Google is quickly becoming the Evil Empire of Microsoft of the Nineties (who, in turn, has managed to pull a 180). The soul left with Larry/Sergei/Eric, and we have corporate drones at the top seeking to maximize shareholder value.
It's only a matter of time before reputation catches up.
At the same time, Google is much less suited to weather a storm:
1) This quote struck me: “You can paper over a lot of problems by throwing money at it and hiring more bodies,” says a long-time Googler, who previously worked for Microsoft. Google went from a small, elite team of the smartest guys in the room, to just bringing in bodies with a pulse. The screening processes are, as has been mentioned many times, simply random.
2) The old culture carried elitism and arrogance, which kind of works if you're competent, but much less so when mixed in with incompetence. Cultural problems are tough to clean up. Wrong and arrogant about it is very poor.
3) Short-term profits are up, and they'll rise for a while yet, but the fundamentals seem to be increasingly evaporating. Switching from Google has a lot less friction than switching from Microsoft. Goodwill was a fundamental for Google. Even when Google tries to be good, it doesn't follow universal values. It's all grounded in a left-wing ideology that resonates with a tiny fraction of its customer base. We can all agree with helping the poor. A lot of people don't agree with identity politics.
It takes 5 minutes to switch search from Google to DDG, so I don't think there's the same stickiness as having Microsoft file formats and APIs.
It's only a matter of time before reputation catches up.
At the same time, Google is much less suited to weather a storm:
1) This quote struck me: “You can paper over a lot of problems by throwing money at it and hiring more bodies,” says a long-time Googler, who previously worked for Microsoft. Google went from a small, elite team of the smartest guys in the room, to just bringing in bodies with a pulse. The screening processes are, as has been mentioned many times, simply random.
2) The old culture carried elitism and arrogance, which kind of works if you're competent, but much less so when mixed in with incompetence. Cultural problems are tough to clean up. Wrong and arrogant about it is very poor.
3) Short-term profits are up, and they'll rise for a while yet, but the fundamentals seem to be increasingly evaporating. Switching from Google has a lot less friction than switching from Microsoft. Goodwill was a fundamental for Google. Even when Google tries to be good, it doesn't follow universal values. It's all grounded in a left-wing ideology that resonates with a tiny fraction of its customer base. We can all agree with helping the poor. A lot of people don't agree with identity politics.
It takes 5 minutes to switch search from Google to DDG, so I don't think there's the same stickiness as having Microsoft file formats and APIs.