Google lays off hundreds working on its voice-activated assistant(semafor.com)
semafor.com
Google lays off hundreds working on its voice-activated assistant
https://www.semafor.com/article/01/10/2024/google-lays-off-hundreds-working-on-its-voice-activated-assistant
264 comments
I pretty strongly disagree. First, from an accuracy perspective, Google Assistant has gotten much better. It almost never misunderstands me, even when I'm mumbling and I'm surprised it can understand me.
I do agree that the set of actions I use Google assistant for is pretty static and are the same ones everyone else uses it for: What's the weather? Set my alarm? What's the first item on my calendar? Play XYZ on Spotify... But I don't see this at all as a "failed experiment". On the contrary, I see it as a successful experiment, at least from a human utility perspective: I ask it to do a concrete task, and it does it.
The reason it's failed from a larger business perspective is because the format is less amenable to big tech sucking any more of our money or mind out of it. But I say Amen to that! Wherever I go I feel like tech interfaces get relentlessly shittier as they just try to hook us into more mindless scrolling (this HN post on the topic is one of my favorites of all time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37509507) That's just fundamentally harder to do with a voice assistant because nobody has yet figured out how to plug in voice "algorithms" in a way that would make the device control you like they do with YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, etc.
If anything, I think the rest of tech that gets you to do things you really don't want to do should be the thing that's considered a "failed experiment".
I do agree that the set of actions I use Google assistant for is pretty static and are the same ones everyone else uses it for: What's the weather? Set my alarm? What's the first item on my calendar? Play XYZ on Spotify... But I don't see this at all as a "failed experiment". On the contrary, I see it as a successful experiment, at least from a human utility perspective: I ask it to do a concrete task, and it does it.
The reason it's failed from a larger business perspective is because the format is less amenable to big tech sucking any more of our money or mind out of it. But I say Amen to that! Wherever I go I feel like tech interfaces get relentlessly shittier as they just try to hook us into more mindless scrolling (this HN post on the topic is one of my favorites of all time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37509507) That's just fundamentally harder to do with a voice assistant because nobody has yet figured out how to plug in voice "algorithms" in a way that would make the device control you like they do with YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, etc.
If anything, I think the rest of tech that gets you to do things you really don't want to do should be the thing that's considered a "failed experiment".
I agree that its transcribing accuracy is better (largely thanks to general progress in neural nets rather than anything Assistant did as a product). However transcription accuracy was already surprisingly good many years ago, and in my experience any improvement since has been swamped by actually reduced reliability in understanding intent and performing actions. Ultimately it doesn't matter if it misheard me or got the words correct but misinterpreted the meaning or simply failed due to internal errors. The user experience is similarly bad in all these cases.
Also I don't feel that hotword detection has improved much, and hotword issues continue to be a big pain point for me. I'm sure the team has a dashboard somewhere that shows consistent gains in their hotword metrics, but as a user I don't feel it at all.
The reason I say it's a failed experiment is that the original ambition was to build the Star Trek computer (explicitly, in Google's case: the project was code named "Majel"), and it hasn't worked out. There may be a couple of features that are somewhat convenient (which, again, largely worked fine already a decade ago) but they don't come close to justifying the level of resources spent on these projects over the last decade.
Also I don't feel that hotword detection has improved much, and hotword issues continue to be a big pain point for me. I'm sure the team has a dashboard somewhere that shows consistent gains in their hotword metrics, but as a user I don't feel it at all.
The reason I say it's a failed experiment is that the original ambition was to build the Star Trek computer (explicitly, in Google's case: the project was code named "Majel"), and it hasn't worked out. There may be a couple of features that are somewhat convenient (which, again, largely worked fine already a decade ago) but they don't come close to justifying the level of resources spent on these projects over the last decade.
One difference I have noticed is that it used to be when I said "five minute timer" it would maybe ten percent of the time hear "five minutes timer" and decide it should search youtube for matching videos. Nowadays, it seems to treat "five minutes timer" and "five minute timer" as equal, but I get more silent misses where it ignores everything I said.
On the other hand, I gave up some kinds of requests. For instance, I used to try "start directions home" when I was driving and it would say "here's a route I found, do you want to start (or some such)" and there would be no way to actually start the directions home without breaking the very expensive law against touching your phone while driving. Does that work today? I don't know, because I've mostly been driving with Android Auto in the last few years and my wife's been in the car on the rare occasion I haven't. But it seems like the Assistant team could straightforwardly improve it.
On the other hand, I gave up some kinds of requests. For instance, I used to try "start directions home" when I was driving and it would say "here's a route I found, do you want to start (or some such)" and there would be no way to actually start the directions home without breaking the very expensive law against touching your phone while driving. Does that work today? I don't know, because I've mostly been driving with Android Auto in the last few years and my wife's been in the car on the rare occasion I haven't. But it seems like the Assistant team could straightforwardly improve it.
> On the other hand, I gave up some kinds of requests.
Those kinds of things seem to work absolutely flawlessly for me lately. I had similarly given up on those requests. Heck I had given up on setting timers since that just plain stopped working. A month ago or so I tried changing navigation by voice while driving and to my surprise it worked fine. Since then I've been picking up my use of the assistant more and have yet to have a miss. My main gripe is the trigger word being kinda iffy at times, but I suspect that's due to me still rocking the original pixel. As I understand it the trigger word stuff runs locally so is dependent on your hardware being good.
Those kinds of things seem to work absolutely flawlessly for me lately. I had similarly given up on those requests. Heck I had given up on setting timers since that just plain stopped working. A month ago or so I tried changing navigation by voice while driving and to my surprise it worked fine. Since then I've been picking up my use of the assistant more and have yet to have a miss. My main gripe is the trigger word being kinda iffy at times, but I suspect that's due to me still rocking the original pixel. As I understand it the trigger word stuff runs locally so is dependent on your hardware being good.
Google assistant is awful via the nest mini, I'd hard disagree that the accuracy has gotten better.
I ask it for the time and it quotes some article on wikipedia about what time is or various movies with time in the name.
I ask it to turn of the lights and it tells me 'power control is not supported yet' at least half the time.
It's gotten worse since I bought it, it never did this and that is with even the most basic of tasks.
I ask it for the time and it quotes some article on wikipedia about what time is or various movies with time in the name.
I ask it to turn of the lights and it tells me 'power control is not supported yet' at least half the time.
It's gotten worse since I bought it, it never did this and that is with even the most basic of tasks.
> I do agree that the set of actions I use Google assistant for is pretty static and are the same ones everyone else uses it for: What's the weather? Set my alarm? What's the first item on my calendar? Play XYZ on Spotify... But I don't see this at all as a "failed experiment"
So since 10 years, all it can do is play some music and tell the weather, all of this only online, so it is not a failed experiment. /s
So since 10 years, all it can do is play some music and tell the weather, all of this only online, so it is not a failed experiment. /s
Yea!
A product that has become pervasive in most households in America, that does it's one task, and tries to do it well. The problem is that companies built out these organizations and marketed these products as the next step of computing after mobile, and it's just not that easy to monetize.
My washer/drier, "all it can do" is spin clothes around and apply heat. I paid a lot more money for that "failed experiment".
I think Apple really should have made the HomePod earlier, and all this could be avoided. They were heavily criticized for not supporting 3P "skills" when it came out. Today, Apple is one of the better sellers, and has properly managed their products expectation from the start.
A product that has become pervasive in most households in America, that does it's one task, and tries to do it well. The problem is that companies built out these organizations and marketed these products as the next step of computing after mobile, and it's just not that easy to monetize.
My washer/drier, "all it can do" is spin clothes around and apply heat. I paid a lot more money for that "failed experiment".
I think Apple really should have made the HomePod earlier, and all this could be avoided. They were heavily criticized for not supporting 3P "skills" when it came out. Today, Apple is one of the better sellers, and has properly managed their products expectation from the start.
You might have enjoyed the reaction from the normies at a party recently when they figured out that my family doesn't have any voice control anything in our house and they started grilling my (comically, for the conversation, nontechnical) wife as to why.
After much very polite dancing around the politics of "listen, it's just a personal choice and nobody here is judging anyone else, I just don't want my children playing arbitrary stupid music and buying things on my credit card", she finally capitulated and pointed out that "well it's listening, isn't it? my husband" (I was actively playing with children at the time), "would have better details, but if it's listening, that means it's recording and sending those recordings to Amazon or Google or whomever".
At which point the lady of the house got up and turned her Alexa off. I attempted to not die laughing in the corner with the children.
After much very polite dancing around the politics of "listen, it's just a personal choice and nobody here is judging anyone else, I just don't want my children playing arbitrary stupid music and buying things on my credit card", she finally capitulated and pointed out that "well it's listening, isn't it? my husband" (I was actively playing with children at the time), "would have better details, but if it's listening, that means it's recording and sending those recordings to Amazon or Google or whomever".
At which point the lady of the house got up and turned her Alexa off. I attempted to not die laughing in the corner with the children.
> well it's listening, isn't it?
It's listening, and so are contractors and employees.
https://apnews.com/article/9000fd56f68043e48a2de8a08997a1fd
https://www.theverge.com/2019/8/7/20758491/microsoft-voice-r...
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jul/26/apple-con...
Companies will pinky promise that it doesn't happen, and say all kinds of things about their security polices and access controls, but spying on people's homes is basically the entire point of these devices. What else would you expect when you bug your home with an internet connected microphone from a company who makes their money collecting as much information about people as they can, especially their most private data.
They're also collecting data on children, and even targeting kids. Companies like Microsoft and Amazon have already been caught and got nothing more than slaps on the wrist, but collecting kid's data is basically inevitable when the house is bugged and kids are intentionally playing with it.
It's listening, and so are contractors and employees.
https://apnews.com/article/9000fd56f68043e48a2de8a08997a1fd
https://www.theverge.com/2019/8/7/20758491/microsoft-voice-r...
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jul/26/apple-con...
Companies will pinky promise that it doesn't happen, and say all kinds of things about their security polices and access controls, but spying on people's homes is basically the entire point of these devices. What else would you expect when you bug your home with an internet connected microphone from a company who makes their money collecting as much information about people as they can, especially their most private data.
They're also collecting data on children, and even targeting kids. Companies like Microsoft and Amazon have already been caught and got nothing more than slaps on the wrist, but collecting kid's data is basically inevitable when the house is bugged and kids are intentionally playing with it.
> A product that has become pervasive in most households in America
You think Google home has over 50% penetration?
You think Google home has over 50% penetration?
Between GAssistant, Alexa and Siri Speakers I bet it’s a significant chunk of the population.
Sonos now have a voice assistant (far more limited though) and many cars are rolling out some sort of assistant too.
I know plenty of people with multiple speakers and from competing brands.
