Remembering GitHub's Office, a Monument to Tech Culture(wired.com)
wired.com
Remembering GitHub's Office, a Monument to Tech Culture
https://www.wired.com/story/github-tech-values/
98 comments
> Every morning GitHubbers choose where they want to work: in one of two bars, several cafes, a library, a park, a speakeasy, a museum, a coder cave, or from home.
This is what it looks like when you have more money than sense. Just imagine. You want to build an office for people to work in to create your business. So you build a half dozen unrelated storefronts, just so your workers have the convenience of working from some other business.
If you didn't have the money to build that, what would you do instead? Text your coworkers to meet up at a real dive bar, coffee shop, library, museum. Take the money you would have spent on a plush office, and instead invest it in the actual business: more unique value-adding feature development, more customer engagement / support / UX, more reliability, more training and iteration on remote culture.
This is what it looks like when you have more money than sense. Just imagine. You want to build an office for people to work in to create your business. So you build a half dozen unrelated storefronts, just so your workers have the convenience of working from some other business.
If you didn't have the money to build that, what would you do instead? Text your coworkers to meet up at a real dive bar, coffee shop, library, museum. Take the money you would have spent on a plush office, and instead invest it in the actual business: more unique value-adding feature development, more customer engagement / support / UX, more reliability, more training and iteration on remote culture.
The thinking behind those kinds of perks is that they'll keep employees on-site longer, and that the additional time is at least somewhat productive. If you accept that supposition, then having nice and/or "fun" offices becomes justifiable...to a certain degree, anyhow; there's a very real limit to what you can reasonably squeeze out of people, after all.
Now, if I wanted to be cynical, I'd think that building what amounts to a bar in your office might be an effort to try and bring the illusion of a healthy work/life balance into the office to squeeze out a couple extra hours of work. If it looks like a bar and feels like a bar, will working in that bar still feel like working? For the most part, but it's that little difference that might be important.
That said, I don't actually think it's so blatantly manipulative. If people were already a bit more on the unhealthy side of a work/life balance--something that isn't exactly unheard of with plenty of tech companies--the design choice probably felt like it was reintroducing, at least to some extent, something already missing for some employees.
In any case, given the cost of building and furnishing new offices considered "nice" or "fancy" in this context, designing sections of the office to look like bars, libraries, or the Oval Office probably didn't add much to the overall budget. After all, you were going to furnish those areas, anyhow. For anything over that, you'd likely try to justify it in terms of increased employee morale and comfort.
Now, if I wanted to be cynical, I'd think that building what amounts to a bar in your office might be an effort to try and bring the illusion of a healthy work/life balance into the office to squeeze out a couple extra hours of work. If it looks like a bar and feels like a bar, will working in that bar still feel like working? For the most part, but it's that little difference that might be important.
That said, I don't actually think it's so blatantly manipulative. If people were already a bit more on the unhealthy side of a work/life balance--something that isn't exactly unheard of with plenty of tech companies--the design choice probably felt like it was reintroducing, at least to some extent, something already missing for some employees.
In any case, given the cost of building and furnishing new offices considered "nice" or "fancy" in this context, designing sections of the office to look like bars, libraries, or the Oval Office probably didn't add much to the overall budget. After all, you were going to furnish those areas, anyhow. For anything over that, you'd likely try to justify it in terms of increased employee morale and comfort.
OMG, those barstools with the flat bottoms. Painful after 10 minutes. Who does this? I see this in co-working spaces all the time. Whoever designed them does not actually do any deep work. I just want a great chair and 3 monitors.
It baffles me too. They're for perching, not for sitting. Compare that with something like an upmarket Korean internet café, where all the chairs are supremely comfortable and the monitors are a gorgeous 4k 120Hz. It's really a lesson in the designers being the users. Internet Café owners in Korea generally grow up using them too. Tech offices are made by the same people who design hipster cafés, wealthy homes, and restaurants interiors for a living. They don't understand the demands, and go for aesthetics over function.
> who design hipster cafés, wealthy homes
And for some reason, they do that while sitting on a table in a hipster café (at least a friend of mine does that).
And for some reason, they do that while sitting on a table in a hipster café (at least a friend of mine does that).
