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I'm no big Google fan but even I can recognize this advice is largely short-sighted and ill-advised. You don't cut wages and lay people off just because "every

I'm no big Google fan but even I can recognize this advice is largely short-sighted and ill-advised. You don't cut wages and lay people off just because "everyone else is doing it". If anything, that's a potential opportunity for companies with deep pockets to keep the door open for competitive new hires. Not to mention, IMO the cushy culture at Google is one of the few things retaining developers who I bet are are otherwise becoming increasingly frustrated with the growing degree of dysfunction at the company. Tell everyone they're getting a massive pay cut and just watch what happens... the cream of your crop who know their pedigree is in demand elsewhere will be among the first to go. They also suggest Alphabet nix Waymo, citing "enthusiasm for self-driving cars has collapsed" and it's "unlikely to achieve profit in the short term". Who cares. Any engineer with half a brain knows true self-driving is a long way off, making today's zeitgeist of negligible relevance. Waymo is one of very few Google bets that actually shows real promise, and is way ahead of its competitors. The examples they use of Ford and Volkswagen shutting down are apples to oranges. I never saw evidence their programs were anywhere near as viable. Some healthy belt-tightening and increased scrutiny around C-level performance is certainly warranted, but the degree to which they want to gut the corporate culture makes the piece come off as an investor who didn't really understand what they were buying and got a case of buyers remorse as soon as tough times hit.

everforward 4y ago
> They also suggest Alphabet nix Waymo, citing "enthusiasm for self-driving cars has collapsed" and it's "unlikely to achieve profit in the short term". I suspect regulatory hurdles and public opinion are an issue they foresee, and would rather let someone else develop the tooling, change public opinion and fight the regulatory issues. Then they can either catch up (leveraging information about how a competitor works), or they can buy someone else out at a cost lower than developing it themselves. I think the Tesla and Uber incidents have lowered both public and regulatory acceptance of self-driving vehicles, and Google sees it as an uphill fight to change that even if they were at a point to launch their product.

everforward 4y ago

> They also suggest Alphabet nix Waymo, citing "enthusiasm for self-driving cars has collapsed" and it's "unlikely to achieve profit in the short term". I suspect regulatory hurdles and public opinion are an issue they foresee, and would rather let someone else develop the tooling, change public opinion and fight the regulatory issues. Then they can either catch up (leveraging information about how a competitor works), or they can buy someone else out at a cost lower than developing it themselves. I think the Tesla and Uber incidents have lowered both public and regulatory acceptance of self-driving vehicles, and Google sees it as an uphill fight to change that even if they were at a point to launch their product.