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Recent extreme frustration with Google products in mind, I'm tempted to read the crux of this post as, "Google engineers/designers are incompetent." It might be

Recent extreme frustration with Google products in mind, I'm tempted to read the crux of this post as, "Google engineers/designers are incompetent." It might be unfair, but on a day when Google Search, Youtube History Search, and (whaddya know) my Nest Thermostat have all failed me, the temptation is strong.

gazpacho 1y ago
I think the reality is that the engineers are competent but this was just not a priority they were given and they were not going to spend nights making this happen instead of hanging out with their kids.
- ajmurmann 1y ago
  They might even have gotten in trouble if they had rolled out an update that product management didn't ask for and is perceived to reduce incentive to upgrade to a new device
dragonwriter 1y ago
> Recent extreme frustration with Google products in mind, I'm tempted to read the crux of this post as, "Google engineers/designers are incompetent." Engineers don’t make business decisions on when to end support, that’s a management decision; engineers ideally ought to be consulted on what it would take to continue support, but even that isn’t guaranteed. If planned obsolescence has been a business strategy, literally having an obsolescence switch and pulling the trigger on it has to be tempting to certain decision-makers even when support would be practical.
throwaway2037 1y ago
I am bit confused by this post. Let me turn it around. Imagine that you are a Google engineer who worked on Search, YouTube, or Nest. How would you feel reading your own post? You would probably vehemently disagree! I'm not sure your sentiment is relative in 2025. Everyone on HN knows that any "web scale" public product (with billions of users) 100s of engineers behind it. And, it takes very good ones to keep them running and continuously improve them. Thus, in response to: > It might be unfair I say: Yes, it is unfair and unnecessary to post. It adds very little to the wider discussion.
JustExAWS 1y ago
If I’m a Google engineer, what motivation do I have to make decisions that keep a device running for a decade? Even more pertinent, when it gets time to go through the promo process and when I need to prove “impact” and make sure what I’m doing is aligned with the department wide OKRs, why would I want to be on a project supporting old legacy tech that I can’t spin to show how it helped the company’s revenue? I’ve never worked for Google. But incentives based on the promo culture is endemic to all of BigTech. And even worse, every company is focused on “AI” these days. If you aren’t part of an initiative that can be said to be AI adjacent, if you care about your career and comp, you shouldn’t touch it with a 10 foot pole. https://www.warp.dev/blog/problems-with-promotion-oriented-cultures https://www.warp.dev/blog/problems-with-promotion-oriented-c... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261488 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261488
- lodovic 1y ago
  I would expect a thermostat to last 15+ years across multiple home owners - it should be an improvement over a mechanical one, after all. If that's not adding to Google's bottom line, they shouldn't have "disrupted" that market in the first place.
  - JustExAWS 1y ago
    https://killedbygoogle.com/ https://killedbygoogle.com/
- RHSeeger 1y ago
  > If I’m a Google engineer, what motivation do I have to make decisions that keep a device running for a decade? Empathy and being a good human being in relation to society. Making devices that look good at first and cause pain later, when it's too late to do anything about it... is bad. > I need to prove “impact” and make sure what I’m doing is aligned with the department wide OKRs Fair, and that's a reason to _not_ put in the effort to make longer lasting devices. > But incentives based on the promo culture is endemic to all of BigTech And we should be calling them out for it. It's bad in the same way that forced ranking systems are bad; they promote the wrong things.

gazpacho 1y ago

I think the reality is that the engineers are competent but this was just not a priority they were given and they were not going to spend nights making this happen instead of hanging out with their kids.

ajmurmann 1y ago
They might even have gotten in trouble if they had rolled out an update that product management didn't ask for and is perceived to reduce incentive to upgrade to a new device

dragonwriter 1y ago

> Recent extreme frustration with Google products in mind, I'm tempted to read the crux of this post as, "Google engineers/designers are incompetent." Engineers don’t make business decisions on when to end support, that’s a management decision; engineers ideally ought to be consulted on what it would take to continue support, but even that isn’t guaranteed. If planned obsolescence has been a business strategy, literally having an obsolescence switch and pulling the trigger on it has to be tempting to certain decision-makers even when support would be practical.

throwaway2037 1y ago

I am bit confused by this post. Let me turn it around. Imagine that you are a Google engineer who worked on Search, YouTube, or Nest. How would you feel reading your own post? You would probably vehemently disagree! I'm not sure your sentiment is relative in 2025. Everyone on HN knows that any "web scale" public product (with billions of users) 100s of engineers behind it. And, it takes very good ones to keep them running and continuously improve them. Thus, in response to: > It might be unfair I say: Yes, it is unfair and unnecessary to post. It adds very little to the wider discussion.

JustExAWS 1y ago

If I’m a Google engineer, what motivation do I have to make decisions that keep a device running for a decade? Even more pertinent, when it gets time to go through the promo process and when I need to prove “impact” and make sure what I’m doing is aligned with the department wide OKRs, why would I want to be on a project supporting old legacy tech that I can’t spin to show how it helped the company’s revenue? I’ve never worked for Google. But incentives based on the promo culture is endemic to all of BigTech. And even worse, every company is focused on “AI” these days. If you aren’t part of an initiative that can be said to be AI adjacent, if you care about your career and comp, you shouldn’t touch it with a 10 foot pole. https://www.warp.dev/blog/problems-with-promotion-oriented-cultures https://www.warp.dev/blog/problems-with-promotion-oriented-c... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261488 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261488

lodovic 1y ago
I would expect a thermostat to last 15+ years across multiple home owners - it should be an improvement over a mechanical one, after all. If that's not adding to Google's bottom line, they shouldn't have "disrupted" that market in the first place.
- JustExAWS 1y ago
  https://killedbygoogle.com/ https://killedbygoogle.com/
RHSeeger 1y ago
> If I’m a Google engineer, what motivation do I have to make decisions that keep a device running for a decade? Empathy and being a good human being in relation to society. Making devices that look good at first and cause pain later, when it's too late to do anything about it... is bad. > I need to prove “impact” and make sure what I’m doing is aligned with the department wide OKRs Fair, and that's a reason to _not_ put in the effort to make longer lasting devices. > But incentives based on the promo culture is endemic to all of BigTech And we should be calling them out for it. It's bad in the same way that forced ranking systems are bad; they promote the wrong things.