I have back problems. For me, perching on a barstool for an extended time is much more comfortable than sitting in a chair.
And the giant open-plan workspace, with no dividers or anything between all the people.
I just want a great chair and a very large 4K monitor, in a peaceful and quiet environment. If I want noise and hubbub, I can play something through my headphones.
I just want a great chair and a very large 4K monitor, in a peaceful and quiet environment. If I want noise and hubbub, I can play something through my headphones.
Office Snapshots here.
Thanks for the link, though for those interested GitHub had another office after the one posted in that link.
It can be seen on the design firm’s site:
https://raptstudio.com/work/github/
Thanks for the link, though for those interested GitHub had another office after the one posted in that link.
It can be seen on the design firm’s site:
https://raptstudio.com/work/github/
The sliding barn doors on open shelves mystify me:
https://officesnapshots.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/githu...
You don't get the cabinet to keep the dust off of the dishes, but we'll keep the cabinet doors so that they're still in the way? It's like a nudist suspending a zipper over their crotch.
https://officesnapshots.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/githu...
You don't get the cabinet to keep the dust off of the dishes, but we'll keep the cabinet doors so that they're still in the way? It's like a nudist suspending a zipper over their crotch.
Form has clearly been prioritized over function for this office design.
Does this make anyone else hungry for a burger and a beer? The interior reminds me of the many brewery/restaurants that have come up in town over the past few years.
Yeah they look like "generic hamburger place on the expensive side"
The interior reminds me of everything. It is the bootstrap.js of interior design.
Probably made by the same interior designers. Same aesthetic, with no consideration as to the purpose and required function.
That's such a gorgeous office!
Some of the "glamorous" tech office designs can be sterile and off-putting. Github's is all at once cozy, innovative, quirky, fun, and sophisticated.
A target to shoot for, and something that will no doubt be missed.
Some of the "glamorous" tech office designs can be sterile and off-putting. Github's is all at once cozy, innovative, quirky, fun, and sophisticated.
A target to shoot for, and something that will no doubt be missed.
One of my favorite offices was Squarespace and GitHub's.
> Squarespace
Now I want to start a Pinterest board. These are so nice.
Now I want to start a Pinterest board. These are so nice.
I love the little study and am trying to remodel a shed-office into something similar.
Off topic, but is it not crazy that there are ads plastered on just about every possible place of this write up, yet there are 0 pictures of the actual office?
There were a bunch of blank spots in the article, I assumed my ad-blocker was blocking the images. So I turned it off and surprise surprise, it was all just spots for ads.
Definitely crazy.
Definitely crazy.
It's not off-topic and yes, it is crazy.
A picture is worth a thousand words. You may be Kurt Vonnegut or Stephen King, but even if you write a novella about Github's corporate office, it's not going to make me read it without a picture.
A picture is worth a thousand words. You may be Kurt Vonnegut or Stephen King, but even if you write a novella about Github's corporate office, it's not going to make me read it without a picture.
Was on my phone and thought it was bizarre indeed. Left me hanging and didn’t read the rest of the article.
Came here to say this. Clicked to see a picture, was completely stunned that there wasn't even a single one in there.
Looking back it really is funny how impressed people used to be by dumb office perks. Free food and coffee? Sure, for the convenience.
But the slides, the ball pits, the scooters? Sure it might make the office a nice place to be but once the novelty wears off it's still really hard to beat working from home.
But the slides, the ball pits, the scooters? Sure it might make the office a nice place to be but once the novelty wears off it's still really hard to beat working from home.
Yes, I live for this stuff. I love perks. Remote work killed perks en masse and I hate it. I found when I worked in the office I could just focus. No family members interrupting me because they can (though this has gotten better).
Never had to worry about food except maybe dinner. I could roam around free away from my desk and enjoy a quiet office park that allowed me to feel safe. I had access to a very nice gym that was quiet and well maintained. The on-site dentist and doctor was also nice, kept my costs down to virtually zero on both accounts.
Pay and stock options were just as good if not better.
I’m sad it’s gone to be honest. While I’d likely advocate for a true hybrid solution myself I don’t dismiss the upsides of offices like this at all
Never had to worry about food except maybe dinner. I could roam around free away from my desk and enjoy a quiet office park that allowed me to feel safe. I had access to a very nice gym that was quiet and well maintained. The on-site dentist and doctor was also nice, kept my costs down to virtually zero on both accounts.
