Favorite bit: > very difficult to find much on Raghavan’s history [..] but from what I’ve gleaned, his expertise lies primarily in “failing up,”
Yeah he only co-authored 2 highly influential CS textbooks when he wasn't failing upward
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The man who killed Google Search?
381–390 of 939 posts
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#382Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I'm not taking a position for or against the article; I haven't read it. If you haven't read it, why are you in a position to suggest whether the title is accurate to the article's contents or not?
This implies that posting a multi-paragraph comment on an article without bothering to read it, as dang did here, is the standard that HN should aspire to going forward.
I didn't post about the article. I posted about how to moderate the title on HN, which is my job, and which does not require reading every article*, though it does require skimming some of them.
* Moderation would be impossible if it did.
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#383Earlier quoted context omitted.
I had to look this up — I've never heard it used in Britain. > Ratfucking is an American slang term for behind the scenes (covert) political sabotage or dirty tricks, particularly pertaining to elections https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratfucking
Interesting. In the (US) military, we used this term to describe someone who breaks into the MRE stash and steals all the good stuff, leaving horrid creations like cheese and veggie omelette. “Private Johnson got caught ratfucking the MREs while everyone was doing PT” etc etc
I've always used it as a variant of chicken fucker
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#384[deleted]
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#385Ex-Google search engineer here (2019-2023). I know a lot of the veteran engineers were upset when Ben Gomes got shunted off. Probably the bigger change, from what I've heard, was losing Amit Singhal who led Search until 2016. Amit fought against creeping complexity. There is a semi-famous internal document he wrote where he argued against the other search leads that Google should use less machine-learning, or at leas…
simplicity is always the recipe for success, unfortunately, most engineers are drawn to complexity like moth to fire
if they were unable to do some AB testing between a ML search and a non-ML search, they deserve their failure 100%
there are not enough engineers blowing the whistle against ML
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#386Earlier quoted context omitted.
I just recently switched to Kagi. It's worth paying a few bucks to get decent results.
Kagi seems to have their heads up their asses though. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40011314
One dude's crappy blog doesn't change the fact that Kagi has excellent search results.
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#387Earlier quoted context omitted.
I thought it was a very good description. The person mentioned is responsible for turning one of the most important pieces of software used by billions, into user-hostile experiences that's better for only a few, including himself, just for profits.
> ..just for profits. well let's be honest, Google was never founded to dig wells or feed starving children. It was only ever for the profits. Also, in their defense, afaik no one's paychecks have ever bounced. I bet many many people would become very interested in profit and its growth if their direct deposit all of a sudden stopped.
I'm talking about the difference between making money off a good product, and being on a quest to enrich yourself at all costs, even if it's detrimental to virtually everyone on the planet, and the company in the long term.
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#388Hard to place the blame on a single person, though I do think a "management consultant wearing an engineer costume" captures Google's engineering leadership these days
Yeah. But what do you expect when the boss comes from McKinsey? Not only does the place teach a particular skillset, it also selects for very peculiar employees. It would be downright weird if an ex-McKinsey employee were anything like a decent engineer.
McKinsey has absolutely stellar engineers and engineering leadership in its internal software teams, it's a gift and joy to work with them. Not sure about the consulting side though.
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#389Earlier quoted context omitted.
That sounds a lot like Kodak. I remember running into Kodak engineers, at an event in the 1990s, and they were all complaining about the same thing. They were digital engineers, and they were complaining that film people kept sabotaging their projects. Kodak invented the digital camera. They should have ruled the roost (at least, until the iPhone came out). Instead, they imploded, almost overnight. The film part was…
If they owned the digital camera space like they should have, who’s to say they wouldn’t have eventually released a smartphone. It probably would have been an absolutely incredible camera first, and some mobile internet and phone features second. One can really dream up a fascinating alternate timeline of iKodak if they didnt shoot themselves in the foot.
And even if they didn’t, maybe it would be Kodak sensors in iPhones instead of Sony sensors. A lot of possibilities.
Re: The man who killed Google Search?
#390I'm dying here, from the article;
> What about Raghavan’s career made this feel right? How has nobody connected these dots before and said something? Am I insane?
Yeah spend any amount of time in tech and you will learn this feeling well. There should be some long German word that describes it.
How many acquaintances do I know that have sold their useless startups for 10s of millions. Others that are promoted well past the Peter Principal into positions that have them leading thousands - and lacking the basic skills or empathy needed to understand what it is their orgs do.
This can either make you bitter and burn out... Or you can let it go. The universe doesn't owe us fairness. Ask the seal being played with by an Orca before being torn to shreds how it feels about fairness.
Go enjoy life friends. Luck dominates so much of what is perceived as success. There are more important things to worry about.