Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead • Hacker News Board

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#461

Post by TheLegace » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 2:09 AM UTC

e12e wrote: post #458

bsdetector wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I mean sure-- if your company is under cash flow pressure you have to pinch pennies. You have no choice. Google's per-ad revenue was down 6% last year. Ads are 95% of their revenue. They have huge data to see trends. Just because Google is still profitable doesn't mean that they aren't seeing a near future of red ink. Say per-ad revenue goes down 10% next year with the same costs and their profit goes from $10 bill…

Well, so they still have lots of money, and quite a lot of time to do something about it. It sounds like their core business is loosing to competitors, and their solution is to keep the old product (the one that they believe is failing) and cut research?

Sounds like Microsoft doesn't it.

And I'd argue with more and more accessible technologies these behemoths won't have the luxury of "lots of time". And hopefully the large sums of money will mean less.

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#462

Post by mathgladiator » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 2:12 AM UTC

api wrote: post #277

Just wanted to say one more thing: I've heard some Googlers say this is accurate, and I've heard some say 20% time is alive and well. Google is gigantic these days. It probably depends a lot on where you are in the company. Two people in different Google divisions or even physical offices are not going to have the same experience.

> It probably depends a lot on where you are in the company

This means it's dead as a company wide policy, and it's problematic to be sold during recruitment.

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#463

Post by plywoodtrees » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 2:29 AM UTC

jrockway wrote: post #98

[deleted] wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

You may want to graduate to management or UML architect or be bogged down in valueless meetings, but that's not for me. I just want to make computers do magical things. That's not what promotions are at Google. If you want to become a manager, that's called a ladder transfer, not a promotion. Promotions are basically for paying you more for making computers do more magical things. You are never asked to do anything o…

> engineering is more than writing code, and senior-levels of engineering even more so.

Google's higher engineering ladder rungs are defined more by scope of influence than the excellence or profusion of individual code. At higher levels, engineers will tend to spend more time communicating with and influencing other people.

Some people are happy to stop at level 4 or 5, where they can mostly do their own thing. They can do good work, they can feel they have time for 20% projects, and (to some extent?) they can keep getting raises and bonuses.

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#464

Post by plywoodtrees » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 2:34 AM UTC

cLeEOGPw wrote: post #193

"Google has a highly developed internal analytics team that constantly measures all employees’ productivity—and the level of productivity that teams are expected to deliver assumes that employees are working on their primary responsibilities 100% of the time." I know that it is a large company and control is required to manage everything, but this sounds depressing. I'm glad I work in a tiny company and even smaller…

This description may lead you to imagine software counting how many lines someone changes or how many hours of the day someone is typing. That would be pretty depressing, but I don't think Google does that.

Their performance measurements are much more based off asking other engineers and colleagues what they think of your work.

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#465

Post by plywoodtrees » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 2:50 AM UTC

This doesn't match my experience as a Googler. I do 20% projects, and my manager has a 20% project. It helps keep things fresh and interesting and I get exposure to more of the vast ecosystem of Google stuff than I would see in my main job.

I get praise and appreciation, and bonuses from other teams. I think it looks good on a resume, I learned something, and it builds a connection across teams. I know the things I'm doing are helping Google as a whole.

People are always going to have different feelings, and often mixed feelings, about putting time into a side project rather than concentrating on their main thing or doing something away from the computer. For me it comes and goes: some days I want a change and sometimes I feel too busy.

How many of you who have startups would feel OK about taking time from it to spend Friday working on an open source project, even if you don't have a boss that's stopping you?

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#466

Post by plywoodtrees » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 2:58 AM UTC

null_ptr wrote: post #192

Maybe developers smartened up. If you have a solid idea that Google would benefit from and allow you to work on it in your 20% time, why not quit and do something similar on your own? Google is no longer a cutesy company, they're a corporation like all others, and most employees probably woke up and realized they don't owe it a single thing, let alone their brightest ideas.

