4 ms·

There are a large number of Google employees and stock holders on HN, and it would not be at all surprising if they leapt to Google's defense for non-technical

by gnosis 13y ago

There are a large number of Google employees and stock holders on HN, and it would not be at all surprising if they leapt to Google's defense for non-technical reasons. It would be enlightening to see the defenders of Google disclosing whether they have any financial or other interest in Google. To complement that disclosure, any attackers of Google should likewise disclose whether they have any financial or other interests in Google's competitors.

cromwellian 13y ago
It would help if people just criticize on the spec based on the technical merits.
- steveklabnik 13y ago
  I agree that technical critiques are good, but technology is social. You can't abstract away the rest of the real world. We need both kinds.
  - tptacek 13y ago
    A reasonable argument would say that we don't need the social and political stuff in standards discussions, which should be based instead on engineering.
    - steveklabnik 13y ago
      Absolutely. This is why I wouldn't make these comments on the IETF mailing list. I do think that HN is an appropriate venue, this is very much a social place. "Should we be doing this?" and "How should we do this?" are two very different questions.
      - tptacek 13y ago
        That's a fair point for why your argument is germane to HN, but for what it's worth I still don't agree with the argument.
  - cromwellian 13y ago
    Sure, but I don't find the social critique very useful either. There are things that Google does, as a corporation, that you can find fault with, technological decisions that may or may not have been influenced by business model. For those, fire away. But the attack on SPDY/HTTP/2.0 because "Google is an advertising company" (which if you actually worked at Google, and knew how people made decisions here, you'd know is ridiculous from an intent or motivation point of view) is just pure mudslinging. Examples of stuff that I, as a Google employee, would criticize Google for: Real Names, building "siloed" services and moving away federated/decentralized approaches (see my essay here: http://timepedia.blogspot.com/2008/05/decentralizing-web.html http://timepedia.blogspot.com/2008/05/decentralizing-web.htm...), most of what Yegge said about APIs, Google Hangouts going "silo" and away from XMPP model, etc. People who work on ads and take their marching orders from ads are a small portion of employees at Google. The guys working on Chromium/Blink/SPDY do not report to ads, do not take orders from ads, and in general, work on technology without reference to monetization strategy. Their day to day job is to improve technology, with the hope that if you raise the tide, all boats will be lifted, and they'll be some ROI from that. But that the idea that engineers are taking marching orders from shareholders to maximize profits based on ads by tweaking web standards is hilariously wrong for people working on Chrome.
    - steveklabnik 13y ago
      I'm not talking about "Larry And Sergey have decreed that Evil Shall Happen!" I'm talking about broad economic incentives. Since I don't work for Google, I have to treat them as a black box; I see what goes in, I see what comes out. I know nothing of the internals, I only have one friend who actually works there. If I implied there was some kind of conspiracy, that is my fault. You're right that that would be ridiculous. I would also criticize Google for your reasons, and they may be even more important. But this isn't a thread about those things.
el1cense3r 13y ago
The only Google employees commenting on HN are the ones with an inflated ego and superiority complex (those who think everyone else working for other companies is an idiot) who then spew garbage on their eng-misc mailing list. Everyone else is busy at work and is able to form their own opinions without drinking the Google cool aid and can see people like Vic Gundotra for what they truly are.
tptacek 13y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5992358 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5992358

by gnosis 13y ago

cromwellian 13y ago

It would help if people just criticize on the spec based on the technical merits.

steveklabnik 13y ago
I agree that technical critiques are good, but technology is social. You can't abstract away the rest of the real world. We need both kinds.
- tptacek 13y ago
  A reasonable argument would say that we don't need the social and political stuff in standards discussions, which should be based instead on engineering.
  - steveklabnik 13y ago
    Absolutely. This is why I wouldn't make these comments on the IETF mailing list. I do think that HN is an appropriate venue, this is very much a social place. "Should we be doing this?" and "How should we do this?" are two very different questions.
    - tptacek 13y ago
      That's a fair point for why your argument is germane to HN, but for what it's worth I still don't agree with the argument.
- cromwellian 13y ago
  Sure, but I don't find the social critique very useful either. There are things that Google does, as a corporation, that you can find fault with, technological decisions that may or may not have been influenced by business model. For those, fire away. But the attack on SPDY/HTTP/2.0 because "Google is an advertising company" (which if you actually worked at Google, and knew how people made decisions here, you'd know is ridiculous from an intent or motivation point of view) is just pure mudslinging. Examples of stuff that I, as a Google employee, would criticize Google for: Real Names, building "siloed" services and moving away federated/decentralized approaches (see my essay here: http://timepedia.blogspot.com/2008/05/decentralizing-web.html http://timepedia.blogspot.com/2008/05/decentralizing-web.htm...), most of what Yegge said about APIs, Google Hangouts going "silo" and away from XMPP model, etc. People who work on ads and take their marching orders from ads are a small portion of employees at Google. The guys working on Chromium/Blink/SPDY do not report to ads, do not take orders from ads, and in general, work on technology without reference to monetization strategy. Their day to day job is to improve technology, with the hope that if you raise the tide, all boats will be lifted, and they'll be some ROI from that. But that the idea that engineers are taking marching orders from shareholders to maximize profits based on ads by tweaking web standards is hilariously wrong for people working on Chrome.
  - steveklabnik 13y ago
    I'm not talking about "Larry And Sergey have decreed that Evil Shall Happen!" I'm talking about broad economic incentives. Since I don't work for Google, I have to treat them as a black box; I see what goes in, I see what comes out. I know nothing of the internals, I only have one friend who actually works there. If I implied there was some kind of conspiracy, that is my fault. You're right that that would be ridiculous. I would also criticize Google for your reasons, and they may be even more important. But this isn't a thread about those things.

el1cense3r 13y ago

The only Google employees commenting on HN are the ones with an inflated ego and superiority complex (those who think everyone else working for other companies is an idiot) who then spew garbage on their eng-misc mailing list. Everyone else is busy at work and is able to form their own opinions without drinking the Google cool aid and can see people like Vic Gundotra for what they truly are.

tptacek 13y ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5992358 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5992358