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Xooglers - Google Discussed by Ex-Googlers

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the insiders-looking-back dept.

perler writes to tell us that Xooglers, a relatively new website created so that ex-Google employees could reminisce and share, has been gaining a great deal of popularity recently. The website shares what went wrong, what went right, and all of the funny happenings in between. Quite an interesting piece of Google history.

8 of 211 comments (clear)

  1. Why "ex" googlers? by cytoman · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I assume that being a Google employee represents the highpoint of your career and you would never want to leave...like one of the xooglers says, why become a boring specialized cell when you can be a stem-cell and take on any and every challenge thrown at you?

    If *I* get a Google job, I am never leaving!

    1. Re:Why "ex" googlers? by nandu_prahlad · · Score: 4, Interesting

      If *I* get a Google job, I am never leaving!
      Never say never. As Lennon said, "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans". Suddenly, working for Google (or some other great company) may not seem like great idea as before because your interests have shifted, or you may wanna spend more time with your family.

    2. Re:Why "ex" googlers? by hyeh · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I'm a Xoogler myself, and personally, I find my current job more fulfilling from a personal/learning/growth standpoint. Just my two cents.

    3. Re:Why "ex" googlers? by koltrane · · Score: 5, Interesting
      Honestly, you people think working for Google is like playtime and that no one would ever have problems there. I felt the same way about working at McDonalds when I was 8.

      Any successful business is just that...a business, and all the adolescent fantasies of corporate ski trips and pool tables in the break room aside, work has to be done. A job at Google is not a panacea for the workaday blues. I'm sure it's a very nice and creative environment, but I remember a lot of dot-com companies that sneered at traditional business practices, opting instead for lavish salaries, non-standard work hours, jacuzzis in every office, and multi-million dollar IPO parties. We all know where they are now...how much is that theGlobe.com stock worth now?

      Not to say that Google is such a company. They obviously have their heads on straight, but don't kid yourself into thinking that no one in his right mind would ever want to leave, because Google ain't perfect.

  2. If you read the stuff by putko · · Score: 4, Interesting

    You'll see there's a lisper who left JPL because managers decided to follow "best practices" of industry and move to C++. This is despite the fact that programming a space mission isn't a "standard" problem -- it is, in fact, a problem that a language like LISP is excellently suited, because people can deal with unclear/dynamic requirements as a project evolves.

    So he goes to Google because they have some LISP guys there (not using LISP -- just smart guys) -- and then he gets told to do the first Java project. And later he gets told that LISP is out of the question.

    And in fact, he details how a race condition in the C++ memory management leads to them billing clients nonsense amounts -- a problem that simply couldn't happen if they'd used a language like LISP (or Java) -- because the GC wouldn't reclaim something if the thing was still in use.

    So Google can yet be beat -- they are not perfect. Of course, that doesn't mean there is anyone to beat them, yet.

    --
    http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/when_to_s tone_your_children/dt21_18a.html
  3. RTFB by vectorian798 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A lot of you are pointing out that these are just random ex-Google people (or even that we have no proof they ever worked there) but there are some good points brought out in the articles. I think the majority of posters who are complaining about the blog or the accuracy of a blog are just randomly posting in hopes of points/Google-whoring rather than actually reading what was linked to. That being said,...

    While those outside Google might disagree with the ultimate decisions the company has made, they should know that those decisions were not made without reflection on the consequences. One of my goals with Xooglers is to expose the nature of that debate. I agree with Matt that providing more transparency into how difficult decisions get made within the Googleplex can only enhance the brand. It's not enough to say you're not evil; you need to show the world how you define evil and how you choose to avoid it.

    Well put don't you think? Indeed a large portion of slashdotters tend to believe Google is the messiah and that they are not an 'evil' company. But let's face it, 'evil' is different from person to person and to vaguely portray one company as evil and another as not is ridiculous. To many, MS won't seem evil - after all, a lot of people use their products and are damn satisfied with them. To still others, the fact that Google supports OSS means nothing and they want only excellence of product (BTW don't start a tangential reply about MS products not being excellent blah blah).

    The moral of the story is that sometimes, and in particular with free software, you get more than what you pay for. There are a lot of companies out there paying dearly for commercial databases (and operating systems for that matter). As far as I'm concerned they might as well be flushing that money down the toilet. Actually, they might be better off. We certainly would have been. As an aside, there is a raging debate in the hacker community about the overall economic merit of the open source model. (Making money producing free software is quite a challenge.) I am not taking sides in that debate here. All I am saying is that from the end user's point of view free software is often much better than the producers of commercial software would like people to think.

    Again, a good point - there are some OSS that are good, others that aren't. But what I want to point out is that Google did go for non-OSS software at one point - suddenly, it seems like Google was making a decision from the standpoint of "What would be best for us?" (the fact that the ACTUAL decision they made was wrong and they returned to OSS later is irrelevant BTW) correct? Indeed, they are a business. While no one here can likely say for certain, we certainly shouldn't assume that because of Summer of Code or other opened material that Google is supporting OSS (btw I am not an advocate of OSS nor am I an opponent, so please don't think I am being biased) or that it is "not evil".

    My 2 cents

    PS: When people bring up databases and talk about MySQL, PostgreSQL, or Oracle, they often ignore some other big players: MS's SQL Server and IBM's DB2. Don't start a thread about the different relational databases half-assedly plz.

  4. The trouble with Google: they're an ad agency by Animats · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Sadly, what Google really is an ad agency that uses a search engine as a traffic builder. It's a very good search engine, but fundamentally, Google is an advertising-delivery system.

    If they'd gone private instead of going public, they could have been a very profitable near-monopoly, sustained by the fact that it doesn't really cost that much to run a search engine, and thus, their ad content can be minimal. But now they have to produce a reasonable return on investment for their overblown market cap. So they have to add more and more advertising-oriented services, from catalogs to classifieds. This dooms them to become more like their competitors in those spaces.

    It's not going to be fun to work there as the profitabilty vise closes.

  5. Let Them Eat Google by TallMatthew · · Score: 4, Interesting
    The one thing that stood out to me reading this guy's blog was how nostalgic he was for the place. He was practically weepy. That attitude makes me nervous. Yeah, it's a company based on innovation with plenty of smart people running around being smart and acting silly. It's also a multibillion dollar corporation. That doesn't make it evil, necessarily. But being a thinktank doesn't make it good, necessarily. When I read accounts of this place that make it sound like heaven, I wonder what the deal is. Behind most panaceas is a bunch of people getting played. Is building a better search engine really such a noble pursuit? Maybe.

    Google is doing a fine job sucking up talent. Not just the big fish like Cerf, but the more clued individuals in our industry. Working at Google has become something of a status symbol, something akin to having a CCIE. Oh, you worked at Google? You must be good. I've noticed one thing that results from this. There seem to be more senior positions open in the Bay Area, New York, everywhere Google has significant footprint. Too, the annual salaries for these positions has risen about 20%, presumedly out of demand.

    For that, I can say ... thank you Google!