24 ms·

Google to close engineering office in Russia

283 points by azov 12y ago

jmnicolas 12y ago
"Google Inc has plans to shut down its engineering office in Russia amid a crackdown on internet freedoms and a law regarding data-handling practices" Should they close their offices in USA then ? (yes I'm being sarcastic here)
- ars 12y ago
  People are so used to their freedom, that they (rightly) get upset over even small losses of it. But it makes them forget what real loss of freedom is, and think that what they lost is somehow comparable. They just don't realize how bad it can really get.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- chj 12y ago
  Being a US company, they have no problem with regulation from US government. But clearly Google doesn't want to cooperate with other governments, be it China or Russia or Spain.
  - icebraining 12y ago
    How did they not cooperate with Spain?
    - mszyndel 12y ago
      They're closing Google News in Spain I suppose.
      - icebraining 12y ago
        Sure, but I don't see how is that not cooperating. Not cooperating would be to close the offices in the country and continue running the site without paying, in defiance to the law. But what Google did was adapt itself to be in compliance with Spanish law, by taking one of the two options available.
        tluyben2 12y ago
        Yes, the problem here of course is that 'the people on the street' don't know about this crazy stuff in their country, so something more drastic needs to happen than shutting down Google News if you want 'the people' to speak up. Trying to block Google because they refuse to comply would be a good one for that.
eldargab 12y ago
Stupid propaganda...
- pavlov 12y ago
  What exactly do you consider propaganda? You don't believe that Google is shutting down their Russian office?
  - eldargab 12y ago
    Reasoning. Internet became regulated in Russia, and what? How does this relate to hacking on V8 engine, for example? (They have such teem in Saint Petersburg) This article appeared just to support sentiment and noise around how bad/evil Russia is doing. No matter of truth or plausibility, all kind of noise just works.
    - anovikov 12y ago
      But it is indeed is bad and going worse. Free people of the world, including Russians, must do everything for this to stop, and Russian/commuinist/orthodox 'world' to be destroyed as quickly and cleanly as possible. History shows this is possible: collapse of USSR already did most of this job, what remains is easier and there is a good chance Russian threat will be over forever in a generation if we (i mean Russians, with the help of the west) try really hard. Don't let propaganda fool yourself: Russian threat is first, and foremost, a threat to Russians themselves.
      - tobltobs 12y ago
        The russion threat is a threat to the world, because starting a war is a popular option with those failing dictators.
        anovikov 12y ago
        Not much, there isn't much Putin could do in the military sense without completely crippling the economy. All he can in foreign affairs is bullying small neighbors. Soviet Union was up to 7-8% of the world GDP and had Soviet Bloc - allies that (not counting China - it was never a Soviet ally really) combined had almost as much. Currently Russia has no allies - not even Belarus - nobody recognized Crimea annexation for example. A few weak post-soviet states could make pro-Russian statements once a while in exchange for another shipment of cheap natural gas, but that's about it. And it is currently less than 3% of the world's GDP. It should be too obvious even for Putin that an attempt of a new Cold War will be laughable. So he won't start another war or seriously threaten West. Victims of his policies will be, in their overwhelming majority, Russian people.
bgarbiak 12y ago
Knowing the government's of Russia ways of controlling the media and opposition, I understand and agree with those scared for personal freedoms. On the other hand, I would feel way better if similar law would be imposed in EU, so my data would stay within its borders and be protected by EU laws.
- cromwellian 12y ago
  Actually, the NSA has a greater power to spy on data on foreign soil than on domestic soil. Ironically, although the 'legal' channels for subpoenaing data with warrants exposes data in the US to government demands, there's at least in theory, some kind of oversight by the courts (although we know they rubber stamp everything). I think the idea that data held within your home country is 'safer' may be a false sense of security.
  - cma 12y ago
    Except they have cross sharing agreements with MI6, we can't spy on our own citizens thoroughly, so you do it for us, you can't spy on your own citizens thoroughly so we'll do it for you. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/UKUSA_Agreement http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/UKUSA_Agreement
  - izacus 12y ago