Oh and obviously every iPhone in the last decade has it built in. That’s 50% of the population right there. Then there’s android phones, where I don’t know if they all have it wakeword enabled, but it’s probably another big chunk too.
Sonos now have a voice assistant (far more limited though) and many cars are rolling out some sort of assistant too.
I know plenty of people with multiple speakers and from competing brands.
Oh and obviously every iPhone in the last decade has it built in. That’s 50% of the population right there. Then there’s android phones, where I don’t know if they all have it wakeword enabled, but it’s probably another big chunk too.
The thread is about Google Assistant, not Alexa, Sonos, or Siri.
Regardless, do you think over 50% of households use the voice commands to the extent we call it "pervasive"?
Regardless, do you think over 50% of households use the voice commands to the extent we call it "pervasive"?
Assistant is included on most Android devices nowadays.
Assuming smartphones in general have 90%+ market penetration, 42% market share for Android, and an average household size of 3, it seems reasonable to assume that 50%+ of households will have at least one device running Assistant.
Assuming smartphones in general have 90%+ market penetration, 42% market share for Android, and an average household size of 3, it seems reasonable to assume that 50%+ of households will have at least one device running Assistant.
I agree with the sentiment, but i don’t think you can go from 42% of the population to >50% of households. Especially because households probably cluster, so it’s probably strictly less than 42% of households use android.
You think over 100% of people use Google Assistant on their Android smartphone?
Why involve voice at all? Sounds like it needs about 4 buttons.
Sounds like all we needed were really fast horses too.
Except they didn't invent a car. They invented a complex device to drive the existing horses.
Well, this particular tech hasn't panned out yet, I agree. But with that outlook ("just use buttons"), you'd never make any changes, which is even worse.
I would counter that voice assistants are not a failed experiment. I would suggest that Amazon and Google’s execution of said experiments have failed.
I am extremely excited about the potential of projects like the Rabbit R1 and Humane.
I am extremely excited about the potential of projects like the Rabbit R1 and Humane.
Things don't seem to be going well at Humane, either: https://www.fastcompany.com/91008117/ai-pin-humane-layoffs
No horse in the race, but the layoff is only ten people from a 250 person company that is still hiring. I'm a little surprised it even merited an article.
I agree, I just think these new projects based on LLMs should be considered a different category, AI agents or something. The traditional grammar-based voice assistant architecture used by Google Assistant, Siri, Alexa, Bixby, etc is an abject failure, and not for lack of trying.
If the Alexa/Echo-category of devices are meant to be some widely flexible and pervasively useful device from Star Trek, they're a failure.
If they're meant to be a usable $30 kitchen timer and music player, they're pretty great.
If they're meant to be a usable $30 kitchen timer and music player, they're pretty great.
Google Voice Search used internal codename "Majel" in reference to Majel Barrett, who played the voice of the Star Trek computer. That was explicitly the ambition. It just didn't work out.
OK. I believe you. They accidentally created something else that was very useful but different from what they set out to do.
Is that a story of failure or of success?
Starbucks launched to sell beans and espresso machines. YouTube launched as a video dating site. Are they also failures?
Is that a story of failure or of success?
Starbucks launched to sell beans and espresso machines. YouTube launched as a video dating site. Are they also failures?
I guess where we disagree is "very useful". If Google Assistant stopped working tomorrow I would hardly care at all. There are a couple of scenarios where it's slightly more convenient than using my phone (assuming I don't encounter one of its many failure modes) and that's about it. I'm sure the hands free aspect is important for certain people in certain situations but I think the vast majority of people just don't see a lot of value from it.
Amazon alone has sold over half-a-billion Alexa-enabled units (around 10 of them to me).
I think people see more than $30 of value in them, at least as their revealed preferences suggest.
I think people see more than $30 of value in them, at least as their revealed preferences suggest.
Those sales were subsidized in expectation of future profitability that will never come (at least not without a ground-up redesign of the product around LLM-based AI agents or some other paradigm). Economically Alexa is a "colossal failure": https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/11/amazon-alexa-is-a-co...
Yeah, my crock pot and ceiling fan are "Alexa-enabled". That's two.
But how often did that computer voice-acted by her really do significantly more than "set timer to thirty minutes"? Outside of some broken plots on the original series ("we have insufficient data to know the truth, let's ask the computer who will tell us anyways!"), it really was mostly mundane voice assistant stuff.
(I'm deliberately excluding the "ten words to 'author' a holodeck scene" part, that had always been stretching my imagination a little too far, more "this can't work!" than space travel and transporter beams. Then stable diffusion happened)
(I'm deliberately excluding the "ten words to 'author' a holodeck scene" part, that had always been stretching my imagination a little too far, more "this can't work!" than space travel and transporter beams. Then stable diffusion happened)
There were some scenes where Riker on the bridge asked the computer essentially a SQL query: "give me a list of star systems with parameters that fit X and cross-reference by Y..." "There are 3 systems which fit your query: ..."
That might have been the initial hope of the team, before Google killed it. It's been on the graveyard for years with zero updates, my google assistance nest mini is arguably worse than when I bought it.
I believe it is possible to have made it better, but they didn't try, they just gave up, like much of google products.
I believe it is possible to have made it better, but they didn't try, they just gave up, like much of google products.
I think way too much money has been sunk into those projects if their ambition is just to be a $30 kitchen timer and music player.
Yup, as far as something that can turn on a light, run a timer, convert some units, tell me the weather, and have an -okay- shot at some categories of random questions instead of me getting out my computer-- the google assistant is just fine.
They do succeed in that way many times a day every day in my house
As '80s telescreens they were fantastic.
I think many parts of the architecture can be reused - in Alexa terms, all of the “skills” that integrate the assistant with various other services. IMO one of the main problems with assistants is that I don’t know what skills are available or how to invoke them. It’s like I’m a wizard who has to memorize all the spells I could be casting. It never happens because I don’t care enough. I think LLM’s could potentially help my making it easier to discover and invoke those skills.
This "spells" is such a great way to explain how it feels to me to use these assistants. I'll play with one if I'm at a friend's house, but honestly can't see the appeal. Telling Google to change the color of the lighting or brightness just seems like something that is mostly a gimmick unless you're maybe disabled and then it may be a big quality of life improvement. The other stuff doubly so.
With ChatGPT I can see the appeal for certain tasks like having it create a custom text adventure for you, but I can't see it being too useful in my day to day life yet.
With ChatGPT I can see the appeal for certain tasks like having it create a custom text adventure for you, but I can't see it being too useful in my day to day life yet.
"Skills" will be obsolete very soon. AI agents will use the same software tools and services that humans do. They won't need special separate AI-only interfaces.
I'm not excited about the Rabbit R1 as a hardware device but their software vision is exactly right and there are new startups coming out of stealth seemingly every day now attacking this problem.
I'm not excited about the Rabbit R1 as a hardware device but their software vision is exactly right and there are new startups coming out of stealth seemingly every day now attacking this problem.
Skills are just APIs that conform to a similar look. We'll definitely continue to have AI-only or developed-for-AI APIs for future "agents" to act against. They probably won't spend much effort formatting text to sound good to a person, but the infrastructure is here.
I disagree. These special APIs will not have the breadth of capabilities that the human UI does, so AIs will use the human UIs out of necessity. But I think in the long term we will eventually see a simplification of UIs. As it becomes less common for humans to actually use them, they will no longer need fancy animations or dark mode or client-side validation or pretty styling. In the extreme, a return to plain HTML forms that a human can use in a pinch but are mostly used by AI agents. At that point I guess you're blurring the lines between UI and API.
Isn't it the exact opposite? Interfaces we use every day can be dead simple, all they need is that they don't change behind our back. The accelerator pedal does not come with a footover pop-up "keep pressed to make car go". Interfaces we use once in a leap year on the other hand, that's where we need all the hand-holding we can get.
Not sure if any comment that holds Humane in high regard can be taken seriously though.
It’s interesting. I had not heard the latest. Their initial videos looked promising.
I ordered a rabbit r1. I can see it’s missing some key functionality (Bluetooth for headphones so everyone doesn’t have to hear?) But… I think it’s an example of a first, promising, step to the era of real voice assistants/agents.
I ordered a rabbit r1. I can see it’s missing some key functionality (Bluetooth for headphones so everyone doesn’t have to hear?) But… I think it’s an example of a first, promising, step to the era of real voice assistants/agents.
> Bluetooth for headphones so everyone doesn’t have to hear?
This is a critical missing feature. I would never ever use this unless it's in my ear alone.
And I hope it doesn't become socially acceptable to be carrying these around forcing everyone else to listen to whatever this device has to tell the user. There is already far too many noise and inconsiderate people in this world.
This is a critical missing feature. I would never ever use this unless it's in my ear alone.
And I hope it doesn't become socially acceptable to be carrying these around forcing everyone else to listen to whatever this device has to tell the user. There is already far too many noise and inconsiderate people in this world.
But how is the input side sufficiently compatible with any state other than being alone? Voice surely does not qualify?
Even gesture control would be a tough sell, and even that only if it's not "AR, where you push buttons projected across your field of vision" but "AR, where you can do the equivalent of gamepad buttons with hand movement anywhere the device can see the hand". Voice output (earbuds) would be far too slow for that kind of interaction, because you can't skim a list. Compared to the strictly sequential nature of audio, screens are the equivalent of embarrassingly parallel.
By the way, that slowness of voice output vs screen is also what I consider the true motivation companies had for creating those essentially free voice assistants: searching for product/service on a screen, even if it's just a small handheld screen, makes you pick from a list. With voice in the other hand, going through the list is so slow and cumbersome that the chances for just picking the first, "I'm feeling lucky", are much, much bigger. The value of placement (bought directly or bought indirectly, "this must be very relevant because we know how much they can spend on our other ad services") is just so much bigger with voice. Chances are people are less likely to listen to the second hit on voice than to go to the second page on screen.
Even gesture control would be a tough sell, and even that only if it's not "AR, where you push buttons projected across your field of vision" but "AR, where you can do the equivalent of gamepad buttons with hand movement anywhere the device can see the hand". Voice output (earbuds) would be far too slow for that kind of interaction, because you can't skim a list. Compared to the strictly sequential nature of audio, screens are the equivalent of embarrassingly parallel.
By the way, that slowness of voice output vs screen is also what I consider the true motivation companies had for creating those essentially free voice assistants: searching for product/service on a screen, even if it's just a small handheld screen, makes you pick from a list. With voice in the other hand, going through the list is so slow and cumbersome that the chances for just picking the first, "I'm feeling lucky", are much, much bigger. The value of placement (bought directly or bought indirectly, "this must be very relevant because we know how much they can spend on our other ad services") is just so much bigger with voice. Chances are people are less likely to listen to the second hit on voice than to go to the second page on screen.