A few reasons:

- Many 20% projects are not things that would not be easily monetizable: open source work, non-technical things, improvements to infrastructure.

- If the idea is very speculative, exploring it while still getting paid a handsome salary is a much easier step than quitting your job.

- Some things are easier to do if you have all the Google infrastructure to build on: for example the Transit Maps thing below is a lot easier if you can plug into Maps! (But some things would be easier to launch externally.)

- Part of the attraction, like for open source projects, is that it's something different from your main job, so you learn and stay fresh. If you turn it into your main job you lose that.

The theory is that if you do work on a new product and it works well, eventually it will be staffed full-time and you'll be rewarded. Apparently that did happen with Google Now. I doubt it happens every time, but then not every worthwhile startup succeeds.

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#467

Post by plywoodtrees » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 3:02 AM UTC

cupcake-unicorn wrote: post #374

For what it's worth, I had a friend who worked at Google a few years ago and asked her about her 20% time. I was extremely underwhelmed, as it sounded like the exact same project she was working on from day to day. My idea of 20% time was always this really creative unbounded time to pursue ideas and things that are interesting to you, but for her it really just sounded like a logical extension of what she was alread…

Why? Maybe that was just what your friend found most interesting at that time.

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#468

Post by VikingCoder » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 4:11 AM UTC

thedufer wrote: post #455

cbg0 wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're probably going to crappy restaurants.

You haven't eaten there, have you? Their "cafeteria" is a bunch of kitchens worked by chefs. Good ones. Their food is the only reason I would consider working there.

Their food is the only reason I would consider working there.

This is bald hyperbole. There are a lot of reasons you would consider working there.

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#469

Post by psigrist » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 7:37 AM UTC

api wrote: post #280

jmduke wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But last I checked SV and California in general pumped out more innovation than the rest of the country combined, and is preparing to colonize another planet and electrify transport. This is what people refer to as a 'reality distortion field'.

Reality distortion fields don't emit actual products that work. It's a field alright, and it does have some reality-distorting side effects, but there is actually a "there" there. If I had to boil it down I'd say it's this: (1) California believes in the future. People in California (stereotypically) think about what they can do tomorrow, building on what they have today. Everyone else thinks about what they already…

Hi api. I'm interested in your view about reasoning from first principles. Is there more behind that suggestion? And do you have evodence of it?

Re: Google’s “20% time,” which brought you Gmail and AdSense, is now as good as dead

#470

Post by lancewiggs » Sat, Aug 17, 2013, 7:40 AM UTC

iyulaev wrote: post #434

TDL wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"MBA is more of a place to socialize, not to 'study' things, right?" What? Go take a financial statements analysis class and then tell me how MBAs don't "study" things. There are certainly ways to coast through an MBA program, as there are ways to coast through many things. Simply because MBAs don't have to go through the mathematical rigor that an engineer or physicist does does not mean there is NO rigor or require…

Not to sound arrogant, but I took a few MBA courses which included Enterprise Finance and Operations Management. There is some rigor to the courses, and I found the finance class in particular interesting and applicable. However, the level of difficulty was at least one order of magnitude below the engineering courses I had taken, when compared EE & Physics courses. Aside from some term memorization the math was real…

I agree - an MBA is not engineering, and many in my class would have been unable at that stage to finishing 3rd year engineering mathematics. A few of us had engineering backgrounds though, and some very deep at that. However there is (usually) a deliberate effort to overload students with volumes of work, so that they can figure out how the real world works and work in teams. Also in my MBA course students had a minimum of quantitative work they had to do, and if they wanted they could dive deeply into the more serious mathematics in certain courses. It was part of the expectations that people who were more technical or more experienced in one area would help out those who had less experience, and vice versa.

Engineering mathematics is not for everyone, and indeed not required for every MBA graduate, but it certainly helps for the more quantitative courses. And finance at one school can differ wildly from finance at other schools. Look for the professors. Look at the courses people take. But also look at the culture. Some universities are focussed on the money, others, like Yale, on much wider impact in business and public service.