    There's that small difference of actually being able to influence our own governments and changing what they give to US. Which is still a huge difference than being exposed to mercy of an overseas government which gives us about the same consideration as it does to cattle and approves of torture.
    - mitochondrion 12y ago
      It's not even so much being able to influence our government versus one to which we are foreign non-residents, it's that at least the people over at the NSA, however much they may abuse their power, have some small consideration for me as a fellow citizen versus "just some German/Chinese/South African guy".
kevingadd 12y ago
This is clearly a pragmatic move that protects them (and their customers), but it feels telling to me that Putin's violent anti-LGBT crackdown - literally threatening the lives of many Google employees, not to mention Google's customers - wasn't sufficient cause to close or relocate their offices.
p_kolya 12y ago
How does engineering office relate to censorship?
- wslh 12y ago
  If they have local presence they can be pressured in any way in a Russian jurisdiction.
  - icebraining 12y ago
    But if "the internet search engine company might retain some employees to assist in sales, business partnerships, user support, marketing and communications", won't they still have a local presence?
    - wslh 12y ago
      It careful says "might" and "assist". In the best case this means minimal presence in Russia that can be unplugged immediately. We don't know if this will happen using the Google company or transferring employees to a another entity and formally outsourcing it.
      - seanmcdirmid 12y ago
        The presence could be purely vendors or a Russian company acting as a representing. More like a consulate, like they still have in China.
- evgen 12y ago
  Engineering offices usually require access to code repos and back-end production servers. This is the path you need to follow if you want to put pressure on a company or flip an employee to act as a spy within the company on your behalf. A sales office or a lot of user ops can be treated like remote contractors and only given access to a limited subset of the company that is needed to do their job. You can also burn a sales office and walk away from it in a heartbeat, but engineering offices usually have people who have valuable company info and state in their heads...
rurban 12y ago
Oh my, goodbye sanitizers? There's still work on the kernel sanitizer and a few other things to be done. Disturbing.
- seanmcdirmid 12y ago
  Is Brian Bershad still involved in this? I assume they are talking about the St. Petersburg office.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- skj 12y ago
  I don't believe anyone is getting fired, though it's true that a mandatory relocation will mean a lot of people choose to leave the company.
  - rurban 12y ago
    I assumed that they will not fire their best engineers. But will their families relocate to Europe, having to speak weird languages and spend a lot of money? Zurich is super expensive.
    - skj 12y ago
      Right, I expect many will choose a severance package instead.
dschiptsov 12y ago
What else "Sharikovs and Shvonders" would expect?
tinco 12y ago
Will they close their offices in Europe as well when Europe implements the same laws? They're put in a bad light now because Russia does it, but the EU is contemplating the exact same laws. These laws are not because Russia wants the data for themselves, they are because the US currently has them and they've been shown to be absolutely incapable of dealing with that responsibility in an acceptable fashion.
- icebraining 12y ago
  One difference is that Google already has multiple datacenters in Europe, while they have none in Russia. It wouldn't surprise me if the data of EU citizens was already for the most part in European territory.
- frozenport 12y ago
  No! The EU doesnt require its citizens to show ID when logging onto public WiFi!
  - supergirl 12y ago
    Some EU countries do. Some want to. Why don't you get informed before talking? Italy is one: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_in_Italy http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_in_Italy The law is meant against terrorism. I am sure Russia has a good excuse too.
    - kolev 12y ago
      Russia or US - two chicks of the the same ass. I understand US and Russia and their imperialistic desires, nothing new under the sun, but what I feel most sorry about is that EU, which now has a higher population then US and Russia and has enough power to beat each of them, is acting as a brown-noser to the US and is getting tricked into this Cold War 2.0. Without EU support, US cannot effective wage this war on Russia, and US is far and is clear that EU will suffer most, when this will help bloom US economy. Stupid EU! 500 million slaves to the US - unbelievable, with all the traditions in politics, economics, and science, with all the brain power, it's pulled by the nose! I'm ashamed!
danmaz74 12y ago
