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Google stopping coding competitions

developers.googleblog.com

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Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#191

Post by DataJunkie »

SteveNuts wrote: post #59
Jun8 wrote: post #6

Is there any other, more gracious, way to interpret this as Google retiring for on being Google, if so I’d like to know. I think the direct impact of these competitions to hiring were minimal. The biggest impact was to have thousands perhaps millions of coders and researchers see Google as the place to be. As the place that gets it. The Mecca of coderdom, if you will. Now they are just another corporation. I hope the…

As a nerdy kid growing up, Google always felt like Willy Wonka's chocolate factory to me. There was somewhat of a feeling of mystery about the things they were working on, and when things like Gmail were unveiled it felt like such a wonder. Now they just seem like a worse version of Microsoft to me, at least Microsoft knows how to deal with enterprises.

Nah, it's still like Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory. You have people turning into blueberries with unknown fate, kids getting stuck in pipes with no way out and now 12,000 going down the garbage chute.

The Oompa Loompas are the sycophants that are still drinking the Kool-Aid.

Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#193

Post by bitwize »

panic wrote: post #89
antondd wrote: post #85

It's been an interesting experience watching the primo crop of Silicon Valley sweethearts coming out of age and turning into this generation's IBMs, Oracles, and Ciscos. "He who slays the dragon shall become one".

The trick is to slay the dragon and then go home. If you stick around the gold and treasure for too long, that’s when it starts to get dangerous.

There's a roguelike cyberpunk game I like to play called Neon Chrome. You play a hacker who can take over the body of an "asset" in a cyberpunk arcology, with the goal of overthrowing the Overseer who rules the arcology.

The plot twist being that with the Overseer disposed of, your character takes his place, and the second playthrough features a NEW "hacker" player character who etc. And so the cycle continues.

Parallels to the history of Google are left as an exercise.

Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#194

Post by bmitc »

gkoberger wrote: post #9

We could lament them shutting it down, but why not thank them for doing this for 20 years? That's a LONG time to do anything, and despite what Google has become, it absolutely defined tech culture. Now it's obvious and commonplace, but an employee-centric company was revolutionary at the time. Things like this changed the lives of every single person here, either directly or indirectly. And best yet, it's a chance fo…

> and despite what Google has become, it absolutely defined tech culture.

I don't think that was a good thing.

Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#195

Post by apetresc »

jrm4 wrote: post #156
lwneal wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sundar is the Steve Ballmer of Google. And that's fine! Ballmer was a competent if uninspiring CEO: Microsoft under his leadership missed many new opportunities, but still made lots of money. Most importantly, Ballmer's tenure is what made it possible for Satya Nadella to pivot Microsoft into what it is today. Realistically, Windows Phone was never going to beat Apple, Bing was not going to beat Google, Yammer was no…

Overall, I don't understand this "that's fine." No. It's not. Which is to say, why do we value "CEO makes money?" That's NOT valuable to me. Microsoft doesn't pay me, therefore the pure question of whether or not they make money is literally meaningless to me, and should be meaningless to you if you are not in their employ. I'm not saying it's bad either, but it's such a weird gut reaction. Which is to say -- if you…

The CEO is answerable to the shareholders, who do get paid when the company makes money.

Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#196

Post by sbrother »

elijaht wrote: post #178
vineyardmike wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesn't exactly answer your question but some FAANGS pay better than others, and its related to the "desirability" of the company. Eg. Amazon started beating out Google's pay, since people wanted to work at google, and had to be coheres to working at amazon. I can't answer where pays better than FAANG, but companies in the bay (eg. Uber) are starting to approach the salary. Even smaller no-name bay companies are…

> Even smaller no-name bay companies are starting to match on base salary (equity+bonus is harder to match). FWIW- I see a lot of places with matching or better base than FANG, but it's precisely because the equity at FAANG is so high. The only places I see with meaningfully higher pay than FAANG + hot tech companies of the day (ex. Doordash, Datadog, ...) are hedge funds. Curious if there is anywhere else

One thing that complicates this is that Google (and probably the rest of FAANG but I don’t have experience there) is happy to severely downlevel people versus the positions they could get elsewhere. They also aggressively cut compensation if you live outside of SF/NYC. I’ve done a couple stints as an L4 SWE at Google and it is one of the worst paying places I’ve worked - but that’s because I’m comparing it to larger scope roles at smaller companies. Whereas yeah Staff or Director at Google is pretty hard to compete with.

Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#197

Post by bitwize »

apetresc wrote: post #182
w10-1 wrote: post #144

Google, Apple, and perhaps 2-3 other companies, have the weird characteristic that they are unimaginably enormous, AND the vast majority of their value is actually goodwill. It's true that Apple makes good devices and Google does good search, but their competitors are good enough. What distinguishes Apple and Google from their competitors is that we like them more. Not "we" the technical literati, but "we" billions o…

What a weird premise. You really think anyone is buying iPhones because of the personal goodwill they feel about Apple or Tim or whatever?

Yes. Apple is built different. No other major tech company has the intense user focus that Apple does, and Apple users repay Apple's regard for them with good will -- buying and evangelizing their products, etc. Many of us know at least one "Apple person" who stays within the Apple ecosystem to the extent possible -- and loves it. I know several.

People don't really have the same good will for Google though. It's an ad company. They simply tolerate it.

Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#198

Post by apetresc »

QuercusMax wrote: post #179
Gigachad wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they don’t buy 30 vacation homes, they buy companies. Where the extra 100m goes a long way. I’m sure he is quite comfortable on 100m though.

Again - what difference does it make to your life, aside from empire-building, to have an extra $100m? Nothing. It's just greed.

To someone in the bottom 10%, I'm sure they think there's no appreciable difference between a $100k/y annual income and $1M annual income. How much rent and food can one person consume, after all?

As others in the thread are trying to explain, there is a huge stratification at those levels. A $1B net-worther has a very different ability to project his will onto the world than a $.1B net-worther, or a $10B net-worther. That matters to them.

Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#199

Post by roncesvalles »

tobyjsullivan wrote: post #167
roncesvalles wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a person is in a $200m per year job, they're primarily incentivized to keep the job for as long as possible. This one objective dwarfs any other consideration in every decision that the person makes. And sure, 99% of his compensation is Google stock, but at those magnitudes the marginal utility of the dollar is zero. What's the difference between $100m and $200m anyway?

How does the money factor in here? Presumably sundar is motivated to remain CEO for as long as possible regardless of the specific motivations, right? Whether he is motivated by earning a billion dollars over a decade or he’s achieved pure altruism and simply wants to make Google the greatest company in history doesn’t really matter. He can only achieve his goals if he remains CEO. And as a public company, that means…

Every decision that we make factors in many variables that are weighed according to how important we perceive them to be. If one coefficient in that "equation" outclasses all others, to a rational person that would become the primary motivator.

>Whether he is motivated by earning a billion dollars over a decade or he’s achieved pure altruism and simply wants to make Google the greatest company in history doesn’t really matter. He can only achieve his goals if he remains CEO.

I don't buy this argument at all. For one, his goals are unknowable and might be what he plans to do with $200m/year, and he could justify anything to attain that $200m up to and including total destruction of the organization. Secondly, many people abdicate power if it's false power i.e. someone forces their hand in critical decisions. He hasn't done that presumably because $200m is more important to him than his pride or (Google) legacy.

Re: Google stopping coding competitions

#200

Post by yreg »

w10-1 wrote: post #144

Google, Apple, and perhaps 2-3 other companies, have the weird characteristic that they are unimaginably enormous, AND the vast majority of their value is actually goodwill. It's true that Apple makes good devices and Google does good search, but their competitors are good enough. What distinguishes Apple and Google from their competitors is that we like them more. Not "we" the technical literati, but "we" billions o…

Apple sells several devices that are absolutely unique on the market. Not saying they are better, but if that's what users want (and many users do want that), they are not replaceable by something else.
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