I think your last paragraph contrasts and slightly contradicts itself but I agree with the failure part. If we consider a real-life PA performing tasks on our phone for us the question can be asked if it makes much sense or if it would be an interesting novelty.
Basic functionality has always been the key winner with this tech. Calling, setting reminders etc. nothing too complex.
Basic functionality has always been the key winner with this tech. Calling, setting reminders etc. nothing too complex.
I just think the new LLM-based agents are in a different category. I don't see them as a continuation of the Siri/Alexa/etc lineage.
I do think a human personal assistant who had unlimited access to my data and could perform any task my phone or desktop could do would be exceedingly useful, even if the only interaction possibility was voice. And I think that AI agents will approach that level of usefulness within a decade or two.
I do think a human personal assistant who had unlimited access to my data and could perform any task my phone or desktop could do would be exceedingly useful, even if the only interaction possibility was voice. And I think that AI agents will approach that level of usefulness within a decade or two.
I think that voice assistants could have been much more usable this whole time if they had avoided getting mired in pushing products/music and instead stayed focused on doing a few things well.
Yes, but there's no money in just being usable.
I have multiple Google Home speaker devices at home. My experience that about 1/3 of the time, even in silence, it does not understand simple commands like "Stop" or "Pause". Sometimes I say "Stop" and it interprets this as "Stocks" and starts reading out stock prices. The fact that it only works 2/3 of the time makes it a frustrating UX, I hate trying to "use" it. (First world problems..)
Yep, I’ve got a few speakers and it feels like a crapshoot. I pretty much only say “lights on/off”, “play rain sounds”, and “stop”. But the goog hears _something_ that translates to “playing lights53 on Spotify”, or “here’s what’s playing near you”. Usually in quiet environments too when it mishears me - oddly good at parsing stuff in noisy environments or low volume, if I’m talking (masculine voice) but my roommate (more femme) usually doesn’t get heard at all.
I mean, without those rudimentary building blocks they wouldn't have a lot of data and talent ready to investigate LLM's (and ofc, lots of polish on the NLP framework. Not as flashy, but very important for the UX). I don't see it as a failed experiment so much as a raw prototype if we believe LLM's can realize the true potential. Heck, for all we know, we were actually just training the model for this past decade.
What are you talking about? What "rudimentary building blocks" came as a result of voice assistants? They have nothing at all in common with LLMs. Your post is pure non-sequitur.
A bulk of data that the product trained upon in order to execute a task based upon promoting instead of a rigid command?
They only have nothing in common if you think of a Voice assistant as no smarter than those auto prompt customer support lines. Clearly Siri/Cortana/Google assistant had sole basic context mapping.
They only have nothing in common if you think of a Voice assistant as no smarter than those auto prompt customer support lines. Clearly Siri/Cortana/Google assistant had sole basic context mapping.
Weird to call Google Assistant failed when it's about to get vastly more capable by being wired to Bard/Gemini. Already, I want to talk to Google Assistant like it's an LLM, but it's not there yet.
LLMs at Google aren't going to augment Assistant, they're going to replace it. With something that isn't an assistant, and doesn't do anything useful.
So what's a good employer now, now that Google has been losing the reputation for treating employees well?
(Multiple rounds of laying off people isn't treating only those people poorly, but also increasing stress for the people who remain, knowing they can suddenly be laid off as well.)
(Multiple rounds of laying off people isn't treating only those people poorly, but also increasing stress for the people who remain, knowing they can suddenly be laid off as well.)
Federal government. No equity, but stability. Best place to take shelter during economic uncertainty or bearish conditions imho. Rode out the 2008 GFC at a DOE lab.
https://www.usajobs.gov/
https://www.usajobs.gov/
Federal government is mostly a miserable place to work if you enjoy up-to-date tech and flat organizational structures with high autonomy to get your work done. Also a miserable place to work if you enjoy earning money.
And you get bonus days off any time congress needs to raise the debt ceiling!
That varies quite a bit. I remember feeling bad for my coworkers who worked on "critical" projects in exchange for IOUs while I got free vacation (although I was also getting paid in IOUs for a little while)
Sometimes better than random layoffs because someone needed to juice the stock price.
https://www.businessinsider.com/google-layoffs-cut-jobs-exce... (“A major Alphabet investor said the company should cut even more jobs and address 'excessive' pay in the wake of mass layoffs”)
(Edit: retracted an unnecessarily snarky statement)
(I admit Congress needs to get its shit together)
https://www.businessinsider.com/google-layoffs-cut-jobs-exce... (“A major Alphabet investor said the company should cut even more jobs and address 'excessive' pay in the wake of mass layoffs”)
(Edit: retracted an unnecessarily snarky statement)
(I admit Congress needs to get its shit together)
Hey both of these suck for everyone involved, I was just trying to point out that government work is not without its own issues. You may be right about government jobs being more stable, you're certainly less likely to just lose your job. They do tend to pay significantly less though from what I've seen.
I'm from the UK so while we do have layoffs, like much of Europe we have relatively good employment protections. The government here don't tend to do layoffs, but do tend to use contractors significantly more than most businesses and do flex their contractor base up and down.
I'm from the UK so while we do have layoffs, like much of Europe we have relatively good employment protections. The government here don't tend to do layoffs, but do tend to use contractors significantly more than most businesses and do flex their contractor base up and down.
Wasn’t a personal attack by any means, more like “pick your poison” with a bit too much snark (which I apologize for). Google is great until it suddenly isn’t, and working for Uncle Sam has its own challenges. Happy to hear you’re in a jurisdiction where you’re not exposed to the US labor experience, I’m just trying to throw life preservers out because I’m not sure how long the market is going to be this dysfunctional for (and this will be my third “once in a lifetime” economic crisis).
Not everyone involved, think of those poor investors!
Spot on about the contractors. The city I live in contains some of the larger data processing hot-spots of the German government (not so much in terms of large number-crunching server farms, but in terms of ever changing complicated business logic running at high volume) and there's a crazy number of consultancies serving that market and nobody else. But ironically those are the safest jobs nonetheless, because that demand could only ever go away in total state collapse.
Spot on about the contractors. The city I live in contains some of the larger data processing hot-spots of the German government (not so much in terms of large number-crunching server farms, but in terms of ever changing complicated business logic running at high volume) and there's a crazy number of consultancies serving that market and nobody else. But ironically those are the safest jobs nonetheless, because that demand could only ever go away in total state collapse.
Working as a contractor for a public entity, I can't think of anything that I would like to do less than that...
I can certainly feel what you mean, it's where those who will take on anything to get a bigger car congregate in these parts. But it's actually not that bad I think, deployments are not "the temp guy in an in-house team" but projects with a presumably not too difficult buyer: the customer-side person you are working with doesn't have too much skin in the game. Realistic expectations and all that. One of the more graspeable downsides I think (never worked that way, but went though the hiring process once) is that those state clients seem to never outsource a complete project, but insist on keeping projects neutral by staffing them from as many different consultancies as possible, which means that you'll only ever work with people who are nominally your competitors.
Incredible lens, to see working for the federal government as the employment version of investing in gold. A real fun concept.
Maybe not gold but as the old British saying goes "there's brass in muck"
Q: whats a realistic salary a SWE or SRE who is 10-15 years deep might expect?
I do understand it’ll be lower, but the GS pay system isn’t that clear to outsiders
I do understand it’ll be lower, but the GS pay system isn’t that clear to outsiders
Made ~$85k/year at the DOE lab I mentioned as a sysadmin, was offered ~$175k/year for a US Digital Service role with ~15 years of infra/sysadmin/generalist experience. YMMV. Imho you’ll top out ~$190k-$200k. Not FAANG money, but also not homeless.
Honestly that's not too far off, Alphabet growth has been stalled since 2021 anyway.
Base salary is a relatively small component of your pay once you've been at Google more than 2 or 3 years. For me it is roughly 30% of my total comp after three years, without any crazy performance ratings or promos. Does the government even give bonuses?
the value of stability is inversely related to confidence
The belief in this idea is an inverse function of wisdom and pragmatism. Confident people end up laid off all the same, you can only make so much luck, although I’d agree you can be more confident (take more risk?) when you’ve objectively derisked financially against downside.
(Risk management is a component of my work)
(Risk management is a component of my work)
> Confident people end up laid off all the same
Indeed, and I am under no such illusions. But it's silly to live in fear of. Hubris would be thinking that your organization or relationship is special.
7 years of plenty and 7 years of famine.
Indeed, and I am under no such illusions. But it's silly to live in fear of. Hubris would be thinking that your organization or relationship is special.
7 years of plenty and 7 years of famine.
Stability, unless conservatives retake power: https://apnews.com/article/election-2024-conservatives-trump...
I retired from Apple a few years ago but still follow the company. I am not aware of any layoffs at Apple. Others have pointed out that Apple didn't go on the same hiring boom that other companies did during Covid.
My friends at Apple say they avoided layoffs because they didn't hire as much during the pandemic. Sounds great, right? Except instead they just worked more hours. Dunno which approach I prefer.
Also retired from Apple (FIRE). I never worked so hard or got paid so much in my life. Would recommend AAAAAaaa+++++ would do again
Have you written about your FI/RE story anywhere? Would be interesting to read. E.g. which SWR, did you end up moving somewhere cheaper, what do you do day-to-day now? How have you found actually living on your withdrawals - has it not caused more worry? How do you avoid the FOMO of seeing your former colleagues pressing on?
I've not shared my story. Much of the FIRE community is sick of hearing about engineers doing it. I was a SRE in Maps - I joined after Apple fired Scott. Many gave me a lot of hell for going to Apple Maps but there was a ton of work. I did move to Portland metro area during pandemic and actually got permission for perm remote work at Apple. But once I saw I could FIRE I waited for 1 more RSU vest and left. Zero FOMO - a coworker on my team left 6 months before me. I'm currently on a 4month vacation in Asia with wife. I'm still connected to former colleagues at Apple and visit the offices. I left Spring of 2022.
I looked at Apple a long while ago - and whilst they certainly have teams doing interesting work - relocating to California will always be a hard no for me… They have positions elsewhere but much less varied.
Just use your resume to Move to location where ever they are hiring. Dont worry about "good employer" certifications. That stuff belongs to a bygone era thats never coming back.
Large corps spanning hundreds of countries are managed primarily by finance arbitragers who use cross border differences in labor costs/interest rates/tax rates/govt regulations/freebies/tariffs etc to keep the lights on. As they get faster and faster at responding and taking advantage of these constant changes world wide, these methods come to dominate decision making, especially during uncertain times.
So dont worry about what they are doing. It will never make sense unless you spend time reading financial statements every day. Just move to whereever they are hiring. And they are always hiring.