Putin is increasingly cracking down on any possibility of dissent and threat to his power, whatever the consequences to the Russian economy, and this of course scares foreign companies who work there - even if, with the recent fall of the ruble, Russian talent is even more affordable now. I'm afraid (I have friends in Russia) that we're going to see more of this.
- osipov 12y ago
  That's a very myopic view and here's why -- virtually all governments in the world are becoming increasingly authoritarian because of the global economic crisis and the civilian unrest that it provokes. For example, replace Putin in your sentence and you'll get "United States is increasingly cracking down on any possibility of dissent and threat to it power". You can support that statement with facts about police in Ferguson, US conflicts with China in Asia Pacific, and of course US crackdown on dissidents like Assange and Snowden. You can also try that exercise by replacing Putin with "Greek government". Demonizing Putin is what your government wants you to do to avoid seeing the bigger picture. The real question is WHY is Putin cracking down on threat to his power?
  - okatsu 12y ago
    I won't disagree that demonizing Putin is what the government wants us to do. I remember how the U.S. funded Saddam to use chemical weapons on Iran and then overthrew him "for the sake of the people." However, it should also be kept in mind that we're still far away from the Russian regime where speaking against the government (releasing classified documents doesn't count) or being a homosexual will land you in jail. So yeah, no one's perfect, but I'll stick to North America for the time being, thanks.
    - osipov 12y ago
      The situation about gays in Russia, i.e. "being a homosexual will land you in jail" is a meme that Western Corporate Media wants you to believe. Read the facts: http://gallery.mailchimp.com/d0e55f3197099944345708652/files/RussianLGBTLawWhitePaper.pdf http://gallery.mailchimp.com/d0e55f3197099944345708652/files...
chkuendig 12y ago
Might be a coincidence, but they also just announced plans to rent 50'000 square meters of office space in Zurich http://www.handelszeitung.ch/unternehmen/google-investiert-den-standort-schweiz-711965 http://www.handelszeitung.ch/unternehmen/google-investiert-d...
- raverbashing 12y ago
  I wonder why is Zurich a big part of Google's strategy as opposed to other places in Europe
  - tribaal 12y ago
    Because it's been on position 1 of best standard of living in the world pretty consistently, and Switzerland is geographically central, well interconnected, business-friendly, and not part of the EU? Just a guess :) EDIT: It seems Vienna is on top since 2010, my bad. But position 2 is not so bad, and the other points still stand :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercer_Quality_of_Living_Survey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercer_Quality_of_Living_Surve...
    - jahnu 12y ago
      These rankings are really odd. They feel like they are only aimed at international business people who work around the world and take their families with them.
      - nemanja 12y ago
        Your intuition is spot on - Mercer is one of the biggest HR/benefits consulting firms, and primary use cases of their surveys are to inform execs and provide a reference to HR when calculating cost of living comp adjustments when execs are relocating
    - pfortuny 12y ago
      The NOT part of the EU is not to be considered lightly. It is possibly a great factor.
robk 12y ago
Word is that most employees are being offered full relocation (generally to Zurich) which I have to think will be well received. This goes for both Moscow and St Petersburg.
- caio1982 12y ago
  They did the same thing when they first closed the engineering office in São Paulo (Brazil) years ago. If I remember correctly.
- riffraff 12y ago
  > which I have to think will be well received. sorry I can't read the english here, do you expect it to be well received (why? seems like it would be a though choice for many people even with a relocation package) or are you expressing hope it will be?
  - _wmd 12y ago
    The value of the rouble has collapsed over the past year, I think he means tech workers would only be too happy to leave.
    - dchichkov 12y ago
      I think he means that most tech workers there wouldn't be just fired. They would be offered relocation packages. It is better than being just fired, thus it would be well received. (Don't forget that although you think that Moscow is in the middle of Siberia and the city is a one big communist radioactive dump that you saw in the movies, actually, the reality is far from it. People there are surprisingly happy, good looking and the city is quite beautiful, especially in the summer. Europe is just 3 hours on an airplane from there. And to be a tech worker there at Google, with middle-class salary is quite nice. On the other hand, the long-term outlook is a bit gloomy, so...)
      - voidlogic 12y ago