Pay and stock options were just as good if not better.
I’m sad it’s gone to be honest. While I’d likely advocate for a true hybrid solution myself I don’t dismiss the upsides of offices like this at all
How did you somehow get your own office and not be forced to work in an open office plan
I didn’t. We had high walled cubicles though and buildings / floors were designated (IE only product and engineering worked in my area), and we had plenty of meeting rooms and micro offices for meetings that people didn’t take them at their desk either.
I also had really good company paid noise canceling headphones and I’m hard of hearing, so that helped
I also had really good company paid noise canceling headphones and I’m hard of hearing, so that helped
Sounds like you were able to at least partially avoid the ubiquitous open office trend. Pre-pandemic, many in tech would’ve killed for a cubicle space of their own. It does sound like a rare good modern office space.
Was my favorite in office experience bar none.
I had a different one with open ish plan and I would still take that today. Noise canceling headphones and good culture norms mitigate a lot for me
I had a different one with open ish plan and I would still take that today. Noise canceling headphones and good culture norms mitigate a lot for me
I want both.
The office is energizing. Collaboration is amazing. Food and amenities take pressure off. White boards, conference rooms. Everything is always clean. Hanging out after hours with an open bar and video games helps with bonding.
Working from home is comfortable. There's no pressure, no transit, and you can build it however you like. You can interleave your chores, focus without distraction, and be around the people and pets you love.
Both of them are good. I truly want to have both.
The office is energizing. Collaboration is amazing. Food and amenities take pressure off. White boards, conference rooms. Everything is always clean. Hanging out after hours with an open bar and video games helps with bonding.
Working from home is comfortable. There's no pressure, no transit, and you can build it however you like. You can interleave your chores, focus without distraction, and be around the people and pets you love.
Both of them are good. I truly want to have both.
As many have said, a lot boils down to commute. If I can walk 10 minutes to an office--assuming I want to live close to the office--going in to people I work with on a somewhat flexible schedule is a nice change of scenery. An hour commute in a car (much less more than that) not so much.
Great comment. This is exactly it. The best of both worlds is when you live close to the office and have the flexibility to come and go whenever you please. For companies that means either an office in a place like Manhattan where they know that they can hire young talent in close proximity to the office, or an office somewhere in the suburbs where they can attract older folks.
No matter where a company is located some percentage of people will have lousy commutes. People buy houses then change jobs. Spouses have jobs a long way in the opposite direction. Commuting into a city is probably going to be bad if you don't live in the city. And so forth. Around major cities, a "good" commute is probably still a good 30 minutes.
True. But even those with lousy commute can come in once a week. My company currently set Thursday as the day everyone is expected to come. It's also the only day with lunch provided. The other days only those with short commutes come in. On Mondays and Fridays the office is usually very quiet. We also have out of state folks. They are of course fully remote but expected to visit the main office 2-3 times a year, depending on their role. The one on my time who is remote said he would've come even if it wasn't required since they get good value from it and feel more energized after a visit.
For one day a week, you can put up with quite a bit even if you don't like it. I don't come into our city office that frequently but I can handle the 2 hour each way commute to talk with a customer now and then and it's not that painful. (I actually have a closer office but I have no reason to go into there at all.) It's a long day but every week or two it's doable.
The coolest office perk we had was a ping pong table and keg. We also had a very good table tennis player come by and give us lessons every few weeks. A lot of great memories from that time, but everyone got older, married, had kids, and stopped hanging out after work. About a year before covid we went fully remote.
Now, I'll never go into an office again if I can help it. But, if I was in my 20s again I'd probably have a different opinion.
Now, I'll never go into an office again if I can help it. But, if I was in my 20s again I'd probably have a different opinion.
> But the slides, the ball pits, the scooters?
There is an extent to which the "cool tech office designer" role has been fulfilled by people who otherwise might've decorated kindergarten classrooms. It's a very strange convergence.
There is an extent to which the "cool tech office designer" role has been fulfilled by people who otherwise might've decorated kindergarten classrooms. It's a very strange convergence.
Right? And who are the adults that are drawn to ball pits and slides.
