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Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

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Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#181

Post by jasonjayr »

asah wrote: post #93

(repost after every Google-bashing...) Alternate perspective as a longtime googler, ex-googler, mostly-happy user and shareholder. Please hear me out. As user, I'm pretty ok with Google. Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. I tried Bing again and came back after a day. Google seems ok on privacy: in 2024, you don't see hackers exfiltrate Google data, employees abuse privilege…

Google has a lot going for it.

But the fact that they can kill your online identity in the blink of an eye, with zero recourse is the biggest reason why I personally cannot fully embrace the full Google ecosystem.

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#182

Post by varelse »

asah wrote: post #93

(repost after every Google-bashing...) Alternate perspective as a longtime googler, ex-googler, mostly-happy user and shareholder. Please hear me out. As user, I'm pretty ok with Google. Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. I tried Bing again and came back after a day. Google seems ok on privacy: in 2024, you don't see hackers exfiltrate Google data, employees abuse privilege…

[dead]

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#183

Post by noqc »

asah wrote: post #93

(repost after every Google-bashing...) Alternate perspective as a longtime googler, ex-googler, mostly-happy user and shareholder. Please hear me out. As user, I'm pretty ok with Google. Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. I tried Bing again and came back after a day. Google seems ok on privacy: in 2024, you don't see hackers exfiltrate Google data, employees abuse privilege…

> Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt.

If you think the complaint about google search is that it isn't as good as chatgpt, I think you might be not listening. The problem with google search is that it's worse than it was

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#184

Post by klyrs »

cageface wrote: post #164
klyrs wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. > How would the existence of LLMs make "classic" web search worse? SEO spam and content farms cluttering the first results page has been going on for longer too. To add my latest peeve, google search is suddenly terrible at units. When I look for "24 inches in cm" it gives me an answer in meters. And duh, I know that conversion, but unt…

It still works for me. What if you try it in an incognito window?

Ah, fun. It didn't work on my last few attempts, it works today. Gotta love the internet.

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#185

Post by sanderjd »

lxgr wrote: post #112
asah wrote: post #93

(repost after every Google-bashing...) Alternate perspective as a longtime googler, ex-googler, mostly-happy user and shareholder. Please hear me out. As user, I'm pretty ok with Google. Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. I tried Bing again and came back after a day. Google seems ok on privacy: in 2024, you don't see hackers exfiltrate Google data, employees abuse privilege…

> Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. How would the existence of LLMs make "classic" web search worse ? SEO spam and content farms cluttering the first results page has been going on for longer too. > Services like Gmail/gsuite are awesome for productivity and while they lag in shiny features, the teams are adding features quickly enough. Google Docs has some of the most cur…

> FWIW, 90% of my gripes would go away if it just supported a "markdown mode" instead of WYSIWYG

Approximately nobody wants this though. Sure, you want it, and I want it, and some other people like us, but we're a rounding error of the user base of Google Docs.

This would be a great plugin, but very difficult to justify building as a first class feature.

And there's nothing wrong with protobuf :)

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#186

Post by pinewurst »

utopcell wrote: post #142
pinewurst wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The regular employees are far more deluded than management in thinking that they're somehow changing the world for the better.

Google Web Search is (supposed to be) changing the world for the better.

Certainly not in the last few years as it’s been increasingly enshitified.

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#187

Post by kibwen »

noqc wrote: post #183
asah wrote: post #93

(repost after every Google-bashing...) Alternate perspective as a longtime googler, ex-googler, mostly-happy user and shareholder. Please hear me out. As user, I'm pretty ok with Google. Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. I tried Bing again and came back after a day. Google seems ok on privacy: in 2024, you don't see hackers exfiltrate Google data, employees abuse privilege…

> Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. If you think the complaint about google search is that it isn't as good as chatgpt, I think you might be not listening. The problem with google search is that it's worse than it was

To be fair, Google Search is worse today because the web is worse today.

But to be ultra-fair, the web is worse today because of the perverse incentives created by Google Search and Google Ads.

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#188

Post by lxgr »

refulgentis wrote: post #176
lxgr wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an easy solution here: Offer both! Google can afford to offer two kinds of document editors, and it would make the entire GSuite infinitely more valuable and enjoyable to me. I already have a bunch of Markdown text files synced to my GDrive – why can I literally not edit them in the GDrive web interface? There's not even a basic text editor!

Want me to really bake your noodle? Ready? It has Markdown mode as an option. Peak HN, perfectly executed: - "it's obvious my pet peeve feature X should be added to Y, the company in the article". - "I don't like X". - "Can we have both?" I'm guffawing

Peak HN is also claiming Y already supports X without showing any evidence.

And no, converting a `#` into a H1 is not "markdown support". I want a non-WYSIWYG mode that can let me work on plain text and export it without changing a single comma or tab, optionally with a WYSIWYG presentation layer on top of that like Dropbox Paper does, but one that does not let me add non-markdown features (which would inevitably get lost when exporting and re-importing the same file, or parts of it via copy and paste).

Update: You made me look: Sadly still no Markdown support. I would have been very happy to be wrong here.

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#189

Post by jszymborski »

noqc wrote: post #183
asah wrote: post #93

(repost after every Google-bashing...) Alternate perspective as a longtime googler, ex-googler, mostly-happy user and shareholder. Please hear me out. As user, I'm pretty ok with Google. Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. I tried Bing again and came back after a day. Google seems ok on privacy: in 2024, you don't see hackers exfiltrate Google data, employees abuse privilege…

> Websearch is sputtering sure but that's normal after a challenge like chatgpt. If you think the complaint about google search is that it isn't as good as chatgpt, I think you might be not listening. The problem with google search is that it's worse than it was

I was puzzling over this argument as well.

Is it possible GP was talking about SEO spam enabled by LLMs like ChatGPT? That's the most charitable read on it I can give it.

Because I can guarantee you my problem with Google Search has nothing to do with chat assistants, and if that is sincerely your position, I'd seriously consider trying to find perspective.

Re: Morale plummets at Google as workers complain bosses are 'inept' and 'boring'

#190

Post by wolverine876 »

michaelt wrote: post #102
sianemo wrote: post #11

Outside of ads, and maybe LLM work, what projects are going on at Google that are interesting, to both the top brass and to line level engineers, that might lead people to feel differently? Google has been a rudderless ship cruising on ad dollars for years, with mid level managers launching one unimpressive product after another. Products that get canned by Google months later and only serve to benefit said managers…

> what projects are going on at Google that are interesting, to both the top brass and to line level engineers, that might lead people to feel differently? Google has at least 5000 engineers worth of interesting work. Chrome has a pretty advanced javascript engine and cutting edge security features. Android, which is sorta-kinda open source. Youtube's pretty much the only place that serves working 4k video. The self-…

> Google has at least 5000 engineers worth of interesting work.

Chrome has a pretty advanced javascript engine and cutting edge security features. Android, which is sorta-kinda open source. Youtube's pretty much the only place that serves working 4k video. The self-driving cars have a great reputation - arguably a much better design than Tesla have. BigQuery's pretty neat, even if it's missing things like unique constraints. GCP is the third largest cloud provider out there. Project Zero is pretty cool. Gmail was great when it launched; nothing's really surpassed it, and they've largely avoided fucking it up.

That requires a lot more than 5,000. Also, much of that is old and not interesting, at least in the sense of innovative, exciting, ground-breaking, disrupting, world-changing.

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