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Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

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Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#171

Post by khazhoux »

I see justinwp is commenting here… Justin, people are asking questions that you’re not replying to. Sorry, but it’s pretty disingenuous to tweet your story and post it here, but then refuse to answer requests for more info.

> I think the cause was that Workspace and certain leaders (and projects) were afraid of being disrupted. But the fear wasn't specific to my CLI, it was a broader fear in what agents meant for Workspace.

Seems to me your management chain was thinking “Why the hell is someone on our team releasing a vibe-coded CLI that’s branded to look like an official API, when we’re 2 weeks from announcing the actual CLI??” If you didn’t know there was an official CLI in the works, that’s one thing, but if you did know then that’s pretty shitty to your teammates in Workspace and bad for users who would adopt one CLI (thinking it’s official) just to then see another one 2 weeks later.

Still, I would expect a talking-to and not an actual firing… but who knows what actually happened since you’re not responding to anyone. :shrug:

Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#172

Post by khazhoux »

cdata wrote: post #131

I'm noticing a few commenters who work (worked?) at Google (inferred from comment history) who are critical of this person's actions. First: you ought to disclose that information when commenting on a topic that relates in some way to your financial incentives. Second: when I worked at Google under Chrome it was very common for individuals and teams to publish projects to open source repositories under Google-managed…

> I'm noticing a few commenters who work (worked?) at Google (inferred from comment history) who are critical of this person's actions.

Tangent: did you really go through people’s histories far back enough to find out they were googlers/ex-googlers? Did you use an agent to do that?

Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#173

Post by financltravsty »

bonsai_bar wrote: post #159
cdata wrote: post #131

I'm noticing a few commenters who work (worked?) at Google (inferred from comment history) who are critical of this person's actions. First: you ought to disclose that information when commenting on a topic that relates in some way to your financial incentives. Second: when I worked at Google under Chrome it was very common for individuals and teams to publish projects to open source repositories under Google-managed…

Is it so extreme? If you work at Google, there's a very clear policy for doing any outside "work" (volunteering, an open source side project, a business, being on a board, etc.): if it's related to your day-to-day work and/or related to Google's business (which virtually anything software is), you need to fill out a disclosure form and get a go-ahead from legal. Obviously a Google Workspace CLI is related to Google.…

This ethos doesn't gel with the old ethos and that's where the disconnect comes from.

At one point Google was there to build cool shit and enable people to do it; not extract maximal amount of value and "being Evil" by the values of its time.

Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#174

Post by financltravsty »

financltravsty wrote: post #173
bonsai_bar wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it so extreme? If you work at Google, there's a very clear policy for doing any outside "work" (volunteering, an open source side project, a business, being on a board, etc.): if it's related to your day-to-day work and/or related to Google's business (which virtually anything software is), you need to fill out a disclosure form and get a go-ahead from legal. Obviously a Google Workspace CLI is related to Google.…

This ethos doesn't gel with the old ethos and that's where the disconnect comes from. At one point Google was there to build cool shit and enable people to do it; not extract maximal amount of value and "being Evil" by the values of its time.

Just a very sad departure from more humanistic values towards "well technically their legal rights take precedence over common good."

Especially that he's an "engineer" not a "Googler" or "a person."

God what a fall from grace.

Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#175

Post by cdata »

qmarchi wrote: post #168
cdata wrote: post #131

I'm noticing a few commenters who work (worked?) at Google (inferred from comment history) who are critical of this person's actions. First: you ought to disclose that information when commenting on a topic that relates in some way to your financial incentives. Second: when I worked at Google under Chrome it was very common for individuals and teams to publish projects to open source repositories under Google-managed…

Former Googler here, and one that has open-sourced projects while working in Cloud. This is certainly not the case in other product areas and for specifically for something that uses the Google name. If I was expected to go through a full IARC committee in order to get my little Discord bot open sourced under my own account, something that uses the Google name would likely have to get IARC + Legal approvals, along wi…

Google contains multitudes. I don't doubt that your personal experience was the opposite end of the spectrum from mine.

I maintain that firing is an extreme resolution here (taking the claims at face value of course). Surely this employee has demonstrated the capacity to deliver impact and could be redirected if properly incentivized.

Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#176

Post by waterTanuki »

In the README

> This is not an officially supported Google product.

Why was this project published under an account named "Google Workspace"? Google seems to want to have their cake and eat it too, same with the cli creator.

If you want to publish a project under open source and you are the sole creator/owner -> do it in your own time, under your OWN individual github account. Nothing good has ever come from ceeding control of these things to giant corporations who only care how much it will increase their profit next quarter.

Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#177

Post by IncreasePosts »

pydry wrote: post #132
Stevvo wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He doesn't recognize it. He claims in the post he was fired because certain leaders were afraid of being disrupted.

This seems pretty plausible. This tool probably did threaten some product line or other with cannibalisation.

Is it plausible?

Imagine any leader that is not sundar trying to get this person fired. At some point, that leader would need to justify to either their leader, or a similarly leveled peer why they budgeted x SWE-years(where x is probably > 25) for a project that took this person far less than 1 SWE-year.

Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#178

Post by jameslk »

cdata wrote: post #131

I'm noticing a few commenters who work (worked?) at Google (inferred from comment history) who are critical of this person's actions. First: you ought to disclose that information when commenting on a topic that relates in some way to your financial incentives. Second: when I worked at Google under Chrome it was very common for individuals and teams to publish projects to open source repositories under Google-managed…

Most big companies attract rule followers. They err on the side of avoiding taking risks like this, which is why they work there (and why there’s so many in this thread talking about rules). It benefits big companies to have mostly rule followers because you can’t have a too many people going in different directions. You need stability and a unified direction, that usually comes from the rulers making the rules. The fewer rule breakers generally find their way to the top, or get canned

This employee’s decision to break the rules, while addressing a real need in the market, must have really pissed off some people above, for better or worse. Google could have just rolled with it but I’m sure it would have stepped on someone else’s plans. Career defining moment, but they didn’t have the political capital it seems. I don’t think they will have much trouble finding work elsewhere though

See also: Power: Why Some People Have It--And Others Don't

Re: Fired by Google for creating the Google workspace CLI

#180

Post by sleepybrett »

bonsai_bar wrote: post #161
QuantumGood wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clueness sometimes goes hand-in-hand with perceived freedom. I think it's that cause and effect are not as often connected (consequences). I remember a Google employee updating a Google font that broke thousands of websites. Community members explained that Google recommended (at that time) letting Google host the font, and that they could fork it instead, or find a path that wouldn't break so many websites. The empl…

We take annual training that warns us against doing what this engineer did.

yes we all pay attention to 'the training'
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