> once the novelty wears off it's still really hard to beat working from home.
This is fairly subjective/personal. Unless another horrendous global pandemic results in me being legally required to (odds of this seem... medium? The period between the 1918 flu pandemic and covid was historically rather high), I don't plan to work from home again. Not for me, at all; I wouldn't consider taking a remote-only job.
This is fairly subjective/personal. Unless another horrendous global pandemic results in me being legally required to (odds of this seem... medium? The period between the 1918 flu pandemic and covid was historically rather high), I don't plan to work from home again. Not for me, at all; I wouldn't consider taking a remote-only job.
I liked the pinball machine we had on our floor (edit: not at github, different company), it was a nice distraction during breaks, something novel. I didn't like that it was installed 10m away from me (loud!)
> once the novelty wears off it's still really hard to beat working from home
For you, it’s really hard to beat working from home.
For some people, it’s really hard to beat working from an office.
For you, it’s really hard to beat working from home.
For some people, it’s really hard to beat working from an office.
He didn't say it was for everyone, did he?
> it really is funny how impressed people used to be
Yes, he did. By talking about "people" he obviously meant everyone or at least a clear majority.
Yes, he did. By talking about "people" he obviously meant everyone or at least a clear majority.
Yes, it was clearly implied when they said, “people.”
Otherwise they would have said, “it really is funny how impressed I used to be”.
Otherwise they would have said, “it really is funny how impressed I used to be”.
> Sure it might make the office a nice place to be but once the novelty wears off it's still really hard to beat working from home.
That was definitely a general statement
That was definitely a general statement
Looking back my best office perk was working in the countryside and having fields to walk through during the lunchbreak.
For me even the rather bad office beats working from home. I vastly prefer to work in a different environment from where I live.
> it's still really hard to beat working from home
Citation needed.
Personally, working from home is an absolute nightmare for me. There is an endless list of chores and things to do around the house that are a constant distraction and mind-space consumer, it is hard to disconnect at the end of the day, I am continually continually interrupted by family members (...and if I am not I am worrying if the kids are ok since why cant I hear them? Are they ok? Are they laying on the floor unconscious? etc etc), cleaners, the post man, the amazon delivery guy/gal, the list is endless. I have to keep half a brain "on-call" to listen out for and react to these interruptions.
This is even with a good sized dedicated office room. I did not even have that during covid and my entire family was in one room at a time.
At the office I can concentrate and get work done, since it is a workplace and there are no non-work distractions. Any interruptions at work are for work, so it is my job to handle them on work time.
Citation needed.
Personally, working from home is an absolute nightmare for me. There is an endless list of chores and things to do around the house that are a constant distraction and mind-space consumer, it is hard to disconnect at the end of the day, I am continually continually interrupted by family members (...and if I am not I am worrying if the kids are ok since why cant I hear them? Are they ok? Are they laying on the floor unconscious? etc etc), cleaners, the post man, the amazon delivery guy/gal, the list is endless. I have to keep half a brain "on-call" to listen out for and react to these interruptions.
This is even with a good sized dedicated office room. I did not even have that during covid and my entire family was in one room at a time.
At the office I can concentrate and get work done, since it is a workplace and there are no non-work distractions. Any interruptions at work are for work, so it is my job to handle them on work time.
When you are at the office, who watches your kids?
I had a few coworkers that skipped out on daycare when they worked from home. Then they complained about being interrupted all the time by their kids. IMO, there is nothing wrong with putting the kids in daycare while you are working at home.
I had a few coworkers that skipped out on daycare when they worked from home. Then they complained about being interrupted all the time by their kids. IMO, there is nothing wrong with putting the kids in daycare while you are working at home.
For me, my wife and childcare look after the kids, but you cant just block-out the shouts and noise and screaming and crying.
So e.g. blood-curdling scream from your kid and then silence. Or lots of laughing and running about and then a huge crash and bang followed by silence as something is clearly falling over.
What do you do? Just shrug and ignore it because there is someone else down there? Of course you cant. 99.9% of the time its all fine, but you can't just turn off that sensation of needing to keep half-a-brain listening for something major happening. The divided attention is a killer for productivity.