        >Europe is just 3 hours on an airplane from there. I thought everything west of the Ural mountains/river (including Moscow) was considered Europe? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe#Definition http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe#Definition
aleksi 12y ago
… and just 2 months ago Microsoft closed Qik/Skype development office in Moscow, relocating willing developers to Czech Republic.
ThinkBeat 12y ago
it is worrying what is happening in Russia but much less so than what is going in the USA. Google, Facbook etc tightly integrated with the nations intelligence agencies, mining the data found there to make secret lists that could result in assassinations, indefinite detention and torture. Russias actions are for the most part overt, and rightly criticized, what the US does, it does so covertly. If anyone speaks about the actions that the Us takes in secret they are hunted to the end of the world, and must seek refuge in Russia. We hear a lot about Russian dissidents leaving Russia because they have their freedom limited. Snowden and Julian Assange have had their freedom limited to much more so than any of the Putin dissidents. (With the exception of the possibility that a couple of them have been assassinated) Remember that the air plane carrying the President of Bolivia was forced to land and be searched by American allies under the suspicion that Snowden might be on-board. Can you imagine AirForce One being forced to land, and be searched by Russia or China? Becaus they suspected it might be carrying a dissident? I dont think so.
- schrodinger 12y ago
  Sorry, but I really don't buy the argument that USA is worse than Russia in this respect. Snowden, while I totally applaud what he did and would love to see him pardoned, or protected under whistleblower laws, leaked a ton of highly classified information. Again, I think he did the right thing, but him being prosecuted is not the same as "if anyone speaks about the actions the U.S. takes in secret they are hunted to the end of the world." Plenty of people have overtly criticized the U.S. government without any fear of retribution.
  - Perdition 12y ago
    Yeah, if Snowden had of betrayed the ~~KGB~~ FSS/FIS he would have fallen down some stairs onto some bullets a long time ago.
    - walshemj 12y ago
      if he was lucky where lucky one agent for the CIA ended up getting tortured and allegedly burned alive in the basement of the KGB and I suspect the poor sods that Kim Philby burned all got a quick clean death
jkaljundi 12y ago
Acronis, one of best known Russian tech companies, is slowly moving to Estonia: http://www.investinestonia.com/en/about-estonia/news/article/905-big-name-in-the-it-world-could-create-500-new-jobs-in-estonia http://www.investinestonia.com/en/about-estonia/news/article... There are also quite a few who are moving from Russia to Ukraine. Also remembered this: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-28/luxoft-to-move-500-programmers-from-ukraine-russia-amid-risks.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-28/luxoft-to-move-500-...
- drzaiusapelord 12y ago
  I can't imagine doing business with a Russian owned company at this point. An autocratic regime has never been good for internet or software freedoms. I'm very glad I chose Sophos over Kaspersky for our shop.
  - notjackma 12y ago
    Why discriminate against a Russian company over something that may or may not happen? Russia has elections and they have laws which affect businesses based there - pretty much like every other country out there. As the article states, Google is moving its engineers but the sales team is staying, so this reorganization is less to do with politics and more to do with Google centralizing its engineers in Zurich - just like MountainView.
    - colinbartlett 12y ago
      And why choose Zurich over Moscow as the place to center its engineers? Maybe because the business climate is not as conducive and that's very much because of the political situation in Russia.
      - notjackma 12y ago
        Zurich = Central location in Europe, natives speak multiple languages, science and R&D already there (pharmaceutical).
tlear 12y ago
Perhaps their executives do not want to have an 'accident' landing Sheremetievo? They are smart to get out now, probably should have been done earlier
ivankolev 12y ago
I really hope Jetbrains, a Russian company, do not secretly work with the government to plant backdoors in all its IDE offerings :). It's fascinating but uneasy feeling how some of the best tools for software development come from Russia
NARKOZ 12y ago
It’s time to recognize the Internet as a basic human right. That means guaranteeing affordable access for all, ensuring Internet packets are delivered without commercial or political discrimination, and protecting the privacy and freedom of Web users regardless of where they live. http://time.com/3631377/internet-cia-putin-berners-lee/ http://time.com/3631377/internet-cia-putin-berners-lee/

