I see a few comments praising Sundar. As someone who doesn’t follow closely, but feels that Google has deteriorated dramatically under his watch, does someone mind explaining the reasoning for said praise?
I mentioned those two because they seem to be their big bets now.
When compared to Satya who is thriving with Microsoft, Sundar looks mediocre at best. I don't mean that in a bad way. Perhaps Google doesn't need to have those tectonic changes to produce value. In that case, Sundar's reserved and low-key profile makes more sense, but don't expect a high profile, exuberant and innovation-driven leadership. I think it's clear he is not that type of leader.
To be clear - I'm not criticizing this particular post or person (whoisjuan, anyways? :) ), but I think it's worth noting these little hints that outgoing and extroverted are thought to be synonymous with "good leadership" (in the US, at least)
I don't think it's synonymous, but it's required. To be a good leader, you need to enjoy being around and understanding people.
Most introverted people don't really enjoy either.
I've had many introverted managers and they all were horrible: lack of communication which went hand-in-hand with passive aggressive behavior.
People who are introverts at heart can learn to become just as good managers as those who aren't. It may come less naturally, I couldn't say, but it's definitely possible.
Personally I think a lot of their products have gotten better recently, like the experience of using voice-controlled Google Maps in my car, and Google Cloud is superior to AWS in many ways, but the company really offers so many different product lines that it's hard for personal experience to be a great representation.
It’s hard for me to say that this is because of Sundar and not just because the whole market has grown size and google already had a massive moat to capture it. Apple, MS, Facebook, Amazon all have grown massively in the past 5 years.
However Google seems to continue to be a one trick pony - GCP lags behind the competition despite the fact that Google invented cloud computing. Even Apple is weaning off its iPhone revenue with its fast growing services division.
I see a proliferation of AWS services, yes, but many seem to be replicating things that GCP has had since the start, in multiple different formats without clear direction. Bigquery covers most of the use cases of Redshift, Kineseis, Athena, EMR, and others. It is at once decoupled from and well integrated with their object storage, allowing reads and writes with clear translation when necessary. I find myself reaching for Bigquery like semantics all the time and having to cobble two or more AWS tools to get similar. I see the same pattern repeated constantly - If I click "ECS" in the Amazon Console, it wants to sell me ECS, ECR, Fargate, and EKS - All of which overlap in non-obvious ways.
Disclaimer: I'm Ex-google, and was a poweruser of dremel
There are a lot of technical refinements in GCP that makes life a lot easier than AWS, but nothing strategically compelling enough for the cost (in cash, developer time, and burning relationships) to jump ship. So I make-do with the not-as-great technology. They are pain-points but not deal-breakers.
I think if our startup were doing AI/ML, or even heavy data processing as our core technology, there's probably enough compelling reasons to invest in a move to GCP. But it isn't.
If I were greenfielding a new launch at a new startup, I'd push for GCP.
I have never worked for Google or Amazon.
Disclosure: ex-googler (left 4 years ago), own no GOOG, use GCP to run my own business. Clients use whatever they want.
AWS is just another IT vendor. The weird dependency, reminiscent of 1980s IBM thinking, is bad for any company, at some point you become more of a vassal than a customer.
But, I have always enjoyed using public GCP more that AWS.
I somehow got CC'd to an internal Google system, Buganizer, which has done nothing but leak a bunch of internal communications, including some small code patches to GCP infrastructure itself.
My support request has not been updated, but Buganizer has let me know that they supposedly updated the documentation mid-November to fix it, but the rephrased advice still was not correct based on my interpretation of the issue. The bug is still open.
Microsoft grew similarly under Ballmer, despite losing a lot of their strategic advantages and missing the boat in a handful of important ways.
Hmmm, maybe that've been for the better.
I have also been appreciating their products lately: Play Books and Movies, the Google iOS app that does a good job of showing my article that interests me, and until I retired (just writing now) I really always preferred Google Cloud over AWS. Even with potential privacy issues, YouTube, GMail, and Calendar are also good.
In the past have been I have been a vocal supporter of FSF (still am, but...) but I look at the world situation now with people in China quickly losing freedoms but excelling in AI and other tech, here in the USA corporate fascism is unstoppable. With the political problems around the globe getting crazier and with chaotic climate change, I think now that people in different countries should do two things: embrace their own culture and values, and to do what they can to make their countries competitive in AI and other tech, especially tech that will help with climate change and generally increase productivity. Those on top will get bigger and bigger pieces of the pie, so we better grow the pie rapidly so regular peoples’ share is sufficient for a good life.
Personally I thought Sundar was a very good manager (much better than Larry, who honestly sucked as a CEO) but a poor innovator. As a HN commenter you're probably looking for an innovator. The average user (who just wants Google to stay up) and the average investor (who just want to make more money) are quite happy having a good manager who can optimize operations, though.
I can't really blame Larry and Sergey for wanting to do something else, and leaving the company in the hands of someone that they know will maximize profits. But that doesn't change the fact that modern Google does a lot of scummy and downright evil stuff today that likely wouldn't have happened during the "old Google" days.
I’d say it was the pre-Google+ Google. That change happened under Larry Page.
Ballmer wasn't competent.