Out-of-sight-out-of-mind at the office is an absolute godsend. Day care is very, very expensive in the UK (especially if you earn over £100K) so financially it is often not viable to send them to daycare for 5 full days a week (this will often cost £2-3,000 a month in London, often more than a mortgage or rental costs)[1]
1 - personal experience, the only data I could find is UK average of £15K a year (https://www.daynurseries.co.uk/advice/childcare-costs-how-mu...) but that is UK average, not London. For comparison the UK average house price is £285K, but in London it is £742k. I suspect the average figures include a lot of people who earn under 100K and so get some aspect of free care - any tech worker will be earning more than this so gets zero help.
So e.g. blood-curdling scream from your kid and then silence. Or lots of laughing and running about and then a huge crash and bang followed by silence as something is clearly falling over.
What do you do? Just shrug and ignore it because there is someone else down there? Of course you cant. 99.9% of the time its all fine, but you can't just turn off that sensation of needing to keep half-a-brain listening for something major happening. The divided attention is a killer for productivity.
Out-of-sight-out-of-mind at the office is an absolute godsend. Day care is very, very expensive in the UK (especially if you earn over £100K) so financially it is often not viable to send them to daycare for 5 full days a week (this will often cost £2-3,000 a month in London, often more than a mortgage or rental costs)[1]
1 - personal experience, the only data I could find is UK average of £15K a year (https://www.daynurseries.co.uk/advice/childcare-costs-how-mu...) but that is UK average, not London. For comparison the UK average house price is £285K, but in London it is £742k. I suspect the average figures include a lot of people who earn under 100K and so get some aspect of free care - any tech worker will be earning more than this so gets zero help.
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In practice my favorite perk has turned out to be working without a shirt on hot days. WFH for life it is, then.
Is a good time to collect stories of this period in Software. I'm doing it too for my own private archives.
I want to compare in 10+ years, how me and my colleagues used to see & experience our industry.
I want to compare in 10+ years, how me and my colleagues used to see & experience our industry.
I once worked in an office which had fake grass all throughout the office. Any metal surface you touched would give you an instant static shock.
I now work for a start-up with no perks other than my salary and options.
> [we] were so preoccupied with whether or not [we] could, [we] didn't stop to think if [we] should.
I now work for a start-up with no perks other than my salary and options.
> [we] were so preoccupied with whether or not [we] could, [we] didn't stop to think if [we] should.
Am I crazy ? ..didn't GitHub pretty much pioneer working from home (called "remote work" then) way way way before the pandemic? Definitely before 2016. They were one of the first to scale salaries to where you lived and set a lot of the common industry standards. It was all about dogfooding their own product and working remote using Github itself.
They were all about NOT having an office. I never even realized they had an office, let alone a famous one. I remember people would dream about working for Github b/c of the flexibility, The article doesn't even mention this in passing ...
They were all about NOT having an office. I never even realized they had an office, let alone a famous one. I remember people would dream about working for Github b/c of the flexibility, The article doesn't even mention this in passing ...
I think that was gitlab
> didn't [GitLab] pretty much pioneer working from home (called "remote work" then) way way way before the pandemic?
We were doing this in the early 90s (even before the WWW). Foosball tables, fire engines, beds to nap in, kitchens full of food: none of that is somehow magically new
We were doing this in the early 90s (even before the WWW). Foosball tables, fire engines, beds to nap in, kitchens full of food: none of that is somehow magically new
For me 90s job hunting everything looked Regus style corporate
That's a shame. 1980s and 1990s had people wearing suits, sure, but also companies in rambling old houses of collections of networked apartments, kitchens with cookie dough, beer and cartons of cigarettes in the fridge, and all sorts of other amenities. Honestly the dot com boom folks seemed relatively sedate in comparison.
Git itself pioneered work from home/anywhere when developers are working on Linux in the early days
I remember my walk through Github's office so many years ago, the Oval Office, Situation Room, t-shirt room, just to name a few, and somehow maintained a very chill vibe. Pretty epic stuff, definitely was a shock to this east coaster at the time, made the Bay Area tech scene seem like a paradise comparatively.
Was that the pinnacle? I remember many offices at the time were going all out on both coasts. Have things mostly come back down to earth since then?
Was that the pinnacle? I remember many offices at the time were going all out on both coasts. Have things mostly come back down to earth since then?
