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Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

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Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#71

Post by dboreham »

JSDevOps wrote: post #2

If you’re still under the impression that network and server design wasn’t about enabling remote work from the start, then you’re simply not seeing the bigger picture. The entire foundation of these systems was built to break down geographical barriers and enable people to work and collaborate from anywhere. This was never just about sharing resources—it was always about laying the groundwork for what would evolve in…

I was around at the time and this is partly correct but somewhat wrong. We were trying to connect people so they could share information and collaborate, but those people at the time were in (different) offices. The notion of people working from their home didn't really arise for regular people (ironically the CEO class always did) until powerful laptops and DSL or HFC residential service appeared. Sometime around 2000.

I first worked from home for one project in 1992 but I had to lug a computer from the office -- several trips to the car to get it all loaded. And I had no network connectivity. A few years later in 2000 I began full time remote work but I still needed a rack of servers in my basement and eventually constructed my own ISP to get decent connectivity. Totally remote working where it's just me and a laptop and a fast network probably took another 10 years to arrive.

So if you got in your time machine and talked to Vint Cerf in 1990, sure he'd be interested in the vision that nobody would need a physical office at some time in the future, but that wasn't why he was building the network because nobody could practically do so for at least a decade and nobody at the time could predict how long it would take. Some predicted advances such as telemedicine and remote learning only took off due to a pandemic, for societal and regulatory reasons, not technical ones.

Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#72

Post by dboreham »

leptons wrote: post #53

It's management's attempt at cargo-culting success. But success has more to do with good ideas combined with talent than anything else. It has nothing to do with where the talent rests their butts during the day. I remember the office days - it was a room full of silent people, all chatting away on Slack. We can do that literally from anywhere.

I haven't had much same-room interaction with my colleagues since 1996. In fact it was an observation that even though colleagues were on the same campus, I generally never saw them, interacting only via phone and email, that led me to conclude that remote work should be feasible, in 2000.

Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#73

Post by [deleted] »

plorkyeran wrote: post #69
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> amazing quagmires built by geniuses You’re describing Google 10 years ago. My recent visits to its campuses have left me unimpressed. There are plenty of geniuses. But there are also many morons, and the mix is maybe a degree or two away from median corporate America.

I think Google's average employee is still almost certainly above the average for the industry as a whole, but they're definitely now only "above average". Google's big problem is that they've always been dysfunctional. The AdSense money printer let them grow the company 100x over the last 15 years without the company actually figuring out how to scale up or solve any of their structural problems.

[deleted]

Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#74

Post by [deleted] »

nemothekid wrote: post #22

This seems extremely self-serving on behalf of Schmidt in order to avoid any serious self-reflection of what seems to be going on at Google. I've never looked a at a Google product and thought "this sloppy product is the result of people who were more concerned about going home". I don't really care about the remote work argument, but this fight is the rug that covers the real problem. Google products are _the_ defin…

[deleted]

Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#75

Post by stvltvs »

echelon wrote: post #33
linotype wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He’s right, Americans won’t work like employees at TSMC in Taiwan. There were _decades_ of struggle to get eight hour per day/five day work weeks. If Elon Musk, the richest man on earth, wants to work all the time, that’s his prerogative and right. He shouldn’t be allowed to force that on his workers though.

> He shouldn’t be allowed to force that on his workers though. If you want to work under those conditions, it should be your own prerogative. There are plenty of places to work.

Until inevitably every employer requires it. Then you either work long hours or starve. It's only the collective effort of workers that protects us from exploitation by those with money.

Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#76

Post by nemothekid »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #41
nemothekid wrote: post #22

This seems extremely self-serving on behalf of Schmidt in order to avoid any serious self-reflection of what seems to be going on at Google. I've never looked a at a Google product and thought "this sloppy product is the result of people who were more concerned about going home". I don't really care about the remote work argument, but this fight is the rug that covers the real problem. Google products are _the_ defin…

> amazing quagmires built by geniuses You’re describing Google 10 years ago. My recent visits to its campuses have left me unimpressed. There are plenty of geniuses. But there are also many morons, and the mix is maybe a degree or two away from median corporate America.

