Hacker News Reader

Comment by pradn | Hacker News Reader

I work about 10 min away from the Chelsea Google office in NYC. It's just like you said. I usually start my day reading near my apartment and then going to the office. The subway is right under the building, so I can often get to where I'm going after work conveniently. The pharmacy and groceries are on the way home. When I'm not feeling well, I just go home to rest. Or if I'm need to go home and wait for a package. But lower Manhattan is one of the few pockets of "European-style" walkable areas in the country.

View on HN

When I lived in Chelsea, Google contacted me and insisted I fly out to San Francisco for a curated tour of Mountain View

“Where leadership roles had to be”

I said I wanted to walk to work to the giant billion dollar office down the street, I love Chelsea, I love the Meatpacking District, I love the Highline and the things around that office, I love models

But “roles with direct reports had to be in mountain view” and they assured me I would be so impressed with the highly coveted Mountain View and highly coveted Google

the only thing seared in my brain from that trip was standing at an elevator that had a warning sign that I might get cancer if I use it, in the middle of a sprawling boring unwalkable suburb and a janitor being my best source at the time that its a boilerplate disclaimer. He was right. But that was my experience.

“highly coveted Mountain View” lmao

> I love the Meatpacking District

Yikes

Curious what is your skillset and experience that Google wants to recruit you so bad?

I'd presume they have already been at Google before, but Google wanted them to not be at the Chelsea office in NYC (the walkable one) but instead in Mountain View. So this is more an existing disagreement with the employer.

never worked for google, they periodically tried to recruit me since the day I graduated college from a tier 3 state school

that’s just what they do

Yea uh, don't know what was going on there but there are roles with direct reports that aren't in mountain view (unless you mean, like in 2004). NYC has 1000s of googlers.

ok.

when recruiters unilaterally reach out to you it’s about a specific team and specific role, even if that’s just bait or a hook for other roles. very different than scouring a careers site for all positions. just writing that in case you weren’t familiar with that.

Also during my time there, yes there were roles with direct reports outside, but if you kept your eyes open you quickly saw that there was effectively a glass ceiling outside of MTV, NYC (and for some groups, LON or ZRH).

People would consistently get promoted more easily for less impactful projects, and getting headcount and approvals for projects in satellite offices was damn near impossible.

If you wanted to get ahead - To L7 or L8, even L6 on some projects - you had to relocate.

The most likely explanation for this is that your recruiter (either individually, or recruiting in general) was tasked with filling roles for an org in MTV.

From the outside looking in, recruiting presents as a unified front, but in reality at many big corps recruiters will not be handling generic hiring. And they may either not be incentivized, or so new and unable to navigate the chaos, such that they can’t direct you to open roles outside their jurisdiction.

yep. no mystery there.

The Bay Area is a car sewer that could be teleported to the middle of Florida or North Dakota, and it would fit right in. It's a place you go for a couple years to make a bunch of money and have zero life, and you get out as soon as you possibly can. No culture. Just asphalt, office parks, pollution, run-down houses, and tent cities.

I live in a town of 80,000 now, that feels more urban than San Jose. It's crazy. San Jose is not a real place. It's a million people all dispersed in a couple hundred square miles, seemingly at random, all in their little boxes on the side of a highway. No landmarks, no tall buildings, no walkable areas. It's not the middle of nowhere, it is nowhere. I'd say you could not design a "city" more poorly if you tried, but the rest of Silicon Valley sure proves me wrong there! Mountain View is even worse somehow!

I'd say that they'd have better luck selling New Yorkers on their dystopian suburban hellscape if they weren't so obnoxiously positive about having paved paradise and put up a parking lot, but toxic positivity is kinda California's whole thing. They're not capable of putting themselves into our cynical headspace. You have to buy into all that woo-woo crap to survive out there. We're fundamentally incompatible with it. Won't find anywhere livable west of Chicago until you reach Tokyo...

Hey now, Howard St in San Fransisco is a pretty great camp ground. Everything you need, with REI right around the corner you can try every tent with their infinite return policy, or just take the tent out the front door and not bother with a receipt. No permits necessary. Cant really think of anything similar in competitiveness.

> San Jose is not a real place

I'm writing from San Jose right now. I a few minutes away from downtown on my electric bike. It's a city like many others. I've lived in Orlando, San Diego, Seattle, Norfolk, Providence.

I'm guessing you worked long hours in an office park and shuttled between a generic apartment and your generic office park. That's dystopian, I agree, but it's not enough experience of a city to judge it and you could have that experience in many other cities.

I'm not really defending San Jose, I'm just saying it's no worse than most other cities. It lacks a waterfront. Cities with water fronts usually seem better.

