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Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

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Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#71

Post by Kylekramer »

saturdaysaint wrote: post #52
Kylekramer wrote: post #20

It is quite the jump from “This is the path we’re headed down – a single unified, ‘beautiful’ product across everything. If you don’t get that, then you should probably work somewhere else" to "Agree with SPYW or GTFO". One is an admirable goal for a whale of a company and the other is a stubborn denial of contrary opinions. I thought Pando Daily was suppose to be a "different" tech news site.

Given the context, it's not much of a jump. Both the fact that this was said at an event after the "Search Plus Your World Launch" and also the strong emotion implied by "you should probably work somewhere else" indicate that this was mostly about their shift into social.

My guess is the event had nothing to do with the launch, it seems more likely to be the weekly TGIF meeting (http://www.google.com/about/corporate/company/culture.html). I don't really see much strong emotion. It is a CEO saying this is the direction we are taking, so if you don't like it then you are going to continue to not like it.

Of course, Lacy's take is the direction = SPYW as it was launched (as it is the news of the moment), which I more charitably interpret his words as direction = unification of Google products.

Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#72

Post by toddh »

Hominem wrote: post #59

Am I the only one that thinks SPYW is the right direction? We have seen that rankings were increasingly being gamed. Algorithmic search is a never ending arms race. SPYW aligns with what google has been trying to do for a while, provide results that are relevant and worthwhile to the user. If my mom searches for digital cameras , she would rather have a link to something written on G+ by someone in her circle than a…

Ideally wouldn't it find the best result? G+ and farm.* seem equally likely to be poor. I did an image search for something like Empire State Building and my G+ results showed first. The results sucked.

Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#73

Post by toddh »

Hominem wrote: post #59

Am I the only one that thinks SPYW is the right direction? We have seen that rankings were increasingly being gamed. Algorithmic search is a never ending arms race. SPYW aligns with what google has been trying to do for a while, provide results that are relevant and worthwhile to the user. If my mom searches for digital cameras , she would rather have a link to something written on G+ by someone in her circle than a…

Ideally wouldn't it find the best result? G+ and farm.* seem equally likely to be poor. I did an image search for something like Empire State Building and my G+ results showed first. The results sucked.

Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#74

Post by rryan »

brador wrote: post #21

Leaders should lead with a unique style. Their way. Larry's playing catchup with Facebook while thinking he can be Steve Jobs, and that, together with guarding the cents by removing the little things that made life @Google awesome (bagels anyone?) has led to low morale among the workforce. Geeks with low morale don't get shit done. They don't innovate. They don't create. Google staff aren't code monkeys, they're not…

Bagels. Really? That's what it takes to make life at $COMPANY awesome?

What about working with smart people on interesting problems?

Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#76

Post by joebadmo »

danilocampos wrote: post #56

A few decades from now, when someone writes up an HBS case study on Google, how will it read? My suspicion is that Google is going to treat us to a very painful object lesson: what happens to your business when you compromise the values of a beloved core product. Here's the thing: having the most complete, most accurate, most relevant search results means never having to say you're sorry. You can add ads, you can do…

I disagree with your premise. The two previous "compromises" you cite are both examples of giving you what you want, instead of what you said you want. While your anecdotal data says that you are annoyingly misled by that, I'm sure there's a measure of selection bias there, and I'm sure Google has a lot more than anecdotal data.

I'm a bit confused by the recent outcry about relevance. Do people disagree that social signals can add to relevance? If not, then how does Google get these social signals, if they're locked out of FB and twitter?

It seems like a pretty clear strategy to me of simultaneously trying to grab as much social signal as possible by creating a meaningfully competitive social product, while also demonstrating to its competitors the value of allowing Google access to social signals.

I find it strange that everyone seems to want Google to just keep doing what it's been doing, to, in a word, stagnate. I, for one, am happy to see Google continue to do big things, undertake big initiatives, respond to a changing world.

Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#77

Post by ay »

tedsuo wrote: post #50
cbs wrote: post #37

Guys, unless you're actually a player, save yourself the headache and don't get caught up in this little valley tiff. I think SPYW is dumb, but google is trying something to improve search results, it happens to use data that they have on the user. I don't think they need permission from everyone in the valley with a sign-in service they can't crawl before they're allowed to make changes that are meant to improve sea…

“Most portals show their own content above content elsewhere on the web. We feel that’s a conflict of interest, analogous to taking money for search results. Their search engine doesn’t necessarily provide the best results; it provides the portal’s results. Google conscientiously tries to stay away from that. We want to get you out of Google and to the right place as fast as possible. It’s a very different model.” -L…

They are not straying, they are pivoting.

Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#78

Post by shutej »

pg wrote: post #53
lsb wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems like the perfect time to relaunch "Larry and Sergey won't respect you in the morning." http://ycombinator.com/ad.html http://www.flickr.com/photos/martindavidsson/96160482

Hmph, I'd forgotten that. Interesting that we wouldn't do that sort of thing now. It would seem too rude to mention Google explicitly. Whereas when we first started YC we were so obscure we couldn't successfully be rude to anyone.

In fairness, that was probably just about the time Google Calendar clipped Kiko's wings, which may have smarted. Also, back then, you probably may not have realized that the new method of funding you were pioneering would create an incubator for Google acquisitions. (i.e. you may not have realized you were poking your own customers in the eye.)

Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#79

Post by HerraBRE »

Aloisius wrote: post #35
pg wrote: post #3

You don't have to get a job at another company. You could also start your own.

Serious question: have there been any success stories of ex-Googlers starting their own companies? I've been under the impression that the few that have had successful exits were bought by Google itself, mostly as talent acquisitions.

Wait, what? It sounds like you are defining success or failure solely in terms of whether there is a big-money exit or not. That seems so... sad. What ever happened to "provides employment" and "provides value to its customers"?

Anyway, I'm an ex-Googler who started a company after leaving. It's still too early to say whether we'll be "successful" by any metric, but I'm really enjoying it so far, which is enough for now.

Re: Larry Page to Googlers: If You Don’t Get SPYW, Work Somewhere Else

#80

Post by danilocampos »

joebadmo wrote: post #76
danilocampos wrote: post #56

A few decades from now, when someone writes up an HBS case study on Google, how will it read? My suspicion is that Google is going to treat us to a very painful object lesson: what happens to your business when you compromise the values of a beloved core product. Here's the thing: having the most complete, most accurate, most relevant search results means never having to say you're sorry. You can add ads, you can do…

I disagree with your premise. The two previous "compromises" you cite are both examples of giving you what you want, instead of what you said you want. While your anecdotal data says that you are annoyingly misled by that, I'm sure there's a measure of selection bias there, and I'm sure Google has a lot more than anecdotal data. I'm a bit confused by the recent outcry about relevance. Do people disagree that social s…

> The two previous "compromises" you cite are both examples of giving you what you want, instead of what you said you want. While your anecdotal data says that you are annoyingly misled by that, I'm sure there's a measure of selection bias there, and I'm sure Google has a lot more than anecdotal data.

You can wave your hands around in pretty patterns all you want – the fact remains I'm a user who used to enjoy the product and now is frustrated by it. I'm not alone in this. Have they annoyed enough users for it to be a big problem? We'll see. But big or not – it's a problem. Adoption curves are led by early adopters. Do they really want to send the sort of person who was once a Google advocate into the arms of a competing service?

> I find it strange that everyone seems to want Google to just keep doing what it's been doing, to, in a word, stagnate. I, for one, am happy to see Google continue to do big things, undertake big initiatives, respond to a changing world.

I don't think we actually disagree here. If Google does nothing, it's dead.

I'm just not sure that the something they've chosen to do is going to be a good idea. If they lose the plot on search, there's not much to fall back on. But, sometimes you do have to bet the farm.

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