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For a small company, "over hiring" is always a sign of incompetency of the management. Think about the good companies in the early days. They can do so much wit

For a small company, "over hiring" is always a sign of incompetency of the management. Think about the good companies in the early days. They can do so much with so few people, like one person evolving zookeeper into a beast to handle FB's scale, or two people having implemented LevelDB in a matter of months, or one person figuring out a way to increase the density of co-lo rack by 10 times.

vira28 4y ago
> or one person figured out a way to increase the density of co-lo rack by 10 times. Curious, whom are you referring? Sorry for my ignorance.
- hintymad 4y ago
  It's documented in the book Google Plex. Google hired a neurosurgeon as their first infrastructure engineer. His fast task was to increase the rack density to save company money. The dude figure out how to pack 10x more processing power into the same size, resulting in overheating of the colo space (or overloading the power line? I can't remember exactly). The colo company had to tear down an entire wall and used a 18-wheeler modified mobile air conditioner. I probably got some details wrong as it's been years since I read the book, but you get the spirit.
- singron 4y ago
  Idk about this one, and 10x sounds past physical limits unless their original footprint was ridiculous, but I heard a story at Google that sounded kind of like this. I think there was some colo in the day that charged only by sqft and gave away the electricity assuming customers would have reasonable densities. Somehow Google crammed a completely unreasonable density of machines into the colo. I would guess this was corkboard days. When the contract was renewed, the colo was sure to change the terms.
bko 4y ago
Reminded me of this: > Coinbase ended Q1 with 4,948 full-time employees, up 33% versus the fourth quarter of 2021. Over the past twelve months, Coinbase also said in its first-quarter report that the company added over 3,200 net new employees. https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/05/19/coinbase-outlines-cost-cutting-measures-employee-grants-amid-weak-results-and-crypto-rout-report/ https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/05/19/coinbase-outlin...
- ushakov 4y ago
  that’s a crazy amount for a crypto wallet are these new hires lobbyists?
  - charcircuit 4y ago
    Their main business is acting as an exchange.

vira28 4y ago

> or one person figured out a way to increase the density of co-lo rack by 10 times. Curious, whom are you referring? Sorry for my ignorance.

hintymad 4y ago
It's documented in the book Google Plex. Google hired a neurosurgeon as their first infrastructure engineer. His fast task was to increase the rack density to save company money. The dude figure out how to pack 10x more processing power into the same size, resulting in overheating of the colo space (or overloading the power line? I can't remember exactly). The colo company had to tear down an entire wall and used a 18-wheeler modified mobile air conditioner. I probably got some details wrong as it's been years since I read the book, but you get the spirit.
singron 4y ago
Idk about this one, and 10x sounds past physical limits unless their original footprint was ridiculous, but I heard a story at Google that sounded kind of like this. I think there was some colo in the day that charged only by sqft and gave away the electricity assuming customers would have reasonable densities. Somehow Google crammed a completely unreasonable density of machines into the colo. I would guess this was corkboard days. When the contract was renewed, the colo was sure to change the terms.

bko 4y ago

Reminded me of this: > Coinbase ended Q1 with 4,948 full-time employees, up 33% versus the fourth quarter of 2021. Over the past twelve months, Coinbase also said in its first-quarter report that the company added over 3,200 net new employees. https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/05/19/coinbase-outlines-cost-cutting-measures-employee-grants-amid-weak-results-and-crypto-rout-report/ https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/05/19/coinbase-outlin...

ushakov 4y ago
that’s a crazy amount for a crypto wallet are these new hires lobbyists?
- charcircuit 4y ago
  Their main business is acting as an exchange.