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Google to close engineering office in Russia

reuters.com

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Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#121

Post by jarek »

nemanja wrote: post #114
schrodinger wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but I really don't buy the argument that USA is worse than Russia in this respect. Snowden, while I totally applaud what he did and would love to see him pardoned, or protected under whistleblower laws, leaked a ton of highly classified information. Again, I think he did the right thing, but him being prosecuted is not the same as "if anyone speaks about the actions the U.S. takes in secret they are hunted to…

If Snowden blew the whistle (to the minimum extent possible to inform the public about what was happening) and stayed in the U.S. to face the music, I could buy the argument that he was a hero and deserves a pardon. What he did instead is that he fled to our biggest foe and revealed publicly a lot of tactical information that only serves to hurt U.S. intelligence operations abroad. Further, we will never know what he…

Really curious how you feel about Litvinenko's work with MI6. Western agent and traitor to Russia should be non-controversial and not bad from Western point of view, but how about the dirtbag?

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#122

Post by muglug »

osipov wrote: post #105
muglug wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Espionage (what the US programs were for) is very different than the widespread victimisation of those who are seen as undesirable. The Russian government is actively conspiring to silence hundreds of thousands of people. Whether it's because they were unfortunate enough to have been born gay, or because they want to talk about Russia's annexation of eastern Ukraine, or whether they just don't think Putin should be i…

Are you still repeating that "putin hates gays" meme?! Read the facts: http://gallery.mailchimp.com/d0e55f3197099944345708652/files...

Yes. The recent policy is similar to Section 28, a British policy enacted in 1988 and only finally repealed in 2003. Though the text of the law talks of "protecting children", its effect has been to stifle the freedoms of gay people to talk openly about their sexuality.

Further, the Russian government has presided over an incredibly well-documented increase in violence towards gay people. The notion in the above report that Russian gay people enjoy greater freedoms than those in the US is utterly specious.

That the author takes John C. Dvorak seriously should tell you everything you need to know.

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#123

Post by pandaman »

okatsu wrote: post #88
osipov wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The situation about gays in Russia, i.e. "being a homosexual will land you in jail" is a meme that Western Corporate Media wants you to believe. Read the facts: http://gallery.mailchimp.com/d0e55f3197099944345708652/files...

Speaking in favor of gay rights is considered propaganda and was made illegal last year.

I know that propaganda of sex to children had been forbidden last year (which makes one wonder, has it really been legal before 2013?), did not know this one. Any links would be appreciated. I can read and write Russian so the law's name would be good enough for me.

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#124

Post by saalweachter »

tribaal wrote: post #85
evgen wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of if, like Google, you are the one paying those salaries indexed to cost of living. Then your employees become rather expensive...

Well, it seems like Google salaries are very capable of sustaining a familly in Zurich: http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Google-Salaries-E9079.htm And that's US salaries (the website only offers a free preview.. yada yada). I think Google generally thinks the cost of a talented enigineer is justified, and switching locations will of course represent a cost, but probably not such a big one in the great scheme of things…

It's quite possible there will be a relative loss of status. You might go from being -- say -- in the top decile or oven top few percentiles of income/wealth in Russia, to being in a middle decile in Zurich, even if you are quite comfortable or your absolute income or disposable income ends up being larger.

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#125

Post by jkaljundi »

Acronis, one of best known Russian tech companies, is slowly moving to Estonia: http://www.investinestonia.com/en/about-estonia/news/article...

There are also quite a few who are moving from Russia to Ukraine.

Also remembered this: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-28/luxoft-to-move-500-...