283 points by azov 12y ago

"Google Inc has plans to shut down its engineering office in Russia amid a crackdown on internet freedoms and a law regarding data-handling practices" Should they close their offices in USA then ? (yes I'm being sarcastic here)

ars 12y ago
People are so used to their freedom, that they (rightly) get upset over even small losses of it. But it makes them forget what real loss of freedom is, and think that what they lost is somehow comparable. They just don't realize how bad it can really get.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
chj 12y ago
Being a US company, they have no problem with regulation from US government. But clearly Google doesn't want to cooperate with other governments, be it China or Russia or Spain.
- icebraining 12y ago
  How did they not cooperate with Spain?
  - mszyndel 12y ago
    They're closing Google News in Spain I suppose.
    - icebraining 12y ago
      Sure, but I don't see how is that not cooperating. Not cooperating would be to close the offices in the country and continue running the site without paying, in defiance to the law. But what Google did was adapt itself to be in compliance with Spanish law, by taking one of the two options available.
      - tluyben2 12y ago
        Yes, the problem here of course is that 'the people on the street' don't know about this crazy stuff in their country, so something more drastic needs to happen than shutting down Google News if you want 'the people' to speak up. Trying to block Google because they refuse to comply would be a good one for that.

eldargab 12y ago

Stupid propaganda...

pavlov 12y ago
What exactly do you consider propaganda? You don't believe that Google is shutting down their Russian office?
- eldargab 12y ago
  Reasoning. Internet became regulated in Russia, and what? How does this relate to hacking on V8 engine, for example? (They have such teem in Saint Petersburg) This article appeared just to support sentiment and noise around how bad/evil Russia is doing. No matter of truth or plausibility, all kind of noise just works.
  - anovikov 12y ago
    But it is indeed is bad and going worse. Free people of the world, including Russians, must do everything for this to stop, and Russian/commuinist/orthodox 'world' to be destroyed as quickly and cleanly as possible. History shows this is possible: collapse of USSR already did most of this job, what remains is easier and there is a good chance Russian threat will be over forever in a generation if we (i mean Russians, with the help of the west) try really hard. Don't let propaganda fool yourself: Russian threat is first, and foremost, a threat to Russians themselves.
    - tobltobs 12y ago
      The russion threat is a threat to the world, because starting a war is a popular option with those failing dictators.
      - anovikov 12y ago
        Not much, there isn't much Putin could do in the military sense without completely crippling the economy. All he can in foreign affairs is bullying small neighbors. Soviet Union was up to 7-8% of the world GDP and had Soviet Bloc - allies that (not counting China - it was never a Soviet ally really) combined had almost as much. Currently Russia has no allies - not even Belarus - nobody recognized Crimea annexation for example. A few weak post-soviet states could make pro-Russian statements once a while in exchange for another shipment of cheap natural gas, but that's about it. And it is currently less than 3% of the world's GDP. It should be too obvious even for Putin that an attempt of a new Cold War will be laughable. So he won't start another war or seriously threaten West. Victims of his policies will be, in their overwhelming majority, Russian people.

bgarbiak 12y ago

Knowing the government's of Russia ways of controlling the media and opposition, I understand and agree with those scared for personal freedoms. On the other hand, I would feel way better if similar law would be imposed in EU, so my data would stay within its borders and be protected by EU laws.

cromwellian 12y ago
Actually, the NSA has a greater power to spy on data on foreign soil than on domestic soil. Ironically, although the 'legal' channels for subpoenaing data with warrants exposes data in the US to government demands, there's at least in theory, some kind of oversight by the courts (although we know they rubber stamp everything). I think the idea that data held within your home country is 'safer' may be a false sense of security.
- cma 12y ago
  Except they have cross sharing agreements with MI6, we can't spy on our own citizens thoroughly, so you do it for us, you can't spy on your own citizens thoroughly so we'll do it for you. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/UKUSA_Agreement http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/UKUSA_Agreement
- izacus 12y ago
  There's that small difference of actually being able to influence our own governments and changing what they give to US. Which is still a huge difference than being exposed to mercy of an overseas government which gives us about the same consideration as it does to cattle and approves of torture.
  - mitochondrion 12y ago
    It's not even so much being able to influence our government versus one to which we are foreign non-residents, it's that at least the people over at the NSA, however much they may abuse their power, have some small consideration for me as a fellow citizen versus "just some German/Chinese/South African guy".