In hindsight, nothing screams ZIRP more than a tech office with a replica of the Oval Office.
This trend for making workspaces ever more like cafes or bars was mystifying even pre covid, especially for offices in downtown locations.
My office is so dark… the building is central and it has narrow slits for windows. Being surrounded by taller buildings doesn't help.
Of course in case a stray ray of sun manages to come almost close to get in, automatic curtains roll out.
The walls are just grey cement, the floor is gray carpet (that statically charges you, as you walk) and the furniture is black.
You need lamps on even in the most sunny summer days.
The lights are constantly dimmed, and the temperature is too cold (probably under legal limits, in the winter).
Oh and there is some speakers constantly playing music.
Overall it looks like it was designed by a teenager trying to be cool.
Of course in case a stray ray of sun manages to come almost close to get in, automatic curtains roll out.
The walls are just grey cement, the floor is gray carpet (that statically charges you, as you walk) and the furniture is black.
You need lamps on even in the most sunny summer days.
The lights are constantly dimmed, and the temperature is too cold (probably under legal limits, in the winter).
Oh and there is some speakers constantly playing music.
Overall it looks like it was designed by a teenager trying to be cool.
And check out the old Slack HQ: https://www.officelovin.com/2019/07/a-tour-of-slacks-super-s...
God that's horrible. One picture of a desk, and that was void of anything. And a single monitor, and generic chairs.
You want me to come into the office? Give me an actual office. Anything less is insulting.
You want me to come into the office? Give me an actual office. Anything less is insulting.
Both this and the pictures of the Github office show people primarily working 'casually', lounging on a couch or sat at a normal table.
My office may be plain, but at least a proper monitor and an adjustable-height desk is considered essential.
My office may be plain, but at least a proper monitor and an adjustable-height desk is considered essential.
Because they are ashamed to show the open plan rooms with 300 desks back to back.
It depends. If I'm deep down in code, I want my 32" 4K monitor. If I'm doing planning or prep work, I quite enjoy unplugging my laptop over to somewhere more comfortable.
At least all the Slack HQ seating includes _some_ form of back support. Most of the GitHub seating looks uncomfortable after 1 hour of working in a spot.
> GitHub—which was acquired by Microsoft in 2018
The makers of Sharepoint and Sourcesafe bought Github, truly the end of an era. :(
The makers of Sharepoint and Sourcesafe bought Github, truly the end of an era. :(
To be fair, the guys who rejected Sharepoint and Sourcesafe (for being shit) to have secret "illegal" Github Enterprise accounts (not managed by Microsoft Corp, but internally by the team) who later became upper management and executives are the ones that bought Github.
Microsoft culturally changed, hard; in some ways good, in some ways bad.
Fun fact, they had an internal proposal to buy Github when it was much smaller: rejected by the old guard; then a proposal to clone Github using git instead of Sourcesafe, also rejected.
In the end, they bought Github at a muuuuuch more expensive price, and it was still worth it given how half the company was secretly using Github Enterprise and then checking in their "final" work into the big monorepo.
Now the monorepo is git, and Microsoft first-party supports git on Windows using their on-top-of-NTFS-because-NTFS-sucks layer.
Microsoft culturally changed, hard; in some ways good, in some ways bad.
Fun fact, they had an internal proposal to buy Github when it was much smaller: rejected by the old guard; then a proposal to clone Github using git instead of Sourcesafe, also rejected.
In the end, they bought Github at a muuuuuch more expensive price, and it was still worth it given how half the company was secretly using Github Enterprise and then checking in their "final" work into the big monorepo.
Now the monorepo is git, and Microsoft first-party supports git on Windows using their on-top-of-NTFS-because-NTFS-sucks layer.
> proposal to clone Github using git instead of Sourcesafe
Maybe you're talking about something different, but this happened, didn't it? ADO supports Git alongside TFS (not Sourcesafe, but Sourcesafe has been dead forever and was pretty much dead when GitHub first started). It's very much store-brand GitHub repos, much of it is the same but there's tons of features missing and the code review tools aren't as good.
As far as I know (per publicly released blogs/docs/talks), the Windows monorepo lives inside ADO, not GitHub.