Large corps spanning hundreds of countries are managed primarily by finance arbitragers who use cross border differences in labor costs/interest rates/tax rates/govt regulations/freebies/tariffs etc to keep the lights on. As they get faster and faster at responding and taking advantage of these constant changes world wide, these methods come to dominate decision making, especially during uncertain times.
So dont worry about what they are doing. It will never make sense unless you spend time reading financial statements every day. Just move to whereever they are hiring. And they are always hiring.
Picking up and moving to the “it” tech city assuming you’ll get hired sounds like a great solution… that is, if you don’t have family obligations, or, really… a family, long-term responsibilities of any kind, a chronic health condition, or lack money to support an expensive interstate/city/country move probably with an increased cost of living while unemployed… and all to assume that your employer is going to cast you side when they’re done with you so you’ll have to do it all over again?
You’re either wealthy enough to not realize how infeasible this is for most people over 25, or you’ve got a serious case of tech industry Stockholm syndrome. I’ll continue to vet my employers.
You’re either wealthy enough to not realize how infeasible this is for most people over 25, or you’ve got a serious case of tech industry Stockholm syndrome. I’ll continue to vet my employers.
Well, maybe there's a deeper truth to qp11's statement:
I completely agree that moving to the tech city _du jour_ caters to the demographic of mid-20 "anywheres". Having a family, long-term friends or obligations such as elderly care rules you out. Or god forbid: A time-consuming hobby or in general something apart from work that gives meaning to your life.
And that's exactly the point! You only get those high wages when you put in the 60–80 hours a week (or 40 very focused hours a week) that you can spend if you live for your work. To the employer, such dependent, driven employees are very valuable. Much more than some family father who comes in for 20 hours a week and is often tired and just wants to get back home to play with his children.
I completely agree that moving to the tech city _du jour_ caters to the demographic of mid-20 "anywheres". Having a family, long-term friends or obligations such as elderly care rules you out. Or god forbid: A time-consuming hobby or in general something apart from work that gives meaning to your life.
And that's exactly the point! You only get those high wages when you put in the 60–80 hours a week (or 40 very focused hours a week) that you can spend if you live for your work. To the employer, such dependent, driven employees are very valuable. Much more than some family father who comes in for 20 hours a week and is often tired and just wants to get back home to play with his children.
Stockholm syndrome. Mercantile utility being the only driving factor that governs these actions is exactly the problem. You're expending your life-- no more or less valuable than the life of the CEO or shareholders-- to give the CEO and shareholders a fantastically luxurious life that was, in nearly every case, only afforded to them because of existing wealth. That's fucked up. What's even more fucked up is that it's stratifying more, not less. Succumbing to this very well-marketed idea that we're worth no more than our monetary value in a market is one of the driving factors.
It's feasible. I have done it. Moved to Singapore and now in South Korea with family. I think experienced people have lot of interesting options. Many don't look.
And suppose you have a spouse with a career that isn't so mobile? Language barriers? Work visas? Elderly parents?
Tons of reasons people can't just up and migrate at the drop of a hat.
Tons of reasons people can't just up and migrate at the drop of a hat.
Millions of people leave their spouses, kids and parents to move to another country for work. Most don't even work anywhere adjacent to tech. We call them migrants. If you're ambitious/hungry enough, you'll do whatever it takes.
Most of those millions also have miserable lives in their new host country, and indeed do it simply out of necessity.
If IT goes that way, I would rather move to the countryside and grow my own food, than become an international wage slave who moves wherever our rich overlords want.
If IT goes that way, I would rather move to the countryside and grow my own food, than become an international wage slave who moves wherever our rich overlords want.
> Most don't even work anywhere adjacent to tech. We call them migrants.
As I indicated, at the beginning of your career as a young person without a family or much tying you down, moving to a place where you're more likely to get a job in your field obviously makes complete sense, but that's not who we're talking about here. These are professionals-- many in their mid to late careers-- that got laid off, largely without notice. Being expected to abandon your life, mid-career to flock to the latest career hotspot because we complacently allow large established employers to pick up and discard large numbers of employees at their convenience-- demanding loyalty and offering none in return-- is not the same thing.
> Millions of people leave their spouses, kids and parents to move to another country for work.
Millions of people also have nutritional rickets.
> If you're ambitious/hungry enough, you'll do whatever it takes.
If you think system this rewards ambition anywhere close to as much as it rewards people already within the existing power structures, you're fooling yourself. Tech is no different than many other industries: it treats less privileged classes like donkeys while the privileged sit on top with a carrot on a stick being sure to let them get a bite every now and again when their frustration starts impacting their output. Of course there are individual success stories you can cherry pick to make it seem like reality for the majority, but you could take the worst NBA free-thrower and cherry pick them a perfect record.
As I indicated, at the beginning of your career as a young person without a family or much tying you down, moving to a place where you're more likely to get a job in your field obviously makes complete sense, but that's not who we're talking about here. These are professionals-- many in their mid to late careers-- that got laid off, largely without notice. Being expected to abandon your life, mid-career to flock to the latest career hotspot because we complacently allow large established employers to pick up and discard large numbers of employees at their convenience-- demanding loyalty and offering none in return-- is not the same thing.
> Millions of people leave their spouses, kids and parents to move to another country for work.
Millions of people also have nutritional rickets.
> If you're ambitious/hungry enough, you'll do whatever it takes.
If you think system this rewards ambition anywhere close to as much as it rewards people already within the existing power structures, you're fooling yourself. Tech is no different than many other industries: it treats less privileged classes like donkeys while the privileged sit on top with a carrot on a stick being sure to let them get a bite every now and again when their frustration starts impacting their output. Of course there are individual success stories you can cherry pick to make it seem like reality for the majority, but you could take the worst NBA free-thrower and cherry pick them a perfect record.
Whatever it takes to survive, not to make a few bucks more. There's no reason to chase that money once you are past a certain point. The truth is lambos aren't that practical anyways.
They do so out of desperation. If that's the future of the tech industry, I would prefer to leave the industry.
> If you're ambitious/hungry enough
You spelled "exploitable" wrong.
You spelled "exploitable" wrong.
You moved a family to Singapore without a job based on the assumption you'd get hired? That's what the comment I'm responding to is proposing. If so, you are unrepresentatively wealthy.
Moved to Singapore from where? The USA? There was a point where I was investigating opportunities out in Southeast Asia, but I never had a ton of success even finding listings.
I think you’re missing an entire category of businesses: ones who are making both a good product/service and a good income.
Sounds like a defeatist comment.
I don’t think there are any left.
The cycle repeats itself though. The leas desirable Google becomes, the more talent is freed up into startups, some of which eventually will offer something similar.
The cycle repeats itself though. The leas desirable Google becomes, the more talent is freed up into startups, some of which eventually will offer something similar.
Problem being that capital is not free anymore, as it has been for close to two decades.
As startups run on venture funding, I'm not so sure there will be a wellspring of new positions generated for those hit by the layoffs, this time around.
As startups run on venture funding, I'm not so sure there will be a wellspring of new positions generated for those hit by the layoffs, this time around.
Which is probably why now is a safe time to release employees into the labour pool i.e. conduct layoffs. There’s a low risk those people will be absorbed into a competitor, until money gets cheap again.
None
There is no job security in this market right now. Even if you have a job, you can be replaced quickly.
Might as well just don't think about it, and prepare for the worst if you are anxious about the future.
There is no job security in this market right now. Even if you have a job, you can be replaced quickly.
Might as well just don't think about it, and prepare for the worst if you are anxious about the future.
Is that the US reality, I guess?
Based in Europe, I'm not seeing this here.
Based in Europe, I'm not seeing this here.
If you are anxious about future job market, just remind yourself that you would be dead one day anyway.
> Multiple rounds of laying off people isn't treating only those people poorly, but also increasing stress for the people who remain, knowing they can suddenly be laid off as well.
How is this not just "business"? That's what Google is.
Granted, they make billions of dollars a quarter and it won't hurt them to keep employees around.
But every company I've ever worked for over the last decades has laid people off, made others nervous, etc.
It may sound harsh but they aren't a charity. People will be laid off, others will be nervous they may be next.
If you are looking for a company where everyone just happy hums along with no fear of job loss, those don't exist.
Except maybe in the Government.
How is this not just "business"? That's what Google is.
Granted, they make billions of dollars a quarter and it won't hurt them to keep employees around.
But every company I've ever worked for over the last decades has laid people off, made others nervous, etc.
It may sound harsh but they aren't a charity. People will be laid off, others will be nervous they may be next.
If you are looking for a company where everyone just happy hums along with no fear of job loss, those don't exist.
Except maybe in the Government.
Even so - I don't have a moral objection to profit motive, I just think they're going about it wrong.
There is one large shift happening now in the industry, to AI. Google will need tons of talent to rise to the challenge. There have been other such shifts before (social, mobile). In the past, Google handled these shifts very differently, by retraining and reorganizing engineering staff, which had for the most part been hired for its generalist ability and could therefore jump to other areas. The theory was that there wasn't a need to know the domain too much, since you were going to reinvent it anyways. It worked exceptionally well for a lot of things. People there didn't build data centers using techniques from the field, they didn't build maps like ESRI or Navteq, etc.
Now it seems to handle it differently, through layoffs that give their employees clear signals that the company will look outside for talent first. Employees are no longer valued as adaptable generalist hires but as narrow-function cogs.
That's a strategic mistake, because the AI field is still so nascent and full of hacks that generalists able to handle novel challenges in innovative ways are so sorely needed. It isn't a mature space at all and outside hires - at the scale that will be needed - will almost certainly be of lower quality and productivity.
What would make sense if they wanted to increase profits: routinely cut low performers to keep people motivated to do their best, and completely drop entire business lines that are losses for the company. It doesn't seem like either thing is happening. By their own admission, it's not the lowest performers that get cut ("role eliminations"), and businesses that cause losses are expected to continue operating with less staff. Staff cuts don't fix structurally lossy businesses, they just make them limp longer. It seems like it's setting up these businesses for a long and painful agony.
There is one large shift happening now in the industry, to AI. Google will need tons of talent to rise to the challenge. There have been other such shifts before (social, mobile). In the past, Google handled these shifts very differently, by retraining and reorganizing engineering staff, which had for the most part been hired for its generalist ability and could therefore jump to other areas. The theory was that there wasn't a need to know the domain too much, since you were going to reinvent it anyways. It worked exceptionally well for a lot of things. People there didn't build data centers using techniques from the field, they didn't build maps like ESRI or Navteq, etc.
Now it seems to handle it differently, through layoffs that give their employees clear signals that the company will look outside for talent first. Employees are no longer valued as adaptable generalist hires but as narrow-function cogs.
That's a strategic mistake, because the AI field is still so nascent and full of hacks that generalists able to handle novel challenges in innovative ways are so sorely needed. It isn't a mature space at all and outside hires - at the scale that will be needed - will almost certainly be of lower quality and productivity.
