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A Tour of Googleplex East
An anonymous reader writes "In Googleplex East: Search And The City, IWeek has posted a visual tour of the search giant's NYC HQ, complete with the requisite massage room, candy machine, and funky cafeteria. (There are even — surprise — work areas.) A companion story argues that New York City has reemerged as a tech center, citing the access to the Big Apple's media as a powerful pull for Web 2.0 companies. It also argues that NY's business community is more important these days to startups than Silicon Valley's deep pool of talent. Do you buy this thesis? Isn't it really unimportant these days where you work, geographically?"
Ok ok, I've had enough... Who cares if Google provides candy machines? This is not news, and many companies have these facilities (and more) available to staff.
Mega Mobiles www.megamobiles.co.uk
Glad to know that there's some diversity in editors in their offices. Wonder if there's an ed(1) advocate on that whiteboard by now.
Can't they just search for what they want to see?
The original generic sig.
I was rather unimpressed with the pictures I saw. OK, so free snacks (debatable if that's good or bad) but personally I find that work environment rather poor. Some big warehouse with waist high cubicle walls. Oh boy, sounds great until you've actually worked in one such cubicle farm. No thank you. I'll buy my own snacks.
"complete with the requisite massage room, candy machine, and funky cafeteria."
:'(
Panem et circenses, anyone? Distract the employees from Google's latest evil schemes with free food and play?
That being said, I would kill for their sushi station
I work from home=I make my own PB&J's
I work at an office=Someone else makes my PB&J's
FTW!
Task Mangler
It's great that they're trying, but once you're in the several thousand employee range, you've lost any genuinely communal feeling amongst the staff, and personally I find the attempts to be relaxed and groovy a bit forced in those corporate environments.
Seriously, what good is a tour of Google's facilities without Oompa-Loompas?
Do Googles employees really want to be treated like 5 year olds in some big, colorful playpen?
I find it patronizing and vaguely insulting.
These people are supposed to be adults, aren't they?
re: "...argues that NY's business community is more important these days to startups than Silicon Valley's deep pool of talent. Do you buy this thesis? Isn't it really unimportant these days where you work, geographically?"
5 0
I think we already covered this yesterday.....
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/02/16/16592
sig has been sent away for a few small repairs...
Judging from he workspace pictures, it appears Google subscribes to the idea that cubicles without high walls promote communication and interworking among employees. Of course, this is at the expense of privacy, peace and quiet, and for some people, stress relief.
After working in both settings, I have to say that I prefer low walled cubicles. High walled cubicles create a claustrophobic, catacomb-like environment. Low walled cubicles create a friendlier work floor, and it is easier to have impromptu meetings in the cubicle hallways when people can spread out and still see each other.
It may not matter where you work once you get the job, but if you want to find a tech job, there's just so much opportunity in the NYC area. I guess living here isn't for everyone, but I haven't looked back since I moved out 8 years ago.
It really does matter. On paper, two very geographically diverse places could be equivalent (infrastructure, cost of living, commute, etc) however, having a certain talent pool and mindset is a HUUUUUUGE advantage. I've lived all around the country in various "hotspots" and I can say without a doubt that by simply living in the Bay Area, I felt so much more creative and productive. You are always surrounded by driven people, creative people, people with ideas, people that aren't afraid to just go for is (ie, not work that 9-5 job). I miss that feeling and I shall be heading back there as soon as I possibly can.
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
From the point of view of the pop-culture imagination, is it as though Googleplex(es) are to our time and set what the Fillmores and Playboy Mansions were to those of the 1960s and 1970s?
Log Buffer
Let me explain this to you.
1) You can work from home ("telecommute", I hear they call it) to a certain extent, but if you happen to be on a team of Humans it is in fact important to be face-to-face frequently. Not all human contact (outside of sex) is counter productive.
2) You can move to Silicon Valley (or Mountain View), right next to your high-tech overlords. But in fact not everybody chooses to move there. This geographic dispersal of Humans is one reason why Wal-Mart has been successful beyond two locations.
3) Places like Google are aggressively hiring. In fact they have been nearly doubling in size each year. AND they are very picky. So it stands to reason that it they want to keep hiring the best and brightest, they have to go where the people are.
Me, I wish they would open a cafeteria in my kitchen. I have no snacks within arms reach, and nobody, not even the Democrat-controlled congress is doing a damn thing about it.