Maybe you're talking about something different, but this happened, didn't it? ADO supports Git alongside TFS (not Sourcesafe, but Sourcesafe has been dead forever and was pretty much dead when GitHub first started). It's very much store-brand GitHub repos, much of it is the same but there's tons of features missing and the code review tools aren't as good.
As far as I know (per publicly released blogs/docs/talks), the Windows monorepo lives inside ADO, not GitHub.
AFAIK, ADO came about because of the "clone GH" proposal having died, but somebody wanting to revive it. Microsoft is a big company, there's a lot of moving parts and a lot of recycled ideas.
Also, AFAIK, the Microsoft monorepo in git did not originally live in ADO. I'm not sure if it does now, either, although it'd make sense for it to as the ADO dogfooder.
Also, AFAIK, the Microsoft monorepo in git did not originally live in ADO. I'm not sure if it does now, either, although it'd make sense for it to as the ADO dogfooder.
Presumably they bought GitHub because that was the best they had to offer, not in spite of it.
> If tech can look past the totalizing shame it currently feels, it can more honestly evaluate both its accomplishments and its shortcomings, and find a way to weave them together into a memorable public legacy.
I don't live in the U.S., but I think the article has over done this no? Shame in the entire sector? This can't be real.
I don't live in the U.S., but I think the article has over done this no? Shame in the entire sector? This can't be real.
Working for a software company in the midwest I feel no shame. Maybe it's different on the west coast with gentrification and the bad reputation of certain FAANG companies at the moment. At the end of the day it's just a job, as long as I'm not working in the defense industry I'm not losing sleep over it.
"Okay, so like, this is my first day at GitHub. I went into work and they had blueberry açai smoothies and steel-cut oats with yogurt and fruit and that was like, super yummy. Then I stopped and listened to the live band they had playing at the hamburger bar. Then I had my first meeting and it was great..."
Wow, this was one of the most cringe and oblivious things I have ever read.
wow, this article and the tacky, random, gimmicky office it describes... yet another day where i am thankful that I work in finance where people still have a modicum of taste and don't treat their employees like insufferable children
I’ll take a ball pit over a mandatory suit and tie
I think the author has a point, but not the point they were trying to make.
The love for the word meritocracy in tech came from a culture of optimism. Optimism affected each layer of the system differently. Executives loved these kinds of office spaces because it was an easy sell to investors, partners, future employees, and clients. Their value was expressed in opulence. For engineers that optimism was expressed in attitudes and greenfield development - the slogans of yesteryear are artifacts of that "In meritocracy we trust", and "Don't be evil".
Of course, a decade after greenfield development had stuck around it became just the field. There's been a shift in tech recently which I think comes from recognizing that as much as you may desire it to move more quickly, the world moves at its own pace. You can seemingly make the ball move more quickly in the short term but in the lattice of time the ball has still moved marginally. People grew up and realized that the optimism we had worked for a few, but not always the ways we intended, and at times worked backwards.
That's not to say we're in a cynical rut, just that things aren't as glossy. San Francisco and the surrounding Bay Area became unaffordable to live in even for engineers. No longer could you have a house, you had to be happy with an apartment or a condo priced a few orders of magnitude above what national averages were. Commutes became long and those that had moved to SF in the early days or already owned homes voted not to improve expanding train lines so that more workers could come to work while enjoying the same fruits those early workers had. The dream soured.
I was in SF as this all changed. I met a wonderful woman, I switched to a remote job, and I moved to a place with less tech workers. I still love writing code, if you visit my house the space dedicated to creativity is quite a set. I have other hobbies though; I have multiple gardens and a greenhouse, a place for chickens, and a space for my dog to run like an idiot.
I never got the millions that people would murmur and dream about. I got what $475k in SouthEast Portland, Oregon would afford me and I was more than happy with that. It's why I'm so adamant that working from home is the right thing to do. I don't need a short order cook, my deli guy will do. I don't need a huge space dedicated to open air conversations, Slack huddles out of my parlor or on my patio will do. I don't need a sardine can office to maximize developers/sqft my quiet office will do.
The optimism, in my eyes, shifted from one centered around the company and the progress we could make as an industry to, "Where can I go to do what I do and make progress with a community that is not work?" That's to say, tech is rediscovering that it is part of the open world, not the leader of it.
