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Totally agree. The people complaining about culture shifts there seem to want the company to pretend it's ~2006. I was never impressed with old Google. All thei

Totally agree. The people complaining about culture shifts there seem to want the company to pretend it's ~2006. I was never impressed with old Google. All their revenue came from ads, and they loss-led other projects. Fun, but the market has matured from that. Since I joined several years ago, perks have really degraded but overall I've become more satisfied with my actual work. Over-engineered pet projects in and around our team gave way to business focus, meaning we work on truly important stuff. I have little faith in Sundar's leadership and think his speeches might as well be AI-generated, but that was always the case.

satvikpendem 3y ago
> All their revenue came from ads, and they loss-led other projects. Great, market has matured from that. Has it? Seems like Google still makes most of their money via ads and everything else is a loss leader.
- detourdog 3y ago
  I loved old google they refused to share a business model. Google ~2006 I think is just past peaked google. I think they developed ads because it was the only model that fit their valuation.
  - khazhoux 3y ago
    You have the history backwards. Ads in early 2000s > Mega-valuation
    - detourdog 3y ago
      Could be, they also had a pre-iso valuation that needed justifying. The signal to me that it was really over was when they stopped supporting jabber/XMPP and look where it go them. I never experienced Google as a stock. My only experience with google is as a search engine and a mail delivery system that broke all the rules of polite society. Could be "Don't be evil" was the answer to the business model question of early google. My memory is that it spawned during an interview with Larry and Sergey regarding the business model.
      - khazhoux 3y ago
        They were making massive jaw-dropping revenue years years before IPO. Secretly — the public or press were unaware.
- hot_gril 3y ago
  Yes Google is still less diversified than its peers. Cloud and YouTube (edit: and Pixel phones?) are profitable afaik. The overall tech market has matured is what I meant; it's no longer time to loss-lead everything.
  - kevinventullo 3y ago
    Not sure I’d characterize YouTube as a diversification from ads.
    - emodendroket 3y ago
      It is though. Being an ad supplier is different from being an ad exchange. Or would you describe the New York Times or HBO as "ads businesses"?
      - hot_gril 3y ago
        Also, they sell Premium
        js4ever 3y ago
        That's probably less than 1% of YouTube revenue (number came out of my hat)
        JohnFen 3y ago
        In 2022, premium subscribers accounted for a bit less than 9% of YouTube's audience (and 67% of premium subscribers were in the US), according to this: https://www.mediagistic.com/blog/how-many-youtube-users-will-be-premium-subscribers https://www.mediagistic.com/blog/how-many-youtube-users-will...
        jonathankoren 3y ago
        To use a googlism: I’m surprised Google can count that low.
- JW_00000 3y ago
  Are the Android app store and GCP loss leaders? I assumed those two would be profitable at least.
  - saagarjha 3y ago
    GCP burns massive amounts of cash and was a loss for many years. It just barely pulled a profit this year, though it looks more like some accounting tricks to make a small negative number look like a small positive one to make things look better during a downturn.
    - davedx 3y ago
      IIRC most of the public clouds changed their depreciation accounting recently. So all that cloud hardware is now good for 20 years instead of 10 years or something. Quite a boost to the old bottom line when you do that.
- Andrex 3y ago
  Google has been trying very hard to diversify, mostly through Cloud. How well they are succeeding at that is up to interpretation but they are chipping away at Ads' percentage of revenue. It used to be higher than 85% but as of 2022 it's down to only being 58% of operating revenue[0]. 0. https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/05/18/how-does-google-make-money-advertising-business-breakdown-.html https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/05/18/how-does-google-make-mon...
  - rileyphone 3y ago
    That's an article from 2021 that says ads were 80% of revenue
  - immibis 3y ago
    When companies figure out that cloud is a waste of money, this might not work.
    - hot_gril 3y ago
      Which mid to large companies have made this decision so far? I know there's Facebook, but their use case is exceptional.

satvikpendem 3y ago

> All their revenue came from ads, and they loss-led other projects. Great, market has matured from that. Has it? Seems like Google still makes most of their money via ads and everything else is a loss leader.

detourdog 3y ago
I loved old google they refused to share a business model. Google ~2006 I think is just past peaked google. I think they developed ads because it was the only model that fit their valuation.
- khazhoux 3y ago
  You have the history backwards. Ads in early 2000s > Mega-valuation
  - detourdog 3y ago
    Could be, they also had a pre-iso valuation that needed justifying. The signal to me that it was really over was when they stopped supporting jabber/XMPP and look where it go them. I never experienced Google as a stock. My only experience with google is as a search engine and a mail delivery system that broke all the rules of polite society. Could be "Don't be evil" was the answer to the business model question of early google. My memory is that it spawned during an interview with Larry and Sergey regarding the business model.
    - khazhoux 3y ago
      They were making massive jaw-dropping revenue years years before IPO. Secretly — the public or press were unaware.
hot_gril 3y ago
Yes Google is still less diversified than its peers. Cloud and YouTube (edit: and Pixel phones?) are profitable afaik. The overall tech market has matured is what I meant; it's no longer time to loss-lead everything.
- kevinventullo 3y ago
  Not sure I’d characterize YouTube as a diversification from ads.
  - emodendroket 3y ago
    It is though. Being an ad supplier is different from being an ad exchange. Or would you describe the New York Times or HBO as "ads businesses"?
    - hot_gril 3y ago
      Also, they sell Premium
      - js4ever 3y ago
        That's probably less than 1% of YouTube revenue (number came out of my hat)
        JohnFen 3y ago
        In 2022, premium subscribers accounted for a bit less than 9% of YouTube's audience (and 67% of premium subscribers were in the US), according to this: https://www.mediagistic.com/blog/how-many-youtube-users-will-be-premium-subscribers https://www.mediagistic.com/blog/how-many-youtube-users-will...
        jonathankoren 3y ago
        To use a googlism: I’m surprised Google can count that low.
JW_00000 3y ago
Are the Android app store and GCP loss leaders? I assumed those two would be profitable at least.
- saagarjha 3y ago
  GCP burns massive amounts of cash and was a loss for many years. It just barely pulled a profit this year, though it looks more like some accounting tricks to make a small negative number look like a small positive one to make things look better during a downturn.
  - davedx 3y ago
    IIRC most of the public clouds changed their depreciation accounting recently. So all that cloud hardware is now good for 20 years instead of 10 years or something. Quite a boost to the old bottom line when you do that.
Andrex 3y ago
Google has been trying very hard to diversify, mostly through Cloud. How well they are succeeding at that is up to interpretation but they are chipping away at Ads' percentage of revenue. It used to be higher than 85% but as of 2022 it's down to only being 58% of operating revenue[0]. 0. https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/05/18/how-does-google-make-money-advertising-business-breakdown-.html https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/05/18/how-does-google-make-mon...
- rileyphone 3y ago
  That's an article from 2021 that says ads were 80% of revenue
- immibis 3y ago
  When companies figure out that cloud is a waste of money, this might not work.
  - hot_gril 3y ago
    Which mid to large companies have made this decision so far? I know there's Facebook, but their use case is exceptional.