As a San Jose resident, let me tell you, San Jose is just really big boring suburban town. It's not a city, no matter what the sign or the population is. There's no downtown. Like sure, there's a place called "downtown", but it's empty, even when SJSU is in session, and when it's not, it's even more of a ghost town. It's not even a good university district. Sure downtown Willow Glen is okay, but it's no different from Castro Street in Mountain View or University Ave in Palo Alto.

Most of San Jose is just tract homes, office parks, strip malls, and parking lots.

The worst part of San Jose is that there's absolutely zero culture here. Like none. Anything interesting in the Bay Area, it's in SF.

I totally agree, San Jose is not as interesting as San Francisco. That's why I take the train to SF. San Jose is a boring city, but my point is many other cities are the same. If I were a young person I wouldn't want to live here. I lived in Portland for awhile and that has a lot more character, but the weather is a huge drawback for me. I like the nice weather in San Jose, pretty much year round. Seattle is ok, but again the weather. I don't think San Jose is any worse than Salt Lake City. If I had the ability to live in any city, I'd move to Nashville.

Edit: I'm basing my opinion on a lot of time spent wandering around by car to have a look around North America. Over 100,000 miles. Some cities that have a good rep actually suck in my opinion, like Austin TX. Actually the most interesting city in N. America appeared to be Vancouver Canada, but I'm not a citizen so I couldn't live there.

What did you find to suck about Austin?

The summer weather in central Texas is not to my liking. When I was there it was very hot, very muggy and dusty. It's better than San Antonio, but if I lived in Texas it be down by Corpus Christi. Rockport was really nice. I once thought about retiring to the Gulf Coast. Fort Walton Beach Florida with it's white sand beaches was a real find for me because it was cheap to live too.

I wouldn’t say it’s the same as any major city. Major cities typically have an entertainment district and a vibe. San Jose doesn’t have that. It’s lack of a real entertainment district and general lack of walkability is a recurring problem at city council meetings.

It seems pretty hopping to me on Fri Sat night when I ride my bike down there to look around, but maybe it's not the kind of crowd the city wants.

So… homeless?

Young Asian, Hispanic American "Fast and Furious" type of crowd that also like to do illegal sideshows

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sideshow_(automobile_exhibitio...

A big part of that “downtown” everyone tries to hype up is a tent city these days, so…

I’m not sure how that makes you feel better spending all that money to live in a place that makes Cleveland look downright exciting in comparison. At least SF and Oakland have some more excitement to go with the unbelievable cost of living and quality of life issues.

Hard to make Cleveland look unexciting

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKDjis1fg8E

If it has more parking space than restaurant/bar terrasses and pedestrian only streets, this is not a city. This is just drawing streets in square and putting building and parking between them.

Providence and Seattle are far better examples of urbanism. I’d agree that it isn’t worse than Orlando. That’s not exactly high praise. Why spend NYC money to live somewhere that’s no better than Orlando?

san jose isn't a real place but sf oakland and berkeley are

It's fun to observe the difference in framing and word choice here. NY "cynicism" vs CA "toxic positivity".

As a Bay native, a younger version of me would've produced the mirror image to that rant along the lines of: "why are New Yorkers so angry and aggressive about everything? are they just miserable because they're all packed like sardines into that shabby concrete prison? why can't they just be chill like Californians?"

No accounting for taste!

The first time you read an email that starts off with “hello friends” and continues on to talk about how “we made the tough decision to part with our valuable colleagues” you will understand what’s so grating about California nice. This kind of thing has unfortunately spread across the country, but California is the epicenter.

Yep. I’d take, “You’re fiahd get the hell outta heah.” Over the Silicon Valley version any day.

Damn, I miss the east coast.

Rude, brash, and raw. Problems are solved with heated verbal sparring — then you both get it out of your system and move on with life.

Everywhere else feels like I’m walking on eggshells or having to really restrain myself to get along.

Ehh. It’s grating in California, but I think the epicenter of it is in Minnesota or Denver, actually.

As somebody who’s lived half their life in each, both are exaggerations.

Most New Yorkers aren’t cynical. Most Bay Area folks aren’t toxically positive. But it’s silly to imagine that the urban infrastructure doesn’t influence peoples’ psyches - they totally do!

The frequency is just high enough to be a noticeable peculiarity

I visited San Fransisco in the late 90s, it was a fantastic place, one of the best cities I went to in th US. What happened? What caused it to get so bad?

Dutch disease atrophying SF's non-tech economy.

You can have fun on a weekend and it has unique look

I hate it though

People there act like or want to be categorized in the same tier as NY, London, Hong Kong and has nothing to cater to that tier except for the people that already wanted to check out to anytown USA with a high achieving leaning, but it doesnt have the self awareness to realize that

San Francisco ia a sideshow. America is a suburban country and the Bay Area is a suburban place. There are ten times as many people in the metro area as in the city. Only Salesforce and Uber are in the city; the rest of Big Tech is in the suburbs. The social and physical infrastructure is built for someone who has a family and works in an office to live in the suburbs.