Good article; it's thought provoking and I'd read it again. It's a good reminder of where we were a seemingly short time ago.
The love for the word meritocracy in tech came from a culture of optimism. Optimism affected each layer of the system differently. Executives loved these kinds of office spaces because it was an easy sell to investors, partners, future employees, and clients. Their value was expressed in opulence. For engineers that optimism was expressed in attitudes and greenfield development - the slogans of yesteryear are artifacts of that "In meritocracy we trust", and "Don't be evil".
Of course, a decade after greenfield development had stuck around it became just the field. There's been a shift in tech recently which I think comes from recognizing that as much as you may desire it to move more quickly, the world moves at its own pace. You can seemingly make the ball move more quickly in the short term but in the lattice of time the ball has still moved marginally. People grew up and realized that the optimism we had worked for a few, but not always the ways we intended, and at times worked backwards.
That's not to say we're in a cynical rut, just that things aren't as glossy. San Francisco and the surrounding Bay Area became unaffordable to live in even for engineers. No longer could you have a house, you had to be happy with an apartment or a condo priced a few orders of magnitude above what national averages were. Commutes became long and those that had moved to SF in the early days or already owned homes voted not to improve expanding train lines so that more workers could come to work while enjoying the same fruits those early workers had. The dream soured.
I was in SF as this all changed. I met a wonderful woman, I switched to a remote job, and I moved to a place with less tech workers. I still love writing code, if you visit my house the space dedicated to creativity is quite a set. I have other hobbies though; I have multiple gardens and a greenhouse, a place for chickens, and a space for my dog to run like an idiot.
I never got the millions that people would murmur and dream about. I got what $475k in SouthEast Portland, Oregon would afford me and I was more than happy with that. It's why I'm so adamant that working from home is the right thing to do. I don't need a short order cook, my deli guy will do. I don't need a huge space dedicated to open air conversations, Slack huddles out of my parlor or on my patio will do. I don't need a sardine can office to maximize developers/sqft my quiet office will do.
The optimism, in my eyes, shifted from one centered around the company and the progress we could make as an industry to, "Where can I go to do what I do and make progress with a community that is not work?" That's to say, tech is rediscovering that it is part of the open world, not the leader of it.
Good article; it's thought provoking and I'd read it again. It's a good reminder of where we were a seemingly short time ago.
I recall when touring the office some kid eating Cheeze-its by the handful and downing cans of Red Bull. Fun times.
It feels like HN leans toward the idea that remote work is always better. I disagree, but I recognize I'm in the minority here.
But, I do want to point out that this happened:
https://www.wired.com/2014/04/tom-pw/
Correlation is not causation, etc. BUT, to me it feels like this kind of thing would not have happened if there had been more consistent in office time.
(ducks from the tidal wave of downvotes...)
Sure, I imagine that many will say: if people were not in the office, there are not opportunities for sexual harassment! But, I would say, interacting with people face to face leads to better communication and connection. And, in doing so, reduces the likelihood of interactions that are interpreted as sexual harassment, and reduces the likelihood that people will interact with others in a purely sexual way because they have limited exposure to them in person.
But, I do want to point out that this happened:
https://www.wired.com/2014/04/tom-pw/
Correlation is not causation, etc. BUT, to me it feels like this kind of thing would not have happened if there had been more consistent in office time.
(ducks from the tidal wave of downvotes...)
Sure, I imagine that many will say: if people were not in the office, there are not opportunities for sexual harassment! But, I would say, interacting with people face to face leads to better communication and connection. And, in doing so, reduces the likelihood of interactions that are interpreted as sexual harassment, and reduces the likelihood that people will interact with others in a purely sexual way because they have limited exposure to them in person.
Btw, the sexual harassment claim was later proven false by an independent investigation
I didn't know that. That's interesting. Do you think that she felt compelled to assert that indicates that she felt disconnected from her leadership? To me that's important in the context of remote work, that less face time means less connection.
So you're using an article from 2014 and grasping at straws to make a point against WFH or what? Just what are you trying to say here?
https://officesnapshots.com/2015/04/06/github-san-francisco-...
https://www.officelovin.com/2014/05/inside-githubs-san-franc...