What would make sense if they wanted to increase profits: routinely cut low performers to keep people motivated to do their best, and completely drop entire business lines that are losses for the company. It doesn't seem like either thing is happening. By their own admission, it's not the lowest performers that get cut ("role eliminations"), and businesses that cause losses are expected to continue operating with less staff. Staff cuts don't fix structurally lossy businesses, they just make them limp longer. It seems like it's setting up these businesses for a long and painful agony.
I empathize with this POV, and I largely hold it myself. That said, there is something incredibly insulting about having a layoff when making billions of dollars.
Look, if a company is going under, everyone can understand they have to lay off huge number of folks (otherwise, they'll lay off everyone). But laying people off when you're profitable just because you want to be more profitable..?
We need some regulation for it, the problem is what regulation. But I don't think it's controversial to say that this behavior shouldn't be encouraged (despite the fact that it is not illegal, and very few would say that it should be illegal).
Look, if a company is going under, everyone can understand they have to lay off huge number of folks (otherwise, they'll lay off everyone). But laying people off when you're profitable just because you want to be more profitable..?
We need some regulation for it, the problem is what regulation. But I don't think it's controversial to say that this behavior shouldn't be encouraged (despite the fact that it is not illegal, and very few would say that it should be illegal).
That's what publicly traded companies are. They literally can't do "this is going well, let's continue going well", because in that case there'd inevitably be someone out there who thinks "but it could go even better". And with their optimistic projections, they are willing to pay more than even the happiest "yay, this is going well and will go well forever" considers the shares to be worth. Ownership by the biggest optimist is inevitable and when they discover that their hopes were unfounded and there's no even bigger optimist the take the bag, they'll rather burn the house for an imagined chance of still winning than accept the losses.
(VC funded is no different of course, that's just a shortcut to arrive at the optimism-race without ever going through "this is going well")
(VC funded is no different of course, that's just a shortcut to arrive at the optimism-race without ever going through "this is going well")
Do you know of any founders with these superiority complexes built upon some ideas of how great their career and field is? Like PhDs were at Google? Or Engineers were at IBM?
That's the foundation of a good company until some MBA type comes and takes over. Then it is not about the work you do but the metric you are judged upon.
And the metrics for Google Assistant are not great. And neither are the metrics for a lot of google projects. But the team and fascination behind their technologies are the only roots keeping them from being X'd.
This is why Android and Chrome will continue to be heavy handed. The current CEO came from over there and started/led the team. But things like Google Search will always be judged by the numbers and metrics, not by the ideas of connecting people with info.
(I ranted. But to answer your question, go to place that is a darling of the power broker.)
That's the foundation of a good company until some MBA type comes and takes over. Then it is not about the work you do but the metric you are judged upon.
And the metrics for Google Assistant are not great. And neither are the metrics for a lot of google projects. But the team and fascination behind their technologies are the only roots keeping them from being X'd.
This is why Android and Chrome will continue to be heavy handed. The current CEO came from over there and started/led the team. But things like Google Search will always be judged by the numbers and metrics, not by the ideas of connecting people with info.
(I ranted. But to answer your question, go to place that is a darling of the power broker.)
[deleted]
I wonder if layoffs will affect company loyalty in the future? I'm leaning towards not, given the frequency of turnover at big tech companies for higher TC
In your opinion what is the proper way to do a layoff? Or if any layoff is a problem, how do you prevent companies from hiring too quickly or whatever?
Layoff should be done with a large cut, but one round. If done right, it gives people the motivation to turn things around. Multiple rounds of layoff in a short amount of time (multiple rounds per year for example) gives the signal that the management can't figure out what is needed to turn the company around. At that time, your bests and brightests will leave.
> At that time, your bests and brightests will leave.
The best and brightest will start looking for greener grass the second the first layoff round hits, no matter what.
Companies that offload the risk of bad management decisions to employees instead of investors are not any employee's friend.
The best and brightest will start looking for greener grass the second the first layoff round hits, no matter what.
Companies that offload the risk of bad management decisions to employees instead of investors are not any employee's friend.
They are making over a billion a week in profits (and still growing). Layoffs can be justified but it's a bit of a head scratcher to be doing them when the company seems to be doing generally well
I feel like this has been a theme for the last year - big tech companies with big profits doing mass layoffs. We've seen Microsoft, Facebook, Goggle, Spotify etc all do this. It's this whole obsession with the word "efficiency" and the phrase "doing more with less." It really makes you think these CEOs are all a bunch of sheep. See:
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/11/techs-new-business-model-do-...
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/11/techs-new-business-model-do-...
The craziest thing to me is that the employees at these companies are some of the most sought after people yet when push comes to shove they seem to have all just rolled over and not raised a fuss with layoffs. These companies are some of the most profitable companies of all time. It's not like I think everyone needs to run out and join a union but the seeming complete lack of torches and pitchforks internally is a huge shock to me.
My dad was in a different field and when the company he worked for did layoffs the company was in a serious financial state and in danger of just folding entirely and also the employees had a say in how layoffs were implemented. Until I started working in tech I had assumed that was the norm but now I realize that that amount of respect for the employees from leadership was the exception (at least at large companies).
My dad was in a different field and when the company he worked for did layoffs the company was in a serious financial state and in danger of just folding entirely and also the employees had a say in how layoffs were implemented. Until I started working in tech I had assumed that was the norm but now I realize that that amount of respect for the employees from leadership was the exception (at least at large companies).
These are some pretty luxurious layoffs by comparison, I think. Generally the benefits packages are excellent.
You answered this yourself. These people got new jobs. What's to raise a fuss about?
IMHO Google's a hot mess top-to-bottom at the moment.
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I had an interesting thought: what if hiring were like bringing a child into your family. No, no layoffs ever. It's the equivalent of disowning your own child.
If the company begins to sink, so be it, the whole family goes down together (or flee as they see fit).
It would make a company hesitant to hire — they would have to think very long term making a decision like that. Perhaps companies would train (re-train) their employees if the jobs or company evolve.
Interesting though that, in the U.S. at least, the relationship we have with our employer is perhaps 180 degrees from that of the relationship we have with our family. That seems a little sad.
(Reminded suddenly of Tim's speech at the end of The Office (U.K.) — pass me a hanky. https://youtu.be/5AlZ-ZYbbPU)
If the company begins to sink, so be it, the whole family goes down together (or flee as they see fit).
It would make a company hesitant to hire — they would have to think very long term making a decision like that. Perhaps companies would train (re-train) their employees if the jobs or company evolve.
Interesting though that, in the U.S. at least, the relationship we have with our employer is perhaps 180 degrees from that of the relationship we have with our family. That seems a little sad.
(Reminded suddenly of Tim's speech at the end of The Office (U.K.) — pass me a hanky. https://youtu.be/5AlZ-ZYbbPU)
Then that country would become an extremely unattractive place to hire employees. Massive incentive to do whatever you can to only use contractors or whatever. Somehow classify your employees as self employed, something like that.
Maybe it wouldn't even be a loophole: everyone would just have to actually go freelance and have no employee protections.
I wonder if any country has anything close to layoffs being illegal and how that went.
Maybe it wouldn't even be a loophole: everyone would just have to actually go freelance and have no employee protections.
I wonder if any country has anything close to layoffs being illegal and how that went.
> Then that country would become an extremely unattractive place to hire employees
Works fine for France, it's very hard to do layoffs there, to the point that a common myth is that they're illegal there. 7th largest GDP. Unemployment rate is at 7% (about 2x the USA), but it's also not the existential risk it is in the US - you are given 75% of whatever your pay was for up to 2-3 years.
> Massive incentive to do whatever you can to only use contractors or whatever. Somehow classify your employees as self employed, something like that.
Going back to France, they'll fine the hell out of a company that did that. Misclassifying your employees to abuse the system is enforced there.
As an American, I am extremely jealous of France's employee protections. Even the most leftist states like CA pale in comparison to the protections the French have.
Works fine for France, it's very hard to do layoffs there, to the point that a common myth is that they're illegal there. 7th largest GDP. Unemployment rate is at 7% (about 2x the USA), but it's also not the existential risk it is in the US - you are given 75% of whatever your pay was for up to 2-3 years.
> Massive incentive to do whatever you can to only use contractors or whatever. Somehow classify your employees as self employed, something like that.
Going back to France, they'll fine the hell out of a company that did that. Misclassifying your employees to abuse the system is enforced there.
As an American, I am extremely jealous of France's employee protections. Even the most leftist states like CA pale in comparison to the protections the French have.
I think you have a bit of a rosy view here. It works, but there are serious downsides.
Salaries are low, unemployment was high for a long time (and still is, especially for the youth), companies make massive use of contractors (via big consulting companies) and getting a permanent contract is very difficult (without which getting a mortgage is pretty much impossible).
Once you have your permanent contract, it's fine, but for newcomers to the job market, it's hell.
Salaries are low, unemployment was high for a long time (and still is, especially for the youth), companies make massive use of contractors (via big consulting companies) and getting a permanent contract is very difficult (without which getting a mortgage is pretty much impossible).
Once you have your permanent contract, it's fine, but for newcomers to the job market, it's hell.
I have a close friend who works for a largish French company and runs their engineering team. They are expanding their engineering team and are considering anywhere but France. The statistic I was told is that the non-salary costs for an engineer in France are so much higher that the equivalent person in NYC would be 40% cheaper. London is even better and is likely where they are going to land their new tech hub.
> 7th largest GDP
This isn't relevant when we're talking about individual welfare. France is 23rd for nominal GDP per capita and 26th for PPP.
Which is still good! A lot of the countries near the top are petrostates or tax havens. But not the US.
This isn't relevant when we're talking about individual welfare. France is 23rd for nominal GDP per capita and 26th for PPP.
Which is still good! A lot of the countries near the top are petrostates or tax havens. But not the US.
If it's not government-mandated, but a choice of the company, then I don't see how "unattractive place to hire" would apply.
If it were mandated, but somehow nothing else changed, then it would be unattractive to hire. If other things also changed, not necessarily.
If it were mandated, but somehow nothing else changed, then it would be unattractive to hire. If other things also changed, not necessarily.
I've heard that's exactly what already happens in Japan, with consequences others already mentioned, like https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ReassignedToAnta... or extreme seniority culture.
Join a monastery.
Why lay-off instead of repurpose?
Will we consider smartphones as "Personal Assistants" anytime soon? AI has advanced considerably in terms of what can be processed locally but the restructure seems a bit over the top considering it's still the same concept in a broader sense.
It's like laying off a team of developers simply because you changed branding.
