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Leaving Google

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Re: Leaving Google

#61

Post by haberman »

fidotron wrote: post #56
[deleted] wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

Easy, above fairly junior level you're either told to be in one of the big offices at the point of joining or they'll hire you then crank up the pressure to move. Places like the Seattle office exist mainly to get people in the company, then to drag the ones they like further south. Many of the rest will effectively be being paid to not work at MS or Amazon. There's a good reason I described MV as a world apart.

I'm sorry but you have no idea what you are talking about.

Re: Leaving Google

#62

Post by typicalrunt »

On the topic of living costs for Vancouver, coincidentally enough WorkSafeBC (Vancouver's version of OSHA) just released a cost of living calculator for the BC region. You can see that housing will eat up the majority of your paycheque for an average wage (maybe not rockstar IT devs) [1].

http://www.costofliving.welcomebc.ca/

[1] Median family income in BC is $69,150 as of 2011. Source: http://www.statcan.gc.ca/tables-tableaux/sum-som/l01/cst01/f...

Re: Leaving Google

#63

Post by jonknee »

Xdes wrote: post #8
psbp wrote: post #5

"Plus I find the Bay Area congested, racist, incestuous, and overpriced." I like this guy.

I am also of the same opinion. Plus he probably doesn't want to lose his Canadian healthcare.

He's Canadian, he won't "lose" anything, it would be waiting for him upon his return. I'm sure Google's health plan is more than generous.

Re: Leaving Google

#64

Post by [deleted] »

haberman wrote: post #58
fidotron wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. If you're in one of those smaller offices you have absolutely no control of your destiny at all, and the glass ceiling is very low.

Neither of those things are true at all, from my experience and from what I have observed working in the Seattle office for five years. Where are you getting this information? The Seattle/Kirkland offices have over 1,000 employees and are growing. They have people at all different levels including directors and principal engineers and lots of important projects going on. These aren't minor little operations.

[deleted]

Re: Leaving Google

#65

Post by wglb »

habosa wrote: post #22

For those who don't know, Tim Bray was one of the original inventors of the XML spec and has been a Developer Advocate at Google for a while. Shame to see him go, I am joining DevRel at Google in the fall and I thought it was awesome to have someone as experience as Tim working kinda-sorta-near me. Hopefully he goes on to do something great.

He is also a serial founder, and, among other interesting things, wrote one of the very first web crawlers. See http://www.textuality.com/ for some of his fun stuff.

Re: Leaving Google

#66

Post by zrail »

typicalrunt wrote: post #51
kohanz wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, Vancouver housing is incredibly overpriced. Perhaps more-so than the Bay Area because wages have kept up even less (supposedly due to Vancouver's desirability as a destination). That doesn't mean there aren't good, well-paying jobs there, but on average, wages in Vancouver are much lower than, say Toronto. As for the racism aspect, I think the choice of word is a bit hyperbolic. That being said, as a Canadian wh…

To put a data point on it, Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) put out a study in Nov 2013 that rated the affordability of housing in Canadian major cities. For Vancouver, it takes 84-88% of your pre-tax income to afford a detached house (page 7 of the report). "Afford" means mortgage (principal+interest), property taxes, utilities, etc. Okay, so 88% is high right? Well "pre-tax" means before the government gets their cut. In…

Small correction: in the US you can deduct mortgage interest. At the beginning of a mortgage, and probably for most people the entirety of their time in any given house, that will be the majority of your payment.

Re: Leaving Google

#67

Post by RogerL »

cromwellian wrote: post #30
drhayes9 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To get some context on the "racist" comment, Google [bart killings]. There are multiple cases of BART transit cops shooting unarmed people of color. Also, the Oakland police department was on the verge of Federal takeover last year largely due to a series of racist-overtoned cases.

That's not really Silicon Valley specific. The entire criminal justice system in the US is racist. Just look at how "Stand Your Ground" laws are applied when African Americans are defending themselves.

The article did not say the bay area is uniquely, or especially racist, it was just stating that there is noticable racism here. Which there is. More than Vancouver I have no idea.

Re: Leaving Google

#68

Post by eevilspock »

haberman wrote: post #26
psbp wrote: post #5

"Plus I find the Bay Area congested, racist, incestuous, and overpriced." I like this guy.

I'm a little sad he didn't say anything about Seattle, only a couple hours from Vancouver and with sizable and thriving Google offices. It is also has "greens and greys and unfussily variegated people" -- clearly it's not Canada, but in general it would be a much less drastic transition!

Vancouver is a real city.

Seattle is provincial, passive-aggressive, unfriendly to outsiders, and segregated. A hick town with skyscrapers as I've often called it. Californians who've moved there almost unanimously agree with my first sentence, and crack up at the latter.

(Sadly, I lived in Seattle for 17 years. The Bay Area before that, and New York now.)

Re: Leaving Google

#69

Post by trhway »

psbp wrote: post #5

"Plus I find the Bay Area congested, racist, incestuous, and overpriced." I like this guy.

>"Plus I find the Bay Area congested, racist, incestuous, and overpriced."

>I like this guy.

yep, he would fit well here in Bay Area.

Re: Leaving Google

#70

Post by stephencanon »

eevilspock wrote: post #68
haberman wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a little sad he didn't say anything about Seattle, only a couple hours from Vancouver and with sizable and thriving Google offices. It is also has "greens and greys and unfussily variegated people" -- clearly it's not Canada, but in general it would be a much less drastic transition!

Vancouver is a real city. Seattle is provincial, passive-aggressive, unfriendly to outsiders, and segregated. A hick town with skyscrapers as I've often called it. Californians who've moved there almost unanimously agree with my first sentence, and crack up at the latter. (Sadly, I lived in Seattle for 17 years. The Bay Area before that, and New York now.)

Seeing as California is extraordinarily passive-aggressive (from a New Englander’s perspective), that really says something.
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