181–190 of 290 posts
Only reason to be disappointed is if you expected something else out of capitalists....
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Imo. The difference is the control Steve had over the company when he was alive. At Google, despite how well run the company is, you really do not know the direction or vision for the company although everything _seems_ really cool. Where as at Apple, the idea is you were sacrificing in order to help Steve achieve _his_ vision.
Been at Apple and at Google. Googlers annoy me endlessly because everyone knows the mission and everyone thinks they're on the same mission. Even if their job is indirectly related or even if what they're doing is potentially evil. They all believe they are changing the world. It's what they tell their aging hippie parents when they visit, it's what they brainwash the legions of school children that visit, it's what…
Well, I find this hard to believe, given what I've read about their relationship/feelings towards Jobs from lots of other ex-Apple employees. Makes me hard to believe the claim that you even worked there in the first place.
I mean, "Just yet another eccentric old dude", really?
The difference was that, that PARTICULAR "eccentric old dude" had started the company you worked on in the first place, had ressurected it from bankraptcy just some years ago, has turned it into the most profitable company on earth, had outmost control over it's products and directions, was named "person of the year" several times, had a worldwide cult following, and micromanaged often the software and hardware Apple pushed out -- to the point that people talked about his "Reality Distortion Field".
walking around in a place full of eccentric old dudes in skirts and high heels.
Huh? Was Apple full of transvenstites?
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Been at Apple and at Google. Googlers annoy me endlessly because everyone knows the mission and everyone thinks they're on the same mission. Even if their job is indirectly related or even if what they're doing is potentially evil. They all believe they are changing the world. It's what they tell their aging hippie parents when they visit, it's what they brainwash the legions of school children that visit, it's what…
It is to be expected, to some extent, for people in the tech industry to be pompous. After all many of us have been great universities and were taught (or perhaps suggested) that we are the smartest of all. I see this general pomposity among my fellow techies all the time. Some think that business people are stupid, some think humanities are unnecessary, some argue that users are all noobs etc... Perhaps it's pride i…
My experience has been that it is simply a lack of perspective due to ignorance. It is very tempting to be dismissive of what other people do when you only understand what they do at a very simple level.
Apple in the late 80s and early 90s was an unfocused beacon of creativity that led to the company nearly going under (PowerPC, OpenDoc, Taligent, Kaleida, Dylan, Newton, QuickDraw GX, AV macs with video conferencing when QuickTime barely worked, Copland).
Was the advice bad? Quite possibly. But it was sincere and i don't think profit was the motive.
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Still, a certain mental makeup is necessary to be able to switch between projects like that. When I work on a project that interests me, I go to bed thinking about it, and in the morning I want to continue where I left it. Often I'll see things clearer after such a sleep break, and then I cannot just switch to another project instead of trying out an idea I had.
This is a learnable skill, and one that is IMHO very worth learning. I also have a tendency to want to just load a whole problem into my head, Think Real Hard, and then write down the solution as quickly as I can. It's a great strategy, when it works. The problem is that it doesn't scale - it sets a limit on the complexity of problems you can attack directly, and it prevents you from working on more than one problem…
Or let's put it another way: I don't multitask / switch contexts.
If you ask me, one of Google's biggest strategic successes was their ability to convince an entire generation of engineers that they were something other than a company. The way many (otherwise intelligent) people talk about it, you'd think it was a religion. What you're seeing here is not the shattering of a dream, but of an illusion -- Google hasn't been a scrappy, idealistic startup for many years. It's a fine com…
Now it seems like Google is shifting to a more short term vision. They have begun leveraging their market power rather than relying on product quality to gain market share. In doing so they are starting to sacrifice their reputation. For big company this is an attractive approach over the short term. A reputation for high quality can be expensive to maintain, and products can become very long term risky investments. It's more profitable in the short term to create the illusion of quality while using tactics that hamper the competition or restrict consumer choices. However, that leads to stagnation and eventually the company becomes obsolete.
You might see start ups as being idealistic, and Google's previous behaviour as being benevolent. However, start ups aren't charities and Google made a boat load of money. It's not really about morality. It's more that big companies have incentives to follow particular short term strategies that ultimately stifle innovation and prevent technological progress. A big company with long term vision forces its competitors to innovate to keep up and helps change the technological landscape in a way that start ups are not able to.
I have been a fan of Google and have used a lot of its products over time. The company has been changing for a while now and a significant part of that change is that it is making the transition from being someone in the background (the advertising business), to someone who wants a front seat in everything digital. Consequently, its product line will also start to reflect that change.
And one of the obvious outcomes of such a change is that a lot of us who have used Google's products extensively from the early days are no longer the primary target group for the company. Early adopters rarely form the mass market and it is the same in the case of Google. Products like Gmail were never front line products. These happened to exist by leveraging existing tech within the company. With Glass, Android etc., these products are now moving to the front lines for the company.
I still use Gmail extensively, most of my video is consumed on Youtube, I still use search, Android and Drive (for online docs & Keep, not file sync). My main Google account does not have G+ on it and while things are not perfect, it is so far usable. I've rarely commented on YT, can't rate anything anymore on Play Store, but I can live with all that, at least for now.
I fully expect the situation to worsen for people like me in the years to come on Google, but that is OK. It will eventually lead to newer products coming into the market and that is always a good thing. Email will be the first thing I will switch and I think that will happen before the second half of 2014 swings around.
All said and done, I have been happy with Google being around -- they revolutionized search, made email an enabler than a pain (better storage & spam management) and every now and then I discover something awesome on YT that makes so grateful that it exists. It has given me much more than what it (and NSA ;-)) probably has taken from me.
Irony in all of this is that all this while everyone has criticized Google for being an ill-organized one-trick-pony! Maybe the OTP was a better company after all, eh?
Google's choice of direction really bugs me.
Scrapping the 20% developer time is fine. Cutting down projects to focus the company on a handful of products is cool. I never used Reader anyway.
What is worrying is the way Google is becoming more and more creepy. They have so much information about you and with the increasing rollout of Google+ I feel more and more like I am being stalked.
Even when I am not on Google sites their ad's follow me around. It used to be relevant ad's. That was ok. Now I visit the Alienware website and all I see are Alienware banners everywhere I go for the next week. Its freaky.
Now Google+ wants to do away with your alias and force you to use your real identity. Why would you ever want to do that? For a while there was a warning "be careful what you put on Facebook, it could get you fired." Google are trying to make that "be careful what you put on the Internet."
Perhaps some people will improve the quality of their comments.. I think a far better chance is that someone looking for me will find a 4 year old opinion or me playing devils advocate in an arguement and think I am a bigot, ill-imformed, stupid, whatever as a result..
The fact is that I want my email and my documents to be linked to me and my name. Anything else I would like to be attached to a throwaway name like the one I have on HN. Something I can abandon without worry that my opinions in 2013 will survive as "internet fact" for years to come.
I am not sure decline is the correct word. Google's choice of direction really bugs me. Scrapping the 20% developer time is fine. Cutting down projects to focus the company on a handful of products is cool. I never used Reader anyway. What is worrying is the way Google is becoming more and more creepy. They have so much information about you and with the increasing rollout of Google+ I feel more and more like I am be…
You point out a really weird feature of targeted ads. Someone mentions something, I do a websearch for that thing and look at a couple of websites. And then, for weeks afterwards, I get that stuff in my ads.
I'm very tolerant of ads (don't run an ad blocker, etc) but I wish there was some better way of guiding what ads I really don't like.
An option box for "Please don't ever show me this ad again," with a few reasons would be great.