kevingadd 12y ago

This is clearly a pragmatic move that protects them (and their customers), but it feels telling to me that Putin's violent anti-LGBT crackdown - literally threatening the lives of many Google employees, not to mention Google's customers - wasn't sufficient cause to close or relocate their offices.

p_kolya 12y ago

How does engineering office relate to censorship?

wslh 12y ago
If they have local presence they can be pressured in any way in a Russian jurisdiction.
- icebraining 12y ago
  But if "the internet search engine company might retain some employees to assist in sales, business partnerships, user support, marketing and communications", won't they still have a local presence?
  - wslh 12y ago
    It careful says "might" and "assist". In the best case this means minimal presence in Russia that can be unplugged immediately. We don't know if this will happen using the Google company or transferring employees to a another entity and formally outsourcing it.
    - seanmcdirmid 12y ago
      The presence could be purely vendors or a Russian company acting as a representing. More like a consulate, like they still have in China.
evgen 12y ago
Engineering offices usually require access to code repos and back-end production servers. This is the path you need to follow if you want to put pressure on a company or flip an employee to act as a spy within the company on your behalf. A sales office or a lot of user ops can be treated like remote contractors and only given access to a limited subset of the company that is needed to do their job. You can also burn a sales office and walk away from it in a heartbeat, but engineering offices usually have people who have valuable company info and state in their heads...

rurban 12y ago

Oh my, goodbye sanitizers? There's still work on the kernel sanitizer and a few other things to be done. Disturbing.

seanmcdirmid 12y ago
Is Brian Bershad still involved in this? I assume they are talking about the St. Petersburg office.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
skj 12y ago
I don't believe anyone is getting fired, though it's true that a mandatory relocation will mean a lot of people choose to leave the company.
- rurban 12y ago
  I assumed that they will not fire their best engineers. But will their families relocate to Europe, having to speak weird languages and spend a lot of money? Zurich is super expensive.
  - skj 12y ago
    Right, I expect many will choose a severance package instead.

dschiptsov 12y ago

What else "Sharikovs and Shvonders" would expect?

tinco 12y ago

Will they close their offices in Europe as well when Europe implements the same laws? They're put in a bad light now because Russia does it, but the EU is contemplating the exact same laws. These laws are not because Russia wants the data for themselves, they are because the US currently has them and they've been shown to be absolutely incapable of dealing with that responsibility in an acceptable fashion.

icebraining 12y ago
One difference is that Google already has multiple datacenters in Europe, while they have none in Russia. It wouldn't surprise me if the data of EU citizens was already for the most part in European territory.
frozenport 12y ago
No! The EU doesnt require its citizens to show ID when logging onto public WiFi!
- supergirl 12y ago
  Some EU countries do. Some want to. Why don't you get informed before talking? Italy is one: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_in_Italy http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_in_Italy The law is meant against terrorism. I am sure Russia has a good excuse too.
  - kolev 12y ago
    Russia or US - two chicks of the the same ass. I understand US and Russia and their imperialistic desires, nothing new under the sun, but what I feel most sorry about is that EU, which now has a higher population then US and Russia and has enough power to beat each of them, is acting as a brown-noser to the US and is getting tricked into this Cold War 2.0. Without EU support, US cannot effective wage this war on Russia, and US is far and is clear that EU will suffer most, when this will help bloom US economy. Stupid EU! 500 million slaves to the US - unbelievable, with all the traditions in politics, economics, and science, with all the brain power, it's pulled by the nose! I'm ashamed!

danmaz74 12y ago

Putin is increasingly cracking down on any possibility of dissent and threat to his power, whatever the consequences to the Russian economy, and this of course scares foreign companies who work there - even if, with the recent fall of the ruble, Russian talent is even more affordable now. I'm afraid (I have friends in Russia) that we're going to see more of this.