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#126

Post by dchichkov »

schrodinger wrote: post #60
ThinkBeat wrote: post #53

it is worrying what is happening in Russia but much less so than what is going in the USA. Google, Facbook etc tightly integrated with the nations intelligence agencies, mining the data found there to make secret lists that could result in assassinations, indefinite detention and torture. Russias actions are for the most part overt, and rightly criticized, what the US does, it does so covertly. If anyone speaks about…

Sorry, but I really don't buy the argument that USA is worse than Russia in this respect. Snowden, while I totally applaud what he did and would love to see him pardoned, or protected under whistleblower laws, leaked a ton of highly classified information. Again, I think he did the right thing, but him being prosecuted is not the same as "if anyone speaks about the actions the U.S. takes in secret they are hunted to…

Well, he is somewhat right. Snooping tech that three-letter-agencies have here is likely to be well beyond anything Russia can possibly have. I've seen some of it in Russia about 15 years back (to my shame, as a student, participated in the development) and even though my code was kinda ok-ish, this was literally child's play ;) You could monitor small percentage of phone calls, but it is a far cry from bulk wiretapping, voice recognition and search/analytics/social-network-analysis that is probably in place here.

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#127

Post by tptacek »

osipov wrote: post #62
danmaz74 wrote: post #28

Putin is increasingly cracking down on any possibility of dissent and threat to his power, whatever the consequences to the Russian economy, and this of course scares foreign companies who work there - even if, with the recent fall of the ruble, Russian talent is even more affordable now. I'm afraid (I have friends in Russia) that we're going to see more of this.

That's a very myopic view and here's why -- virtually all governments in the world are becoming increasingly authoritarian because of the global economic crisis and the civilian unrest that it provokes. For example, replace Putin in your sentence and you'll get "United States is increasingly cracking down on any possibility of dissent and threat to it power". You can support that statement with facts about police in…

False equivalence watch: what Snowden did was so outside the bounds of established law that he'd face prosecution in virtually any administration in American history. His arguments mitigating the offense might be important at a trial, but we can't know, because he fled the country rather than face that trial. The attention paid to Snowden is not in itself evidence of increased authoritarianism in the US.

When I think of Putin, I don't so much think of things my government says (in fact, Americans don't generally pay that much attention to what the government says; our legislature is skirting single-digit approval ratings).

I think more about news stories about how 4chan-style prank videos of kids having gay porn posters put up on their wall are reported as factual news by Russian state-owned television:

http://www.advocate.com/world/2014/12/06/watch-russian-docum...

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#128

Post by jkaljundi »

chkuendig wrote: post #30

Might be a coincidence, but they also just announced plans to rent 50'000 square meters of office space in Zurich http://www.handelszeitung.ch/unternehmen/google-investiert-d...

Google has been extremely active in Zürich and Switzerland for 10+ years: http://www.lunchoverip.com/2007/09/inside-google-z.html

Google Panoramio is also based there: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panoramio

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#129

Post by dantheman »

tribaal wrote: post #41
raverbashing wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why is Zurich a big part of Google's strategy as opposed to other places in Europe

Because it's been on position 1 of best standard of living in the world pretty consistently, and Switzerland is geographically central, well interconnected, business-friendly, and not part of the EU? Just a guess :) EDIT: It seems Vienna is on top since 2010, my bad. But position 2 is not so bad, and the other points still stand :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercer_Quality_of_Living_Surve...

The #1 best standard of living metrics are highly flawed. Vienna ranks quite high, but ask people where they want to live and it's not Vienna or Zurich, it's larger cities like Paris/London/New York/Boston/Los Angeles/San Francisco/Tokyo/Hong Kong or it's smaller rural towns. The factors they focus on don't really reflect well on quality of life.

Re: Google to close engineering office in Russia

#130

Post by dantheman »

tribaal wrote: post #41
raverbashing wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why is Zurich a big part of Google's strategy as opposed to other places in Europe

Because it's been on position 1 of best standard of living in the world pretty consistently, and Switzerland is geographically central, well interconnected, business-friendly, and not part of the EU? Just a guess :) EDIT: It seems Vienna is on top since 2010, my bad. But position 2 is not so bad, and the other points still stand :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercer_Quality_of_Living_Surve...

The #1 best standard of living metrics are highly flawed. Vienna ranks quite high, but ask people where they want to live and it's not Vienna or Zurich, it's larger cities like Paris/London/New York/Boston/Los Angeles/San Francisco/Tokyo/Hong Kong or it's smaller rural towns. The factors they focus on don't really reflect well on quality of life.
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