Will we consider smartphones as "Personal Assistants" anytime soon? AI has advanced considerably in terms of what can be processed locally but the restructure seems a bit over the top considering it's still the same concept in a broader sense.
It's like laying off a team of developers simply because you changed branding.
I seem to recall Google saying that they don't hire for a specific position; they hire good developers and then find the right position for them. This idea is directly countered by the act of firing developers in a specific position because that position is no longer viable.
If a company wants to fire some people they believe can cause legal trouble if fired individually, somtimes they will spend a year or two reorganizing in a way that incidentally have many of these people all ending up in the same part of the organization.
Then they can do layoffs there, seemingly without violating any wrongful termination laws.
Somehow the best developers and others who contribute directly to the bottom line tend to be unaffected by such events.
Then they can do layoffs there, seemingly without violating any wrongful termination laws.
Somehow the best developers and others who contribute directly to the bottom line tend to be unaffected by such events.
I had on very good word that Bard / Assistant was used as a husk for this.
New managers managers manager moves in with a good chunk of people to Help With Bard.
Then 6 months later you and the older handers are asked to move to an exciting new opportunity in Assistant.
of course it's an opportunity, we're investing in it. Bla bla bla.
8 weeks later your roles have been eliminated, you're locked out of everything except the internal jobs listing site for the next 8 weeks. (Note this was happening _before_ tonight's culling)
Sundar's really done a great job with culture
New managers managers manager moves in with a good chunk of people to Help With Bard.
Then 6 months later you and the older handers are asked to move to an exciting new opportunity in Assistant.
of course it's an opportunity, we're investing in it. Bla bla bla.
8 weeks later your roles have been eliminated, you're locked out of everything except the internal jobs listing site for the next 8 weeks. (Note this was happening _before_ tonight's culling)
Sundar's really done a great job with culture
> 8 weeks later
This sounds like they've been in a rush. Maybe there are bonus deadlines coming up.
This sounds like they've been in a rush. Maybe there are bonus deadlines coming up.
Right, that doesn't quite make sense. The previous layoff was all across the board and likely trimming lower rated engineers across the whole company. Wiping a specific team, with potentially top tier talent, makes no sense.
Are we sure this is actually general engineers? The headline only says "working on". It could be people doing very specific work, like prompt validation, QA, etc.
Are we sure this is actually general engineers? The headline only says "working on". It could be people doing very specific work, like prompt validation, QA, etc.
> The previous layoff was all across the board and likely trimming lower rated engineers across the whole company.
This is simply untrue for the Jan 2023 Alphabet layoffs. Entire orgs (>200 FTE) were let go regardless of individual performance.
This is simply untrue for the Jan 2023 Alphabet layoffs. Entire orgs (>200 FTE) were let go regardless of individual performance.
That's mostly to reduce their legal liability, rather than anything else. Poor management, nonetheless.
I would wager a fair amount that Google took that lens and very likely "saved" much of the talent that they had previously identified as top tier (in some cases months or quarters before this round of layoffs; in others during the layoff prep).
I don't think the previous layoffs took perf/grad stack rankings into account
This is an excellent point, Xoogler and been struggling to explain concisely why I've been offended / think all this is fundamentally misleading. And that's it right there. We were all special snowflakes who could always help the mothership. Now we're ballast that Sundar and VPs need to take yearly turns Optimizing.
That's definitely not how Google does hiring anymore. They don't do true generalist interviews, that's for sure. Every Google interview gauntlet I went through was at least 50% specialists asking me specialist questions, and in the end when I got hired it was when I got interviewed by specialists appropriate for my domain, and I was hired for a specific position.
If we accept the premise, then why wouldn't it make sense to fire developers in specific positions? If a position is no longer viable, it won't matter to you if you fire that person, since presumably any person you choose would also be a "good developer."
I'm making the assumption that they're _also_ still hiring, and that the people that were fired could, instead, be transitioned into other roles. I would be amazingly surprised if they were not still hiring.
out of good positions
Level 1: "we need to reduce costs; everyone work on that"
Level 2: "we've been told to cut costs, and staff is the lowest hanging fruit; which products should we kill?"
Level 3: "hey, I need to reduce the number of products, and staff is the lowest hanging fruit; which teams should we reduce?"
Level 4: "since I can't ask if anyone is actually doing anything without raising suspicion, we'll just pick the largest cost sinks, and cull a bit; here's a list"
I doubt anyone really cared which products got reduced. In an org with 100k employees, it's just numbers all the way down to level 5-6 somewhere.
Level 2: "we've been told to cut costs, and staff is the lowest hanging fruit; which products should we kill?"
Level 3: "hey, I need to reduce the number of products, and staff is the lowest hanging fruit; which teams should we reduce?"
Level 4: "since I can't ask if anyone is actually doing anything without raising suspicion, we'll just pick the largest cost sinks, and cull a bit; here's a list"
I doubt anyone really cared which products got reduced. In an org with 100k employees, it's just numbers all the way down to level 5-6 somewhere.
> Why lay-off instead of repurpose?
Appease investors probably
Appease investors probably
Generally to boost numbers for the quarter, it takes a while for the damage to propagate through the system after a mass firing (in terms of new code/features/products) but the profits increase instantly, appeasing investors who think only in terms of weeks and quarters.
I’m continually surprised that this tactic still works. It’s been rinsed and repeated so many times that the inevitable damage (and effect on the company financials) is practically boring.
I have no context on what's happening in this particular case, but Google usually indeed does not layoff straight up: teams get "defragged" and the people working on them have some time to try to find new roles.
It's not like that anymore sadly, so pathetic. Like it kinda is: you can "find a new role". But you're locked out of everything except Grow. Everything. No chat, no email. And everyone has negative headcount anyway, there's no roles on Grow. It's not the cool old school kind where you had opportunities to pick from and legit month(s) to find the right spot, with encouragement to take your time
> But you're locked out of everything except Grow.
A friend who's role has been cut says they were locked out of everything except Grow, Meet, and email and has 60 days to find a new role. Can't even get in the building to access the food onsite.
A friend who's role has been cut says they were locked out of everything except Grow, Meet, and email and has 60 days to find a new role. Can't even get in the building to access the food onsite.
> Why lay-off instead of repurpose?
Because they are overstaffed already and the cost reduction is more attractive.
Because they are overstaffed already and the cost reduction is more attractive.
maybe the manager(s) corrupted the employees
Wow... What is going on it tech? We are just 10 days in the new year and every day there has been surprise layoffs!
Unity
Twitch
Several startups
And now.. Google!
This is at the same time when stocks are almost all time high :).
Unity
Twitch
Several startups
And now.. Google!
This is at the same time when stocks are almost all time high :).
About twelve months ago professional tax doing people advised me to wait and see what would happen with section 941 long term with the expectation there was a good chance Congress would revise the rules again in 2023. That didn’t happen, and if anyone was waiting to gauge the long term impact of the r&d credit rule changes they may be making cuts accordingly now.
Section-174[1]
maybe?
[1]: https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/section-174/
[1]: https://blog.pragmaticengineer.com/section-174/
High interest rates. If Fed dropped them to 0 overnight, everyone on the list would have happily hired everyone back. But then the grocery prices would start growing faster than SPX.
The timing is surprising if this was the main motivation. Rates have been flat for nearly a half year and are projected to come down later in 2024 -- https://www.cmegroup.com/markets/interest-rates/cme-fedwatch...
Rough guess is that these companies saw the need to downsize in Q3, but didn't want the optics of doing it directly before the holiday season.
Loans and bonds are typically at fixed rates and have months or years-long terms. As you reissue bonds and take out new loans, your overall interest rate on debt approaches the much higher market rate. It doesn't happen immediately.
Expecting interest rates to drop later this year is big for the stock market, which runs on expectations, but doesn't matter to people borrowing money and issuing debt before then, since you cannot attract lenders at rates below the US treasury yield.
Expecting interest rates to drop later this year is big for the stock market, which runs on expectations, but doesn't matter to people borrowing money and issuing debt before then, since you cannot attract lenders at rates below the US treasury yield.
rates market only somewhat accurately prices the next fed meeting, after that it's anyone's guess and the far out rates are priced to basically fed inflation target anyway. that doesn't mean the price isn't accurate now, it's just not necessarily what it'll be when the fed meets.
Possibly these companies decided to make redundancies late in 2023 but deferred announcements until after Christmas
[deleted]
It's the end of an industry as we knew it.
There will be demand for developers in some very specific sectors and specialities, and some legacy code support for a while, but likely most of us will be out of work within the next few years.
Some people are claiming "things will pick up again Real Soon Now, you'll see" but they are whistling in the dark.
There will be demand for developers in some very specific sectors and specialities, and some legacy code support for a while, but likely most of us will be out of work within the next few years.
Some people are claiming "things will pick up again Real Soon Now, you'll see" but they are whistling in the dark.
> It's the end of an industry as we knew it.
I was considering agreeing that "the old Silicon Valley" was probably no more.
> There will be demand for developers in some very specific sectors and specialities
Yea....
> and some legacy code support for a while,
Well sure, we still famously have Cobol...
> but likely most of us will be out of work within the next few years.
Hmm. Uh.
> "things will pick up again Real Soon Now, you'll see" but they are whistling in the dark.
Nah, I think it'll pick up real soon. We saw inflation quickly come under control, high employment rates, wage growth, etc. It's generally a healthy economy. These giants shedding fat is probably good for juicing the rest of the industry and spreading talent around. Suck for the individuals of course, that can be very challenging to experience. But lots of people have been pretty unhappy with the products big tech has been giving, so hopefully this can put some smart entrepreneurs into the waters.
I was considering agreeing that "the old Silicon Valley" was probably no more.
> There will be demand for developers in some very specific sectors and specialities
Yea....
> and some legacy code support for a while,
Well sure, we still famously have Cobol...
> but likely most of us will be out of work within the next few years.
Hmm. Uh.
> "things will pick up again Real Soon Now, you'll see" but they are whistling in the dark.
Nah, I think it'll pick up real soon. We saw inflation quickly come under control, high employment rates, wage growth, etc. It's generally a healthy economy. These giants shedding fat is probably good for juicing the rest of the industry and spreading talent around. Suck for the individuals of course, that can be very challenging to experience. But lots of people have been pretty unhappy with the products big tech has been giving, so hopefully this can put some smart entrepreneurs into the waters.
This comment won’t age well.
I would be happy to be proven wrong.
Do you have any idea how much software there is in the world? What would you think it's just going to stop being produced and maintained tomorrow?
Do you have any idea what the societal costs of such a change would be?
Even if it was due to "AI", hundreds of thousands of AI augmented developers are going to be off launching new startups writing more and more software, hacking stuff, it's not just going to end tomorrow because there is value in software and software solutions.
Do you have any idea what the societal costs of such a change would be?
