Google lays off hundreds working on its voice-activated assistant • Hacker News Board

Re: Google lays off hundreds working on its voice-activated assistant

#261

Post by fnord123 » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 9:02 PM UTC

vineyardmike wrote: post #259

fnord123 wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A product that has become pervasive in most households in America You think Google home has over 50% penetration?

Between GAssistant, Alexa and Siri Speakers I bet it’s a significant chunk of the population. Sonos now have a voice assistant (far more limited though) and many cars are rolling out some sort of assistant too. I know plenty of people with multiple speakers and from competing brands. Oh and obviously every iPhone in the last decade has it built in. That’s 50% of the population right there. Then there’s android phones…

The thread is about Google Assistant, not Alexa, Sonos, or Siri.

Regardless, do you think over 50% of households use the voice commands to the extent we call it "pervasive"?

Re: Google lays off hundreds working on its voice-activated assistant

#262

Post by nashashmi » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:46 PM UTC

neilv wrote: post #22

So what's a good employer now, now that Google has been losing the reputation for treating employees well? (Multiple rounds of laying off people isn't treating only those people poorly, but also increasing stress for the people who remain, knowing they can suddenly be laid off as well.)

Do you know of any founders with these superiority complexes built upon some ideas of how great their career and field is? Like PhDs were at Google? Or Engineers were at IBM?

That's the foundation of a good company until some MBA type comes and takes over. Then it is not about the work you do but the metric you are judged upon.

And the metrics for Google Assistant are not great. And neither are the metrics for a lot of google projects. But the team and fascination behind their technologies are the only roots keeping them from being X'd.

This is why Android and Chrome will continue to be heavy handed. The current CEO came from over there and started/led the team. But things like Google Search will always be judged by the numbers and metrics, not by the ideas of connecting people with info.

(I ranted. But to answer your question, go to place that is a darling of the power broker.)

Re: Google lays off hundreds working on its voice-activated assistant

#263

Post by danjac » Fri, Jan 12, 2024, 7:44 AM UTC

dieortin wrote: post #258

danjac wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I already pointed out there's going to be legacy work for a while, especially in certain specialisations. Everything else "AI powered developers are going to startup all the things!!!" is just hype by some poster literally calling themselves (ironically I hope) ChatGPT.

You still have not provided a single reason why software developers are supposedly going to become useless overnight

Only 700 new IT jobs created in the last year for the whole of the US:

https://www.theregister.com/2024/01/08/700_it_jobs_us/

The blood-letting is still ongoing (Pixar and Discord, just talking about today).

I think the overall reason is that a lot of startups and services have been unprofitable for a while, and the zero-interest-rate environment of the past decade was the high tide that covered a lot of people swimming naked, as Buffett once put it. There might be other reasons for example SAAS platforms being consolidated into fewer and fewer big players. Long term AI will play its part - perhaps creating lots of junk code, but CEOs don't really care about long term quality these days, just short term earnings calls.

Of course there are going to be niches and things like payroll or flight booking programs that will need maintenance work from now until the end of time, and some programmers will be around in 10 years, just not as many.

Again, I would love to be proven wrong.

Re: Google lays off hundreds working on its voice-activated assistant

#264

Post by jiqiren » Sat, Jan 13, 2024, 11:16 AM UTC

agent008t wrote: post #246

jiqiren wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also retired from Apple (FIRE). I never worked so hard or got paid so much in my life. Would recommend AAAAAaaa+++++ would do again

Have you written about your FI/RE story anywhere? Would be interesting to read. E.g. which SWR, did you end up moving somewhere cheaper, what do you do day-to-day now? How have you found actually living on your withdrawals - has it not caused more worry? How do you avoid the FOMO of seeing your former colleagues pressing on?

I've not shared my story. Much of the FIRE community is sick of hearing about engineers doing it. I was a SRE in Maps - I joined after Apple fired Scott. Many gave me a lot of hell for going to Apple Maps but there was a ton of work. I did move to Portland metro area during pandemic and actually got permission for perm remote work at Apple. But once I saw I could FIRE I waited for 1 more RSU vest and left. Zero FOMO - a coworker on my team left 6 months before me. I'm currently on a 4month vacation in Asia with wife. I'm still connected to former colleagues at Apple and visit the offices. I left Spring of 2022.

Re: Google lays off hundreds working on its voice-activated assistant

#265

Post by shiroiuma » Tue, Jan 16, 2024, 2:51 AM UTC

usrusr wrote: post #203

modeless wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google Voice Search used internal codename "Majel" in reference to Majel Barrett, who played the voice of the Star Trek computer. That was explicitly the ambition. It just didn't work out.

But how often did that computer voice-acted by her really do significantly more than "set timer to thirty minutes"? Outside of some broken plots on the original series ("we have insufficient data to know the truth, let's ask the computer who will tell us anyways!"), it really was mostly mundane voice assistant stuff. (I'm deliberately excluding the "ten words to 'author' a holodeck scene" part, that had always been s…

There were some scenes where Riker on the bridge asked the computer essentially a SQL query: "give me a list of star systems with parameters that fit X and cross-reference by Y..." "There are 3 systems which fit your query: ..."