation?

[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=turn+the+page+lyrics

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#479

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Names says nothing about a person while he/she describes an aspect of you. A person who wants to use the wrong pronoun is like a fat person wanting people to call them thin. Of course calling fat people fat is not very nice, the same can be said about missgendering people, but it is very hard to call fat people thin so you try to avoid the subject. So if you look like and behave like a man then people will call you a…

"in most cases" What is the issue, that you are claiming grave consequences exist for making an innocent mistake, and that's happened to you enough times to generalize? ...or are you saying you are unwilling to behave in an expected manner once you understand the expectations? ...in the latter case, do you find yourself frequently disagreeing with other people about who looks and behaves like a man/woman? Or are you…

I don't know a lot of trans people in real life and I have never miss-gendered someone. But there are a lot of prominent trans people in for example the gaming community and I am basing that anecdote on the discussions from there.

Edit: Note that I am not the person above the parent, I don't think there are any grave consequences for missgendering people, at least not if you don't do it consistently. I guess it could happen if you did it on for example twitter and some activist picked it up, but not in a casual conversation at work.

Late edit: As for what I consider man/woman, take this picture: https://keyassets.timeincuk.net/inspirewp/live/wp-content/up...

If I saw it without context I'd assume it was a guy being surrounded by two women based on their body and face structures, it is very hard to see the middle one as a woman. But surprisingly they are all three women.

Re: Google cancels TGIF weekly all-hands meetings

#480
post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately that's what happens when the discussions get leaked. It's hard to be candid and open if what you say might end up distorted in the media and without you having an ability to defend yourself.

> It's hard to be candid and open if what you say might end up distorted in the media and without you having an ability to defend yourself. Distorted by the media? That's the point of "leaks": to make transparent leaderships' opinions verbatim. The firms that control our lives should not be allowed to confer behind closed doors.

The media constantly misconstrues or completely invents whole stories based on small pieces of information that are presented without context.

I don’t see how that is helpful to society.

I’m not against whistleblowing but I completely understand why someone would choose not to engage in that, since they are basically volunteering information knowing it may very well be taken very seriously when it was done throw away off hand comment or shared without underlying meanings being properly attached.

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