Even if it was due to "AI", hundreds of thousands of AI augmented developers are going to be off launching new startups writing more and more software, hacking stuff, it's not just going to end tomorrow because there is value in software and software solutions.
Nobody maintains anything anymore anyway. Even a company that sells 18M laptops a year for $30B can't be bothered to timely fix their OS bugs.
So that's 99% of the code base right there. X has proven 80% aren't doing much of importance.
Of the remaining 1%, 3/4ths are probably rewriting to some flavor of the week and 1/4th are developing some real feature.
So that's 99% of the code base right there. X has proven 80% aren't doing much of importance.
Of the remaining 1%, 3/4ths are probably rewriting to some flavor of the week and 1/4th are developing some real feature.
Yep, like I said, whistling in the dark.
So basically you have nothing. Thanks for confirming I guess.
I already pointed out there's going to be legacy work for a while, especially in certain specialisations.
Everything else "AI powered developers are going to startup all the things!!!" is just hype by some poster literally calling themselves (ironically I hope) ChatGPT.
Everything else "AI powered developers are going to startup all the things!!!" is just hype by some poster literally calling themselves (ironically I hope) ChatGPT.
You still have not provided a single reason why software developers are supposedly going to become useless overnight
Only 700 new IT jobs created in the last year for the whole of the US:
https://www.theregister.com/2024/01/08/700_it_jobs_us/
The blood-letting is still ongoing (Pixar and Discord, just talking about today).
I think the overall reason is that a lot of startups and services have been unprofitable for a while, and the zero-interest-rate environment of the past decade was the high tide that covered a lot of people swimming naked, as Buffett once put it. There might be other reasons for example SAAS platforms being consolidated into fewer and fewer big players. Long term AI will play its part - perhaps creating lots of junk code, but CEOs don't really care about long term quality these days, just short term earnings calls.
Of course there are going to be niches and things like payroll or flight booking programs that will need maintenance work from now until the end of time, and some programmers will be around in 10 years, just not as many.
Again, I would love to be proven wrong.
https://www.theregister.com/2024/01/08/700_it_jobs_us/
The blood-letting is still ongoing (Pixar and Discord, just talking about today).
I think the overall reason is that a lot of startups and services have been unprofitable for a while, and the zero-interest-rate environment of the past decade was the high tide that covered a lot of people swimming naked, as Buffett once put it. There might be other reasons for example SAAS platforms being consolidated into fewer and fewer big players. Long term AI will play its part - perhaps creating lots of junk code, but CEOs don't really care about long term quality these days, just short term earnings calls.
Of course there are going to be niches and things like payroll or flight booking programs that will need maintenance work from now until the end of time, and some programmers will be around in 10 years, just not as many.
Again, I would love to be proven wrong.
Also Amazon Prime Video.
https://www.reuters.com/technology/amazon-lay-off-employees-...
Companies have started to understand that tech workers are overpaid and now that it’s no longer a workers market, they can lay off people in large numbers, rehire later at far lower prices.
Employees are a companies most valuable assets. All that a company has to do is to lay off a bunch of them and it realizes that value with a higher stock price :). Edit: in case anybody missed the nuance, this comment is meant as satire.
I do always laugh a little about these things. "Safety is our top priority." It can't be, or you wouldn't be in the business of drilling mines or whatever. Safety is the second priority.
By that logic monetary value is a company’s most valuable asset.
Edit: I understand it was satire.
Edit: I understand it was satire.
[deleted]
[deleted]
There were also large layoffs in Google’s ad sales org today, but I haven’t seen any news articles about it.
Sales seems like a truly miserable role. You have to sell whatever the company makes, which often times isn't what the customer wants. You mostly get paid by commission, so if someone just goes out and buys your product without talking to you, you don't get paid. Finally, it's treated by business as some sort of resource they can autoscale up and down as necessary. Need more money? Get more salespeople. Out of money? Fire all the salespeople.
I just find it so weird.
I just find it so weird.
I also see it as a position I wouldn't want in a million years, but whenever I talk to salespeople I can absolutely see why they do it. There seems to be a mindset, or a particular kind of motivation, that fits with the act of selling and with the idea of commission based earnings.
I'm also not sure that many salespeople see their role as "sell whatever the company makes". There's a common trope of engineers scrambling to build what the sales team have sold, but even aside from that, I think many salespeople see their job as building and growing accounts in their clients, and finding the products or features available to grow into. Perhaps just a perspective difference, but that can be all that matters.
I'm also not sure that many salespeople see their role as "sell whatever the company makes". There's a common trope of engineers scrambling to build what the sales team have sold, but even aside from that, I think many salespeople see their job as building and growing accounts in their clients, and finding the products or features available to grow into. Perhaps just a perspective difference, but that can be all that matters.
It's also the role that have the most direct employee compensation per generated company profit that you can get without betting any money as investment. It certainly appeals to someone who thinks they can bootstrap themselves instantly to the top.
And DSPA. Some news articles about that one.
It's not like that team has achieved a single thing in 6+ years. I'm shocked to hear anyone at all is still working there.
I have both Nest Mini's and Alexas strewn throughout my house hooked up to my home automation etc.. Over time I've found that Alexa works better and that the google assistant progressively gets worse. This will probably not help things. Makes me wonder if they are slowly stepping away from Google assistant.
Agreed. The quality in not only GAs responses but also its ability to understand intent has seemingly been on a downward trend for at least a couple of years now.
It was much more broad than the Assistant org.
https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/10/24033994/google-reorganiz...
Fitbit and AR too.
Fitbit and AR too.
from a consumer perspective, the Fitbit acquisition has pretty much been a disaster/no-op:
- bizarre, fitness-feature-removal "updates" to the iOS Fitbit app
- piss-poor UI refresh
- very buggy "move Fitbit to your Google account" post-acqui-process
i suppose i was an idiot as a paying (G Suite) Google user + paying Fitbit user to expect anything other than Google:
1. acquiring fitbit
2. integrate Fitbit user tracking data into waves hands Borg
3. do All The Things that Google does with human tracking data etc
4. kill the app
- bizarre, fitness-feature-removal "updates" to the iOS Fitbit app
- piss-poor UI refresh
- very buggy "move Fitbit to your Google account" post-acqui-process
i suppose i was an idiot as a paying (G Suite) Google user + paying Fitbit user to expect anything other than Google:
1. acquiring fitbit
2. integrate Fitbit user tracking data into waves hands Borg
3. do All The Things that Google does with human tracking data etc
4. kill the app
Doesn't Google do that thing where if your team becomes redundant, they don't lay you off, they give you some time to find another team if you choose to transfer?
They have done that before. But they have also laid off 12,000 employees without doing that as well. Do we know which today's announcement resembles?
From what I saw in the UK, the Jan 2023 layoffs (the 12k) had a lot of people redeployed. Of the 3 people I knew personally impacted by it, 2 were redeployed elsewhere in the business (1 eng, 1 HR). I know it happened extensively in at least one other country too.
A company that plans ahead a little can also relocate top talent BEFORE the layoff rounds start, and even relocate people they want to get rid of TO the part of the or where layoffs are coming.
I'm sure some orgs stealthily start planning this months if not years ahead of such events, especially if they identify that they have unproductive people on board that are difficult to fire the regular way (like European employees, where regulations makes it harder to fire people than in the US).
I'm sure some orgs stealthily start planning this months if not years ahead of such events, especially if they identify that they have unproductive people on board that are difficult to fire the regular way (like European employees, where regulations makes it harder to fire people than in the US).
Are there (m)any countries where they can't pay off an employee to resign?
I don't know of any countries where you're not allowed to make an offer.
But if you offer packages to people who are underqualified or underperforming for the terms they currently enjoy, it may require a very high sum to make them sign it.
And in markets where every job basically come with the same terms as academic tenure, people will be less worried that the company will play hardball and just fire them without compensation if the package is refused.
However, most if not all European countries allow layoffs, even though the terms of the layoffs may have to be approved by the union in a few places, or at least have the selection criteria for who gets laid off made public.
And if some department can be stuffed full of all underperformers, it can serve as a convenient proxy for performance to lay off mostly from that department, based on lack of profitability there.
I'm sure this happens in the US, too, at least if it turns out that a higher fraction of those on the way out belong to some protected identity group, which may easily be the case in tech companies where essential developers are disproportionality male and/or asian/white, while various support staff, account managers etc are recruited from a more diverse pool.
But if you offer packages to people who are underqualified or underperforming for the terms they currently enjoy, it may require a very high sum to make them sign it.
And in markets where every job basically come with the same terms as academic tenure, people will be less worried that the company will play hardball and just fire them without compensation if the package is refused.
However, most if not all European countries allow layoffs, even though the terms of the layoffs may have to be approved by the union in a few places, or at least have the selection criteria for who gets laid off made public.
And if some department can be stuffed full of all underperformers, it can serve as a convenient proxy for performance to lay off mostly from that department, based on lack of profitability there.
I'm sure this happens in the US, too, at least if it turns out that a higher fraction of those on the way out belong to some protected identity group, which may easily be the case in tech companies where essential developers are disproportionality male and/or asian/white, while various support staff, account managers etc are recruited from a more diverse pool.
this is a very weird claim. big tech companies regularly fire employees in Europe for low performance, they have entire elaborate machinery for it.
They do. And in some countries it's even about as easy as in the US. I wasn't granular enough.
_Some_ countries in Europe have very strong worker protection laws, probably correlated to trade union participation rate:
Another factor that may also apply to the US, is that if the people you want to get rid of disproportionally belong to some demographic groups or other identity groups, have medical conditions or have participated in disruptive activism, etc, claiming that they are fired for bad performance (even if true) makes the risk of bad press significantly worse.
Exactly what traits risk come with such risks may very from place to place.
_Some_ countries in Europe have very strong worker protection laws, probably correlated to trade union participation rate:
https://qery.no/trade-unions-worldwide/
Another factor that may also apply to the US, is that if the people you want to get rid of disproportionally belong to some demographic groups or other identity groups, have medical conditions or have participated in disruptive activism, etc, claiming that they are fired for bad performance (even if true) makes the risk of bad press significantly worse.
Exactly what traits risk come with such risks may very from place to place.
I also personally knew about 9 people affected in the UK. Of those, only one managed to find another team before the end of the garden leave.
incorrect, almost everyone (>>90%) in the UK that was made redundant left the company.
there were a very small number of exceptions and the process was made deliberately hard/impossible.
there were a very small number of exceptions and the process was made deliberately hard/impossible.
Looks more like last years Jan layoffs. Laptops restarting & people getting locked out.
Are you referring to the 60 days (from WARN act) to find another team before getting removed from the company? If so, yes, but imagine the difficulty of finding another team to take you while the company is actively shedding roles.
No, Google did not give people that chance last Jan. Even if it had been on the table, imagine 12,000 ppl looking for an internal move at once.