osipov 12y ago
That's a very myopic view and here's why -- virtually all governments in the world are becoming increasingly authoritarian because of the global economic crisis and the civilian unrest that it provokes. For example, replace Putin in your sentence and you'll get "United States is increasingly cracking down on any possibility of dissent and threat to it power". You can support that statement with facts about police in Ferguson, US conflicts with China in Asia Pacific, and of course US crackdown on dissidents like Assange and Snowden. You can also try that exercise by replacing Putin with "Greek government". Demonizing Putin is what your government wants you to do to avoid seeing the bigger picture. The real question is WHY is Putin cracking down on threat to his power?
- okatsu 12y ago
  I won't disagree that demonizing Putin is what the government wants us to do. I remember how the U.S. funded Saddam to use chemical weapons on Iran and then overthrew him "for the sake of the people." However, it should also be kept in mind that we're still far away from the Russian regime where speaking against the government (releasing classified documents doesn't count) or being a homosexual will land you in jail. So yeah, no one's perfect, but I'll stick to North America for the time being, thanks.
  - osipov 12y ago
    The situation about gays in Russia, i.e. "being a homosexual will land you in jail" is a meme that Western Corporate Media wants you to believe. Read the facts: http://gallery.mailchimp.com/d0e55f3197099944345708652/files/RussianLGBTLawWhitePaper.pdf http://gallery.mailchimp.com/d0e55f3197099944345708652/files...

chkuendig 12y ago

Might be a coincidence, but they also just announced plans to rent 50'000 square meters of office space in Zurich http://www.handelszeitung.ch/unternehmen/google-investiert-den-standort-schweiz-711965 http://www.handelszeitung.ch/unternehmen/google-investiert-d...

raverbashing 12y ago
I wonder why is Zurich a big part of Google's strategy as opposed to other places in Europe
- tribaal 12y ago
  Because it's been on position 1 of best standard of living in the world pretty consistently, and Switzerland is geographically central, well interconnected, business-friendly, and not part of the EU? Just a guess :) EDIT: It seems Vienna is on top since 2010, my bad. But position 2 is not so bad, and the other points still stand :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercer_Quality_of_Living_Survey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercer_Quality_of_Living_Surve...
  - jahnu 12y ago
    These rankings are really odd. They feel like they are only aimed at international business people who work around the world and take their families with them.
    - nemanja 12y ago
      Your intuition is spot on - Mercer is one of the biggest HR/benefits consulting firms, and primary use cases of their surveys are to inform execs and provide a reference to HR when calculating cost of living comp adjustments when execs are relocating
  - pfortuny 12y ago
    The NOT part of the EU is not to be considered lightly. It is possibly a great factor.

robk 12y ago

Word is that most employees are being offered full relocation (generally to Zurich) which I have to think will be well received. This goes for both Moscow and St Petersburg.

caio1982 12y ago
They did the same thing when they first closed the engineering office in São Paulo (Brazil) years ago. If I remember correctly.
riffraff 12y ago
> which I have to think will be well received. sorry I can't read the english here, do you expect it to be well received (why? seems like it would be a though choice for many people even with a relocation package) or are you expressing hope it will be?
- _wmd 12y ago
  The value of the rouble has collapsed over the past year, I think he means tech workers would only be too happy to leave.
  - dchichkov 12y ago
    I think he means that most tech workers there wouldn't be just fired. They would be offered relocation packages. It is better than being just fired, thus it would be well received. (Don't forget that although you think that Moscow is in the middle of Siberia and the city is a one big communist radioactive dump that you saw in the movies, actually, the reality is far from it. People there are surprisingly happy, good looking and the city is quite beautiful, especially in the summer. Europe is just 3 hours on an airplane from there. And to be a tech worker there at Google, with middle-class salary is quite nice. On the other hand, the long-term outlook is a bit gloomy, so...)
    - voidlogic 12y ago
      >Europe is just 3 hours on an airplane from there. I thought everything west of the Ural mountains/river (including Moscow) was considered Europe? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe#Definition http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe#Definition

aleksi 12y ago

… and just 2 months ago Microsoft closed Qik/Skype development office in Moscow, relocating willing developers to Czech Republic.

