As always, this is a complicated question - more complicated than probably intended. Google certainly isn't seen as the "hip", "cool" place to be anymore. Go

As always, this is a complicated question - more complicated than probably intended. Google certainly isn't seen as the "hip", "cool" place to be anymore. Google+ seems shiny and new, but as a whole, Google has this aura of being a place where creative, active developers get sucked into a black hole, and you never hear or see anything from them again. I would love the chance to work with great people and to make a killer income there, but to work at Google I'd have to move to a different country, or move completely across the country I already live in. Both of those options are simply unacceptable right now - even if I was willing to jump willy-nilly, I have a significant other who has real ties to where we are right now. I also seriously doubt that I'd get to work on something that interesting at a company so large. That said, if Google offered me a large salary and the opportunity to work on my side projects full time - Hell yeah. You'd have to make a really good argument why anyone shouldn't take advantage of that! :)