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Is Google Too Smart For Its Own Good?
An anonymous reader writes in with a piece in Fortune speculating on what's next for Google. The writer believes that a supersaturated solution of very smart people, plus stock that may have run out of upside, will yield what he calls Son of Google — a large wave of innovative companies created by Google graduates. And a Google less intent on hiring, and less able to hire, the very smartest people around. Could happen.
I'm not worried, at least not until we get to the Revenge of the Son of Google, or maybe the Bride of the Son of Google. That's when the entertainment value really drops off.
Perhaps part of the google ethos and internal structure is aimed at reducing competition from former employees - the sorts of pressures that drive people to break away are diminished, with the 20% project time and a good chance of whatever you're working on becoming a proper google beta. Of course, people that just have a drive to be the boss of the boss's boss will still form companies, perhaps they are eliminated at interview?
I am one of many. My idea is not unique, nor do I expect my voice alone to sway you. I speak in a chorus of opinion.
People are forgetting the secret to Google's success.
Luck.
They developed the right product at the right time. Microsoft did the same. They happened to be home when IBM called and got the DOS contract.
heir graduates can come up with quality product but will they be able to provide somethign the market really needs?
I'm not sure that online service providers are going to be naturally monolithic in the way that, say, hardware manufacturers or pre-web software companies are. I find it easy to imagine that Google's core business could be wiped out in a year by a new upstart with a better technology. Microsoft are lucky in that they have established lock-in - it will be superceded by something else over the long term rather than replaced by superior products of the same ilk. Google doesn't have any lock-in, and I think the nature of online serices is such that companies that try to establish it aren't going to be successful.
Is Slashdot Too Political And FUD'ish For Its Own Good?
Better luck next time,
-DSA
Kind of how Failchild Semiconductor was the wellspring for many of todays semiconductor companies? This graphic (PDF warning) was the best thing I could find.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
Hiring mediocre people backfires a lot sooner than hiring only really smart
people.
The kind of people who will form their own companies will do so irrespective of whether they work for google first.
http://rareformnewmedia.com/
Right, lets role play here for a minute. I'm a phd coder employed at google. I have a good chunk of cash in google shares that will vest soonish. So I'm going to take that money and go and start a startup because?
Which wally thought that the primary motivation for programmers was making money?
Pretty much every study of programmers motivations i have ever read has shown them to be intrinsically motivated by the opportunity to solve puzzles, and to be able to hang out with birds of similar feather. The fact is that money isn't that much of a motivator for coders, provided there is sufficient to buy toys. The latest laptop. A 30" lcd into which to plug said laptop. A plasma telly and an xbox 360 on which to play halo.
Starting up a company is risky, there is a bucket load of work to do that isn't coding, and you have to stop talking to all the other coders who you like chatting with at work. Wtf?
Someone has NO CLUE how coders think. And this made it to the front page of slashdot how, exactly?
I agree completely. As I understand it you are even required to spend 20% of your time on your own project. One of the smartest people I know will probably go to Google soon, so I don't think they have a problem with hiring. As to spinoffs, sure maybe there will be some, which is a good thing too. However, if you get to work on your cool idea on company time, and get bonuses in relation to the succes of your project, why start up your own company. Do you want to become a manager who has to run a business, or do you want to play with your toys. Google works by making it profitable not to start your own company. Sure, you might not make 1 billion dollars with a brilliant idea, but who needs that much money? If google makes it that your brilliant idea earns you millions and does the boring admin and pays you to work on your next crackpot idea that may or may not work then why would you leave.
Going anon obviously.
Two things -
1. Academic != Smart. The amount of small minds here (particularly the worst kind; small minds with large egos) is unreal. Just because you have a PhD does not make you smart.
2. Most Google employees are total sheep. They are the type of people who want to join a cult. This goes against everything business owners stand for.
3. Setting up a business has nothing to do with being smart or academic. Only certain kinds of people (generally, the kind of people who like selling, i.e. not nerds) enjoy and succeed at setting up businesses.
People totally overrate Google employees. It's funny/sad.
A little off-topic, but in an interview the golfer Bernard Langer was once told that he was extremely lucky to sink a particularly difficult put.
He responded 'The more I practise, the luckier I get!'.
I don't believe the successes of Google or Microsoft are down to luck. Neither do I think that Warren Buffett is a lucky investor.
Being opportunistic and taking a calculated risk sounds more like it.
Well it's nothing new, Microsoft has already been there, done that. Give it 10 years and Google will be the new company geeks love to hate. It's already getting that way for a growing minority.
I love my sig.