Right, there's few roles for everyone, and tbh I've been looking to switch teams since August and not too many really interesting positions were open.
Technically yes, but when there's no open roles it doesn't matter
Google lays off 0.05% in a restructuring. Is that really "the scoop" and newsworthy?
I think it is, because it suggests that a development arc either has maxed out, or is now subject to a different dynamic.
Apple has a team of at most 12 people working on TCP/IP and IPv6. It's arguably one of the most important parts of the software stack. But, it's late stage mature code. Netflix had 4-6 people working on TCP flow control. Google had a small team, based in Japan, doing IPv6 for android. If a team has 100+ members and they can go, it poses "wow, at scale, how many people do you need to do things" questions when things as mission-critical as the entire IP stack can be done by less than 10 people.
Maybe I'm in an odd corner, but I find this thing fascinating. When they laid off the adsense sales and support staff because AI can do it cheaper, I found that fascinating too.
(I don't work for Apple, Google or Netflix, and my numbers are approximate based on bar conversations with some of the people in each team in each company. Consider them Fermi numbers)
Apple has a team of at most 12 people working on TCP/IP and IPv6. It's arguably one of the most important parts of the software stack. But, it's late stage mature code. Netflix had 4-6 people working on TCP flow control. Google had a small team, based in Japan, doing IPv6 for android. If a team has 100+ members and they can go, it poses "wow, at scale, how many people do you need to do things" questions when things as mission-critical as the entire IP stack can be done by less than 10 people.
Maybe I'm in an odd corner, but I find this thing fascinating. When they laid off the adsense sales and support staff because AI can do it cheaper, I found that fascinating too.
(I don't work for Apple, Google or Netflix, and my numbers are approximate based on bar conversations with some of the people in each team in each company. Consider them Fermi numbers)
I’d be careful not to conflate criticality with complexity.
The TCP/IP stack is extremely well defined and covers a finite problem space.
Products higher up the software stack tend to balloon in complexity as they reach into concrete use cases. I’m sure there are plenty of overweight teams, but most products can’t survive with 4-6 people.
The TCP/IP stack is extremely well defined and covers a finite problem space.
Products higher up the software stack tend to balloon in complexity as they reach into concrete use cases. I’m sure there are plenty of overweight teams, but most products can’t survive with 4-6 people.
TCP/IP is so well defined because the engineers on these small teams are the ones publishing the standards. It isn't like they are simply reading a spec out of an existing document and coding up a conformant program.
> standards. It isn't like they are simply reading a spec out of an existing document and coding up a conformant program.
Err, yes - that’s what 98% of modern TCP/IP development work is. There aren’t frequent new RFCs for TCP - it is established, standardized, and stable.
Err, yes - that’s what 98% of modern TCP/IP development work is. There aren’t frequent new RFCs for TCP - it is established, standardized, and stable.
The other 2% keeps engineers fairly busy, I imagine. Custom congestion control algorithms come to mind
Yeah, but even so, that pales in comparison to Joe Product Manager saying "the new French tax code dropped last Tuesday" or "our biggest competitors just signed an agreement that they will implemented a new standard they're proposing and we need to get onboard".
Non-technical stuff is crazy complex compared to purely technical stuff, which tends to be a lot better defined.
Non-technical stuff is crazy complex compared to purely technical stuff, which tends to be a lot better defined.
> Apple has a team of at most 12 people working on TCP/IP and IPv6
Do you know who they are and how to reach them? I have filed 3 or 4 bugs with proper reproducers through Apple's feedback assistant over the years and till this day those issues haven't even received a single comment nor any acknowledgement that the report has been read.
Do you know who they are and how to reach them? I have filed 3 or 4 bugs with proper reproducers through Apple's feedback assistant over the years and till this day those issues haven't even received a single comment nor any acknowledgement that the report has been read.
Perhaps write it up as an open letter/blog article and link it here??
I prefer just getting those bugs addressed. A lot of times writing these blogs and open letters just brings some attention to the blog/article and the real issue never gets addressed. Plus at least 2 of these would involve me sharing internal details which I prefer doing only through the official bug reporting channels.
If you file something through FA, the advice in the community lately has been to re-file the bug against every beta of the OS and every new version of the OS until it's resolved. If you have any new information at all, re-file the bug with the new version. Apple's bug triage team doesn't route things that are old/ancient/sitting in the system forever. Your bugs probably haven't reached the team yet.
I wonder if this will work - buy a couple (even 1 share should do, now that I think of it) shares of apple, write a letter to investor relations saying you're a shareholder, you've found bugs, you've filed them, nothing's been done, this is very disappointing, etc etc
edit: added the stuff within brackets
edit: added the stuff within brackets
Based on past experience, trying to leverage acquaintance from conference and meetings into a support case exchange terminates the friendship. So I am sorry but I decline to try and bridge this gap. I really am sorry, it sucks you can't get to the back end engineering staff.
> because AI can do it cheaper
I'm interested to see how this works out in the mid-longer term to see where it tracks on the graph with "Cheaper" on one axis and "Better" on the other (where '0' is in the centre of the "Better" axis, not at the bottom/left).
I'm interested to see how this works out in the mid-longer term to see where it tracks on the graph with "Cheaper" on one axis and "Better" on the other (where '0' is in the centre of the "Better" axis, not at the bottom/left).
Building an AI stack to perform some task can often be budgeted as capex even where it would be opex if humans did it.
Capex tasks can be considered to be either "Cheaper" (as they're investments, not expenses) or "Better", since they create long term value on top of the short term, depending on how you want to define your axes.
When doing this budgeting, moving items from opex to capex in this way is mostly based on belief structures, as it's too early to tell if the capex generates lasting value or not. Short term, though, it tends to be good for the stock price regardless.
Capex tasks can be considered to be either "Cheaper" (as they're investments, not expenses) or "Better", since they create long term value on top of the short term, depending on how you want to define your axes.
When doing this budgeting, moving items from opex to capex in this way is mostly based on belief structures, as it's too early to tell if the capex generates lasting value or not. Short term, though, it tends to be good for the stock price regardless.
Opex to capex is a reverse machine that goes ping.
And so the pendulum swings.
And so the pendulum swings.
And while it swings, people get promoted or move to another company.
This underrates contributing size a little because there's a lot more who occasionally contribute in the layers above or below - like if you're working on cellular modem performance you also care about TCP behavior, or someone working on video streaming is going to want to tune networking themselves.
Yes because the more that news says “Layoff” the more they can create the perception that the market is terrible and trick employees into accepting lower wages.
It's a much larger layoff. My friend's three VPs (heh) were all laid off in Fitbit. Entire orgs were wiped there.
With the number of VPs sending emails, I think it's much larger than "hundreds".
I'm hearing they laid off thousands today actually but it could be my friend has the number wrong.
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At least in my area it's 10%.
I imagine that killedbygoogle will soon be adding Fitbit and Assistant to the graveyard.
The finance industry expects people to work way harder then tech, but the E.V. is usually less. Yes, there are stories about quants making 7 figures, but that's exceedingly rare now compared to the early 2ks. The people who had this aptitude and skillset would have thrived in tech anyways. For example, Jeff Bezos used to be a trader.
There was even a window of time where people in finance saw how the grass was greener in tech.
It just happened to be that the finance industry is mature, whereas tech was nascent, with a skills shortage during a period of exponential growth. The pool of graduates studying CS has grown an order of magnitude, while demand for jobs has contracted.
What we are seeing is the tech industry maturing. The golden era of tech is over. Tech will just be another middle class job. Tech will only be slightly better than other middle class white collar jobs, but it will no longer be the be the guaranteed path to being a millionaire after 5-10 years of working.
There was even a window of time where people in finance saw how the grass was greener in tech.
It just happened to be that the finance industry is mature, whereas tech was nascent, with a skills shortage during a period of exponential growth. The pool of graduates studying CS has grown an order of magnitude, while demand for jobs has contracted.
What we are seeing is the tech industry maturing. The golden era of tech is over. Tech will just be another middle class job. Tech will only be slightly better than other middle class white collar jobs, but it will no longer be the be the guaranteed path to being a millionaire after 5-10 years of working.
Depends on what you mean by middle class job. Salaried employment in general is inextricably middle class in my opinion.
> but it will no longer be the be the guaranteed path to being a millionaire after 5-10 years of working.
For the vast majority, this has not been a thing in the first place.
For the vast majority, this has not been a thing in the first place.
wonder if there will be any actual consequences for senior management this time?
I'd be absolutely fascinated to see the analysis of how they decided that eliminating the (almost) sacrosanct rule of "oh don't worry about your project, if it gets canned you can just chill out for a bit and find another team" was worthwhile.
how valuable did they think instilling fear in the company was?
I'd be absolutely fascinated to see the analysis of how they decided that eliminating the (almost) sacrosanct rule of "oh don't worry about your project, if it gets canned you can just chill out for a bit and find another team" was worthwhile.
how valuable did they think instilling fear in the company was?
That's not how any business works. Googlers aren't entitled to a job at Google, believe it or not. Even if their feelings are hurt.
Please, please, take 1 minute and imagine a world where a company is punished by (someone?) for laying people off. Please think of the consequences of that. lol.
Please, please, take 1 minute and imagine a world where a company is punished by (someone?) for laying people off. Please think of the consequences of that. lol.
Probably related: "Google reorganizing Pixel hardware: Fitbit’s James Park leaving, layoffs hit AR team"
https://9to5google.com/2024/01/10/google-reorganizing-hardwa...
I had not visited Semafor before. I like the simplicity of it. The word choice is clear and simple. Anyone have thoughts on reading Semafor once a week? Even though I am on here, I try to avoid too much daily news.
Semafor is great for getting the news without getting caught in the news-hype-scare-cycle.
Is GCP affected?
Google's done company wide layoffs today in a fragmented way to make them look localized, but it's affecting the whole company, see here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38947580
The link is dead and won't work for anyone without [showdead] enabled; for posterity here's the content:
Leads across Google are sending coordinated emails within their orgs announcing layoffs. They've all gone out in the last 2 hours or so.
They've fragmented the layoffs on purpose to make them seem more localized, but it's affecting the whole company.
Orgs that I've heard/I'm part of that have been impacted so far include Ads, Search, Assistant, Maps Android & Core.
I'm sure there are more, but I can't confirm.
I can't find WARN notices yet, so I assume they haven't been filed yet in any state.This link seems broken.
I created a thoraway account, maybe I can't post yet?
Maybe post the link in your reply here (not the link the the HN submission, but to what the submission was supposed to link to).
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I consider voice assistants to be a failed experiment. It's clear that they were doomed to fail without the true ability to understand natural language and perform common sense reasoning that is only now starting to become a possibility with large language models.