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Comparison of Working at the 3 Big Search Giants

Posted by Zonk on from the searching-for-some-free-sushi dept.

castironwok writes "Finally, everything you've ever wanted to know about being an employee at Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo. Tastyresearch describes his (or her) past few years interning and working at the three companies. Things I didn't know from before: Bill Gates wears old shoes, Google's internal security watches you like a hawk, the office styles of each company, and how to fill your suitcase with Google T-shirts. He calls the few select companies the 'prestigious internship circle', noting 'once you have worked at one, it's a lot easier to get into another'."

7 of 179 comments (clear)

  1. I've worked at all three... here's my take by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    When I worked at Yahoo, I had to say things like "Doinky doink" to my boss and paint my face green on one side and white on the other since I was the guy in charge of the Saskatchewan part of Yahoo...wherever the hell Saskatchewan is...anyway... the people in the cubes next to me where chimpanzees but they wore "Richard Nixon" halloween masks.
    When I worked a Microsoft, I had to wear a suit, but the suit was in camoflage colours. My supervisor (I never did find out his name, I only knew him as "XZ95") was in charge of BTLIME.DLL, the subroutine that made sure that the system clock didn't accidentally exceed the number "6"...a big responsibility.
    Finally, I got a job at Google... I don't know how it's going because I've spent all my time trying to win the "special day" competition to remake the "Google" web page logo on those "special days"

    Thanks for listening

  2. Maybe a tamed, blind hawk? by kaigeX · · Score: 5, Interesting

    "Google's internal security watches you like a hawk"

    Uhh...no. I walk around with my badge concealed, explicitly to see how much of a problem it causes, and I have been stopped less than a handful of times this year, and probably less than twenty last year. (Barring events that are explicitly high-security.)

    1. Re:Maybe a tamed, blind hawk? by EveryNickIsTaken · · Score: 5, Funny

      You're so badass.

    2. Re:Maybe a tamed, blind hawk? by robably · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Or you could look at it from the point of view that "security" has become so pervasive and commonplace in your life that you no longer think it unusual to be stopped 20 times a year...

    3. Re:Maybe a tamed, blind hawk? by robably · · Score: 5, Insightful

      How many times do you think you'd be stopped walking around NSA without a badge?
      If they were any good, then just once.
  3. Pretty good actually by EmbeddedJanitor · · Score: 5, Funny
    Well that's pretty high security for most places. Where I work there's a badge-on-display policy but I have not worn my badge in the last ten years.

    When I worked in the military everyone was supposed to have badge-on-display and everybody was supposed to look at badges all the time. The top security guy rigged a test: He had an arbitrary soldier replace his picture with one of a baboon. He walked past security points at least 6 times a day and was only discovered after 6 months when he dropped his card and people had a really close look at it.

    --
    Engineering is the art of compromise.
  4. Re:big three? by Teresita · · Score: 5, Funny

    Guy at my $ORKPLACE has MSN set as his homepage. Whenever he needs to browse a website, he opens IE, types "google" into the MSN search box and hits ENTER. Once at Google, he searches for whatever it is he is looking for.

    This is exactly like sitting in a Yugo as it is dropped straight down into a Mustang convertable, and then busting out the windshield of the Yugo so you can shift.