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About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

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Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#351

Post by apta »

rebelos wrote: post #312
apta wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the problem with hiring SJWs. They will claim being victimized, racism, etc. the moment they don't have their way. I'm sure many people would have loved to be in her position and have her salary and benefits. Some people can't have enough it seems. "Wokeness" is a disease, the goal is to keep getting more and more power behind the guise of "equality". Hopefully more employers will reject hiring "woke" people…

I suspect you're being downvoted because this post sounds like a denial of very real issues of sexism and racism. However, the suggestion that employers will work to identify and preemptively reject employees with an SJW bent is not only sound but almost certainly already underway.

That's good to hear. The SJW crowd has caused enough chaos already.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#352

Post by contemporary343 »

cyrus20 wrote: post #307
gcr wrote: post #2

Maybe different teams are different, but on my previous team within Google AI, we thought the goal of google's pubapproval process was to ensure that internal company IP (eg. details about datasets, details about google compute infra) does not leak to the public, and maybe to shield Google from liability. Nothing more. In all of my time at Google AI, I never heard of pubapproval being used for peer review or to criti…

At least when I was there, my papers were getting thoroughly reviewed and often had to make some adjustments before getting approval. Never occurred to me to make any demands from the reviewers or threaten to resign if my paper doesn't get immediately and unconditionally approved. Seems like she's asking for preferential treatment.

She's the one asking for an option to revise and discuss it. Management is the one demanding an unconditional retraction, with no recourse.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#353

Post by free_rms »

albatruss wrote: post #306
trhway wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

every time it is the same - somebody got the power to enforce the prevalent ideology of the time and place, they happily do it under the premise that it is the most right and good ideology, and because of being such visibly pious followers and strict enforcers these self-declared occupants of high moral ground start to feel and behave themselves as more entitled and better than others. They highjack the cause and fra…

You are right that there have been many iterations of normative standards, but that does not imply that all situations, ideologies, positions and so on are equally correct. It does not mean that we should stop trying to do better, nor that we have made no progress made through these efforts toward a better world.

No, they're describing a particular scenario where the Political Officers of those norms wind up being a sick joke of careerism and weaponized ideology.

The Soviet Union was about equality for workers. Who could be against that?

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#354

Post by roenxi »

acoard wrote: post #64
theobeers wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the examples of issues flagged in review that Jeff keeps highlighting—like Timnit’s alleged failure to mention recent work to reduce the environmental impact of large models—are themselves a bit worrisome. Jeff gives the impression that they demanded retraction (!) because they wanted Timnit and her coauthors to soften their critique. The more I read about this, the worse it looks.

Yeah, put more simply, they pushed out someone in their Ethical AI department because they did not soften critiques against AI enough. They couch these in terms of rigour, but the substance of the problem has to do with her criticisms against AI. Ultimately it makes the whole Ethical AI department look more like a rubber stamp for Google.

Big oil companies don't pump out damning studies on oil use, big tech companies won't pump out research damning the use of their tech.

If people have an expectation of Google to turn out academically pure research then I certainly respect the position and encourage it in reality. But thinking like that means life is going to contain a bunch of surprises that really shouldn't be surprising. Google is simply not going to employ people who they recognise as undermining the success of Google. It is not feasible to run a company that way; roughly speaking companies can choose between ruthlessness and bankruptcy. If you expect tolerance of radicals and debate, look to the universities.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#355

Post by stjohnswarts »

gcr wrote: post #2

Maybe different teams are different, but on my previous team within Google AI, we thought the goal of google's pubapproval process was to ensure that internal company IP (eg. details about datasets, details about google compute infra) does not leak to the public, and maybe to shield Google from liability. Nothing more. In all of my time at Google AI, I never heard of pubapproval being used for peer review or to criti…

Why wouldn't you want to weed out bad papers as close to the source as possible to save company embarrassment and external people's time? If you see something wrong during a review why not push it back to the author before it does rounds outside the company? That would seem like a very bad practice to me.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#356

Post by apta »

yodelshady wrote: post #325

Well, the lesson I'm taking from this is to have a good HR department, and listen to them. One of their most valuable functions is to stop you "letting go of" people for stupid and petty reasons that blow up in your face, spectacularly.