>You’re describing Google 10 years ago.

The Google of 10, or 15 years ago did not build quagmires. Google's interview process is so rigorous that I do not doubt the caliber of talent that even currently works there. I think people don't have enough perspective when they criticize something like the Pixel Phone or Gemini. I don't think those are products that could be built by "morons".

There is a lack of risk or commitment to whenever Google launches anything new, and they refuse to be anything other than a fast follower. Stadia was an great product - afaik it worked with acceptable latency and the hardware was good. Morons could not have executed it that well. The quagmire came from the fact the messaging was confusing and there was no leadership that had any vision or conviction for the product. When I look at something like Stadia, as a microsm of new Google projects, the last lesson I take away is "Stadia was a shoddy product because people didn't spend enough time in the office." More engineers sleeping overnight at Google wouldn't have saved Stadia. Replace Stadia with any half baked release out of Google.

I worry the same for Waymo - an amazing product, damn near futuristic at this point, that will fall on the sword because no one at Google will be willing to risk their career on it.

Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#77

Post by cfcfcf »

er4hn wrote: post #37
nemothekid wrote: post #22

This seems extremely self-serving on behalf of Schmidt in order to avoid any serious self-reflection of what seems to be going on at Google. I've never looked a at a Google product and thought "this sloppy product is the result of people who were more concerned about going home". I don't really care about the remote work argument, but this fight is the rug that covers the real problem. Google products are _the_ defin…

There was a recent post on here ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41239520 ) where someone noted that people at Google tend not to use their own products. When it was posted on X a Google Director said that they use Google software because it's a software company. Which does show part of the dysfunction - you have a lot of hardware being built by people who aren't using it. I have no idea if similar things happe…

There might be some truth to this, but under Ballmer's leadership, Microsoft's inflexibility re: the use of competing hardware came with its own problems. Since Nadella relaxed this policy, it's unclear to me whether you could say HW quality is worse. In any case, the significance of this policy may be overstated one way or the other.

Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#78

Post by arunabha »

Looks like Schmidt has walked back his claims now. https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/google-eric-schmidt-ai-remote-wo...

From the article "I misspoke about Google and their work hours,” Schmidt said Wednesday in an email to The Wall Street Journal. “I regret my error."

Looks like that comment brought more heat than he preferred.

Re: Eric Schmidt Says Google Is Falling Behind on AI–and Remote Work Is Why

#79

Post by JumpCrisscross »

nemothekid wrote: post #76
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> amazing quagmires built by geniuses You’re describing Google 10 years ago. My recent visits to its campuses have left me unimpressed. There are plenty of geniuses. But there are also many morons, and the mix is maybe a degree or two away from median corporate America.

> You’re describing Google 10 years ago. The Google of 10, or 15 years ago did not build quagmires. Google's interview process is so rigorous that I do not doubt the caliber of talent that even currently works there. I think people don't have enough perspective when they criticize something like the Pixel Phone or Gemini. I don't think those are products that could be built by "morons". There is a lack of risk or com…

> Google's interview process is so rigorous that I do not doubt the caliber of talent that even currently works there

I do! The process is rigorous. But in my opinion, rigorously wrong. It tests for problem-solving skills. But not something else. (I openly admit I don’t know.) It’s the freshman dorm commons at an Ivy League with a lot of money.

This nonsense clears out above the 8th tier of whatever ranking system they employ (principal?), for the most part. But it’s a lot of making increasingly-elaborate artisan firing mechanisms for guns that shoot a Petri dish of cancer, in the name of curing cancer. It’s technologically marvellous. But it’s so stupidly useless. (Bloom! Self-piloting boat that could mostly keep pace with the winds. Why? The balloon tore itself apart if inflating with even a bit of wind on launch.)

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