ThinkBeat 12y ago

it is worrying what is happening in Russia but much less so than what is going in the USA. Google, Facbook etc tightly integrated with the nations intelligence agencies, mining the data found there to make secret lists that could result in assassinations, indefinite detention and torture. Russias actions are for the most part overt, and rightly criticized, what the US does, it does so covertly. If anyone speaks about the actions that the Us takes in secret they are hunted to the end of the world, and must seek refuge in Russia. We hear a lot about Russian dissidents leaving Russia because they have their freedom limited. Snowden and Julian Assange have had their freedom limited to much more so than any of the Putin dissidents. (With the exception of the possibility that a couple of them have been assassinated) Remember that the air plane carrying the President of Bolivia was forced to land and be searched by American allies under the suspicion that Snowden might be on-board. Can you imagine AirForce One being forced to land, and be searched by Russia or China? Becaus they suspected it might be carrying a dissident? I dont think so.

schrodinger 12y ago
Sorry, but I really don't buy the argument that USA is worse than Russia in this respect. Snowden, while I totally applaud what he did and would love to see him pardoned, or protected under whistleblower laws, leaked a ton of highly classified information. Again, I think he did the right thing, but him being prosecuted is not the same as "if anyone speaks about the actions the U.S. takes in secret they are hunted to the end of the world." Plenty of people have overtly criticized the U.S. government without any fear of retribution.
- Perdition 12y ago
  Yeah, if Snowden had of betrayed the ~~KGB~~ FSS/FIS he would have fallen down some stairs onto some bullets a long time ago.
  - walshemj 12y ago
    if he was lucky where lucky one agent for the CIA ended up getting tortured and allegedly burned alive in the basement of the KGB and I suspect the poor sods that Kim Philby burned all got a quick clean death

jkaljundi 12y ago

Acronis, one of best known Russian tech companies, is slowly moving to Estonia: http://www.investinestonia.com/en/about-estonia/news/article/905-big-name-in-the-it-world-could-create-500-new-jobs-in-estonia http://www.investinestonia.com/en/about-estonia/news/article... There are also quite a few who are moving from Russia to Ukraine. Also remembered this: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-28/luxoft-to-move-500-programmers-from-ukraine-russia-amid-risks.html http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-28/luxoft-to-move-500-...

drzaiusapelord 12y ago
I can't imagine doing business with a Russian owned company at this point. An autocratic regime has never been good for internet or software freedoms. I'm very glad I chose Sophos over Kaspersky for our shop.
- notjackma 12y ago
  Why discriminate against a Russian company over something that may or may not happen? Russia has elections and they have laws which affect businesses based there - pretty much like every other country out there. As the article states, Google is moving its engineers but the sales team is staying, so this reorganization is less to do with politics and more to do with Google centralizing its engineers in Zurich - just like MountainView.
  - colinbartlett 12y ago
    And why choose Zurich over Moscow as the place to center its engineers? Maybe because the business climate is not as conducive and that's very much because of the political situation in Russia.
    - notjackma 12y ago
      Zurich = Central location in Europe, natives speak multiple languages, science and R&D already there (pharmaceutical).

tlear 12y ago

Perhaps their executives do not want to have an 'accident' landing Sheremetievo? They are smart to get out now, probably should have been done earlier

ivankolev 12y ago

I really hope Jetbrains, a Russian company, do not secretly work with the government to plant backdoors in all its IDE offerings :). It's fascinating but uneasy feeling how some of the best tools for software development come from Russia

NARKOZ 12y ago

It’s time to recognize the Internet as a basic human right. That means guaranteeing affordable access for all, ensuring Internet packets are delivered without commercial or political discrimination, and protecting the privacy and freedom of Web users regardless of where they live. http://time.com/3631377/internet-cia-putin-berners-lee/ http://time.com/3631377/internet-cia-putin-berners-lee/