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I sense there are certain parallels between this article and the one recently on HN about the challenges at Yale. As an "outsider" to both Yale and Google, I ad

I sense there are certain parallels between this article and the one recently on HN about the challenges at Yale. As an "outsider" to both Yale and Google, I admit the problems in both cases seem over-wrought, but I can't deny that the people involved feel very emotionally invested so I am still curious to see what can be learned. Both articles present insider perspectives lamenting how internal conflicts within highly exclusive organizations were pushed into the public sphere through leaking and protesting. Both organizations are experiencing disconnects between people in various roles (admins vs students, execs vs employees) and a sense of loss of culture. So my thoughts are: - is this a generational culture shift? Less trust in internal systems and better access to outside publishing means young people aren't making a real effort to stay within the system to discuss? - is "internal transparency" an impossible thing at scale in the modern era? Keeping things internally private doesn't work because you only need one bad actor out of thousands to leak everything? - are the culture of Yale and Google really that special, or were they just really well marketed? Why are people so personally and emotionally invested in these organisations? Are all big orgs like this now, or were the cultures at these particular spots just well evolved for loyal following?

skybrian 7y ago
We're reading about them because they are the center of attention and they leak. But I also have a sense that lots of things that were considered positives in the early days of the Internet have become negatives, or are simply taken for granted. For example, growth was once considered good, but now it's bad. Giving services away for free is ho-hum at best and maybe suspicious. Trying to fix Internet problems is greeted with deep suspicion based solely on who is doing it. Personalization was once good, but now it's bad. And so on. That's inevitably going to result in a different internal culture at an Internet company than back in the days when Google's search engine first appeared on the Internet and got near-universal respect.

skybrian 7y ago

We're reading about them because they are the center of attention and they leak. But I also have a sense that lots of things that were considered positives in the early days of the Internet have become negatives, or are simply taken for granted. For example, growth was once considered good, but now it's bad. Giving services away for free is ho-hum at best and maybe suspicious. Trying to fix Internet problems is greeted with deep suspicion based solely on who is doing it. Personalization was once good, but now it's bad. And so on. That's inevitably going to result in a different internal culture at an Internet company than back in the days when Google's search engine first appeared on the Internet and got near-universal respect.