Um, no. A lot of business is still done face-to-face, and people tend not to trust people they don't have physical (no, not in a dirty-minded sense :) contact with. Who'd you trust - someone whom you've spoken to in person, or some face on a teleconference screen? Also, where you work is where you live - within a 50 mi or so radius anyway. NYC offers art, theatre, lots of young people of the correct gender, open stuff late at night, hyperactive, energetic people - some people love being around all of the above and would feel bored and boxed-in in a place like, say, Podunk, SD. And it's not even as expensive as everyone claim if you avoid the "trendy"/tourist-trap places and neighborhoods.
-b.
Paul Graham makes this interesting case:
http://paulgraham.com/siliconvalley.html
I am Jack's writable stack pointer.
All the images are oddly depressing. I don't mind a work environment that's all business, so to speak, and I have seen small offices where creativity is the goal and some of them were really beautiful and relaxing and allowed you to sit and work for ridiculously long periods of time and still feel comfortable. But the pics of the Googleplex are actually depressing to me. It's a standard looking office space with a bunch of novelties thrown in to remind you of what it's like to not be at work.
:-D
That said, Google if you are hiring, I'd love to work at your facilities
1 (short ton / firkin) = 89.1432354 slugs / keg
- big space set up as a cube farm so everybody hears everything and it's nearly impossible to concentrate?
/. I do think they treat their workers a lot better: having a real office with a door that closes and a window beats every massage/gamesroom/freesnacks/... cubicle farm: I know, I've worked in both and my productivity level is hugely better when I can concentrate without being distracted by coworker xyz on the phone, or other coworkers having an impromptu meeting on things I couldn't care less (hint: that's what 4-person meeting rooms are for).
- cubes are set up in a way so that PHBs can walk around and see what everybody is doing without any sort of privacy?
- only office pictured is a 4-person office with desks facing the corners so again there's no privacy whatsoever?
- nobody playing games in the gaming area but just one person taking some sort of nap?
- snacks around the office so workers don't ever need to leave and can get right back down to work?
this is making the news just because it's google, the working arrangements are the same as a million other valley startups: as much as MS-bashing is de-rigueur here on
-- the cake is a lie
Vegas was an artificial creation, grown by Benny Siegel and the Mafia (later big business) in the 40s and 50s to support one business: gambling/entertainment, and that's still the primary business. And the summer climate would make walking or being outside much in the city somewhat ... interesting I'd imagine.
-b.
The real question is, do their masseuses offer a happy ending?
-Low cube walls... hopefully nobody talks on their phone.h ronicle/archive/2006/01/25/BUGA6GSFCG1.DTL
-Snack room... ok so the 'Whole Foods' styled snack dispensers are cool, however, not sure of the value over your standard vending machine.
-Game room? How about a gym? Do they have workout facilities or is the game room supposed to be similar to the "DDR in Schools" phenom we're starting to see? http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c
Google reminds me of MSFT, they have a cash cow (search, Windows and Office), but as an investor I'd have to ask both those companies "What have you done for me lately?" Plenty of released projects that just aren't generating any revenue....
Just you watch, one of these days Google finance will say "All this free food/massages etc... costs too much money... time to cut back.."
What's so special about that workplace? It looks gray and depressing to me. No green space (ie. plants, water). It's also severely lacking in natural light. I like the sun, it makes me feel good.
This is just an average workplace for an over-hyped company. The Google fanaticism is about to end.
I would truly hate to work there. It looks like kindergarten. Or maybe the island of pleasures in Pinocchio. Or something. How stupid... Not sure how this environment would attract true thinkers and help them innovate. But then again, Google is not known for innovation. Their only innovation was the original idea, the Page algorithm. All others innovations were acquired: Goggle Earth, Sketchup, etc. Can someone tell me what innovation was started in-house at Google within the confines of this glorious kindergarten environment?
Are the massages complete with "happy ending" ?
Low walled cubicles create a friendlier work floor, and it is easier to have impromptu meetings in the cubicle hallways
That's great if your work productivity improves by having frequent impromptu meetings. It very well might for some jobs, but for many others in IT it's a real productivity wreck.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
If the rest of the facility looks like Rober Propst's worst nightmare. I don't care how much goddamned sushi and free candy you stuff down my gullet if I have to work in a gunmetal-grey, quarter-wall cube farm with unfinished ceilings and flourescent lighting. Oh, but I get a communal razor scooter to get to the bathroom!