I don't think letting go of a person for causing a tantrum is a bad thing. She threatened to quit, let her own up to it.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#357

Post by throwaway19937 »

yodelshady wrote: post #325

Well, the lesson I'm taking from this is to have a good HR department, and listen to them. One of their most valuable functions is to stop you "letting go of" people for stupid and petty reasons that blow up in your face, spectacularly.

It's quite common for managers to fire or accept resignations from employees who give ultimatums.

There's also the angry email that she sent to other people ranting about Google's behavior and telling them to stop work.

Either of these scenarios would get you fired any place that I have worked.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#358

Post by stjohnswarts »

nickff wrote: post #224
UncleMeat wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your work is suddenly and unexpected roadblocked at the last second by internal review, the only way to make changes that prevent that from happening in the future is to clearly understand the situations and criticisms that led to the roadblock. This is why understanding who raised these concerns is important. Anonymous feedback blowing up a project at the final moments is sure to frustrate anybody. If what she ha…

As a manager, if someone gives an ultimatum, you basically have to fire them. There's no real option; Ben Horowitz covered it somewhere, but the bottom line is that if you yield, you've given up all control.

Maybe in certain situations. But as an engineer on more than a couple of occasions I have pushed back on safety concerns and I was adamant that certain things be fixed for the company's reputation and for safety reasons. I did go over my manager's head because he wouldn't listen. Should I have been fired? Ultimately on one occasion I went up 4 layers of org chart to a VP who finally had the sense to listen because my concern was going to cost the company a lot to fix. I didn't get fired and actually got a bonus and raise that year because I stood my ground. However I never threatened to resign, they would have had to fire me to get me out of there :)

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#359

Post by abeppu »

that_guy_iain wrote: post #67
theobeers wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the examples of issues flagged in review that Jeff keeps highlighting—like Timnit’s alleged failure to mention recent work to reduce the environmental impact of large models—are themselves a bit worrisome. Jeff gives the impression that they demanded retraction (!) because they wanted Timnit and her coauthors to soften their critique. The more I read about this, the worse it looks.

> Jeff gives the impression that they demanded retraction (!) because they wanted Timnit and her coauthors to soften their critique. The more I read about this, the worse it looks. I get the impression that she wrote a hit piece on Google and published with Google's name. For me, it's correct they demand a retraction. It's simply unprofessional to critque your company for something while not mentioning the work they'…

> It's simply unprofessional to critque your company for something while not mentioning the work they're doing to combat that.

It would seem deeply problematic for an AI ethics researcher to have the expectation that when they critique their own employer, they should mention all their work to ameliorate bias or ethics problems, but to not have a similar expectation when they're critiquing other companies. Is the point of having an ethics researcher to expand our understanding of ethical issues, or merely to aid in PR?

If a university administrator were to attempt to tell a PI not to submit a paper critical of work from another lab at the same institution, I think that would be judged as a shocking overreach. But for Google, we're not even in agreement that this behavior is a problem. It's unfortunate that we expect so little from corporations, even if those corporations are some of the main drivers of research in a field.

Re: About Google's approach to research publication – Jeff Dean

#360

Post by bigbubba »

aylmao wrote: post #200
nullc wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excerpts were already being leaked on HN. The 'email from Timnit' doesn't exactly look good... I would expect a manager posting company lists in that manner to be dismissed (or a junior employee to receive some mentioning about professional conduct, if not dismissed). I don't believe anyone has published the ultimatum email, which I think would be more accurately described as what precipitated the outcome.

I hope Timnit finds it [1]. Google has it in their email servers but I doubt they'll publish it. [1]: https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1334881120920498180

Surely the email can be found in the inboxes of some of her friends still at Google. Any of her friends that were on the same mailing list could give her a copy. Assuming she has any friends at Google.
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