Yeah, uhm, thanks but no. It must look great to a 20-something who has never worked anywhere else and for whom free Red Bull sounds like a genuine perq, but that "don't be evil" bear is pretty discordant standing in the middle of an environment that most adults recognize as the absolute most abusively evil standard in existence.
If this was Fark, I'd half expect a Photoshop contest to include medievally-garbed Dolly Parton, Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda to be pasted in with dancing fauna and falling chains.
That was very well stated. Just by BEING around all that in your daily life, you can't help but pick up that creative vibe. It's all around you every minute of every day of your life. There's no trapsing down to the coffee shop to be around creative people....they're everywhere. I can't think of one party that I went to where there WASN'T someone creative, an entrepreneur of some sort, and I didn't get engaged in some sort of conversation of how we could better some new technology or business process.
I've spent far too many hours trying to explain to friends or family members what that all means to me in life. "You can find creative people anywhere" is the common response. Well yeah, sure I can. I'm sure I could a surfer in Kansas too. I'd much rather walk down the street where nearly everyone has something to contribute than I would to have to spend time to get to a certain destination to find (hopefully) the same people.
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
Is Google NY as tough as NY? How many fights break out in the cube farm? Do they have anger relief facilities? You'd think they would have more privacy. Or perhaps the NYorkers are chained to their desks, literally.
Was amused by a portrait of the directors being provided but no portraits of developers. These are the guys who can live in houses, own apartments in Manhattan, and own 25 acres in upstate NY. All the subordinates, not pictured, could work all they wanted and never ever have the means to own anything.
Like play with yourself.
While it's true that there are talent centers in places like New York or the Silicon Valley, there are myriad smaller, but no less talented, tech pols across the nation.
:)
For example, some of the best developers and designers I've ever worked with are based in Columbus, Ohio. You've got lots of graduates coming from the Columbus College of Art and Design, as well as The Ohio State University. It's a tough-to-beat combo of talent and craftsmanship, in large part due to that good ol' Mid-Western work ethic.
I find it interesting that Google, spawned in California (one of the most anti-gun-owner places in the USA), is expanding in another of them: New York City, home of the Sullivan Act.
On the "Red State / Blue State" scale, they're both deepest blue - which means they're doing the same on a lot of other issues.
About half the population, and about half the technical talent and genius-level personnel, are members of "Blue State" cultures, and unwilling to move to places where their rights would be as thoroughly curtailed as those where Google has chosen to operate.
So Google's choice of siting is cutting in half their pool of talented potential recruits.
"Shooting themselves in the foot", so to speak.
But by all means let them make such choices. It leaves a pool of talent available for potential competitors who don't have the same political and social baises - or blindness.
(I wait with bated breath for some "Red" state with a good university and decent gun and tax laws to clone the provision of California law that prevents employers from claiming their employees' inventions if they aren't in a business where they apply. Then we might just see another "silicon valley" phenomenon, Red State style.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Some Googler! What's he playing? Q-bert?
Take off every 'SIG'!!
Apparently Google employees eat crap.
All Microsoft needs to do is wait a couple years
and Google will just die of a heart attack...
I guess you don't need to be smart to be an engineer.
I'm glad to see you New York boosters coming out of the woodwork, but I'm not the one who's interested in an East vs. West fight... my contention is that the East coast media is -- in particular I've seen many whiney complaints about google in places like the Wall Street Journal (how dare these young whipper snappers tell us that we've been doing our IPOs wrong? And what about that "don't be evil" nonsense, are they accusing us of being evil?).
It is certainly true that despite the many flaws of the New York Times (and they're not small: Miller is gone but Gordon is still there). in comparison, the West coast has yet to come up with a daily newspaper worth paying much attention to. On the other hand, the British press kicks New York's ass... even if you insist on a conservative bias, the Economist totally trashes the American news weeklies.
Why exactly it is that the West coast press is in such poor shape is an interesting question... back in the early internet era, the San Jose Mercury News was doing some interesting things with combined print and on-line journalism... but there's the strange case of Gary Webb who re-opened the issue of the CIA-cocaine connection there, and got people annoyed enough that the Merc backed down.
The current version of the San Francisco Chronicle, always a lame newspaper, is put out by the Hearst corporation, and from what I understand is screwing up and losing money -- and this is the only daily newspaper in a city full of well-educated people who are definitely readers (SF spends the most on books per capita of any city in the US), and a fair number of them are politically concerned people who care about local news quite a bit.
Once the Chronicle goes down... or maybe even if it doesn't, if Hearst continues to subsidize it... there will be interesting times in San Francisco.