American postwar suburbia has a well-oiled machine for metabolizing growth, but it has to be fed with virgin land. The Bay Area long ago ran out. The growth kept on going, so it manifests in house prices and dysfunction instead.

airbnb, adobe and apple, are in sf. and that's just the As

Apple HQ is in Cupertino, Adobe HQ is in San Jose, and while Airbnb is still in SF, they've cut a lot of real estate there.

in fact, all three still retain substantial footprints in SF

The problem was the centralization of a certain brand of tech. If they had started making semiconductors in 1 or 2 other places in America this wouldn't have happened.

I went there for the first time a few months back. It’s one of the filthiest, smelliest, homeless cities I’ve seen. I hate it.

He's talking about "Silicon Valley" which is an hours drive south of San Francisco. As for San Francisco itself, I still love it here. Downtown has been dead since the pandemic but I don't really go there so it doesnt affect me much. And outsiders seem to have ramped up their anti-SF propaganda quite a bit but that doesnt affect me much either.

This is the best description of suburban hell I’ve ever seen expressed on this site.

So wait what is this livable city of 80,000?

If you have an answer to this question don't spill the beans. Many cities livable at 80k will find themselves unlivable if they hit 160k in 15 years.

I have zero interest in putting where I’m at anymore on the map than it already is. Such places are vanishingly rare in the US, and incredibly common in Europe. It’s very frustrating.

However, in the interest of shaking everyone off my trail, I will mention that there’s many affordable, walkable towns and cities outside Philly and Chicago that were built up 100 years along the commuter railroads. In the absence of zoning-related tyranny, transit oriented development happens naturally. Look for towns and cities that were built before 1945, before we paved paradise and put up a parking lot.

We already know about Bloomington

    Won't find anywhere livable west of Chicago until you reach Tokyo...

I like Vancouver, although I've only ever visited rather than lived there.

It’s great if you move there with $1M in your pocket for a down payment. I think a somewhat boring city, but the access to nature is unparalleled (well, at least comparable to Denver or SLC).

San José has a downtown that's not so terrible.

No landmarks, no tall buildings, no walkable areas.

Absolutely not true - and shame on you if you've never explored the older neighborhoods downtown.

However I definitely agree that overall it's a huge did of a city for its size (and most especially for the housing costs). And that you're saying applies to at least 90 percent of it by surface area. "Not a real place" absolutely nails it.

Won't find anywhere livable west of Chicago until you reach Tokyo...

Not true at all. Sounds like you've almost never been out there, except for a random business trip or two. The west coast isn't my ideal either, but it has plenty of perfectly livable places (if you can only somehow afford to settle down there).

"a huge dud", sorry.

Prop 13 working as intended.

There’s nothing wrong with San Jose, it’s not amazing but it’s definitely not nowhere. Look at Japantown, a central neighborhood with nice well maintained apartments and condo developments well integrated in the street grid. Five minutes walk to dozens of shops and restaurants. Good network of bike routes including protected bike lanes on stroads. 12 minute bike ride to BART, 15 minute bike ride to CalTrain. 20 minute walk to downtown (adequate nightlife, San Pedro Square is walkable, etc). 20 minute bike ride to The Alameda and Willow Glen gives variety of walkable business districts. Plenty of parks with tall trees within a 20 bike ride (eg. Guadalupe River, Overfelt Gardens). Excellent Asian food, pretty good food in general. Fairly frequent city buses and a light rail (candidly, though, I have never used them).

That’s all^ for if you don’t have a car. Yea with a car you can access all the suburban stuff of which there is a lot (eg. shopping and restaurants at Westfield, The Pruneyard, eg. amazing hiking at New Almaden, Saratoga Quarry Park, eg. the vast amenities of nearby small cities). I recommend a car, it gives you access to more stuff, but is definitely not necessary, and even if you have one you don’t need to drive for everyday needs.

My one complaint about San Jose is not enough of a base of everyday cultural events, specifically live music and stand up comedy. The only small music venue I am familiar with that has regular bands is Mama Kin’s. There is no good regular stand up comedy to my knowledge. I guess SF and Oakland suck that energy out of SJ, but that’s a real deficiency.

the first part made some sense, but the second part with the prop65 warning is pretty silly. it's everywhere, and kind of useless for the most part, but i've seen it on buildings, in parking garages at disney, on clothing, on equipment i've purchased. it's just a thing (tm).

and i'm moving to MV at the end of the month and am super excited about the walkability, green space, beautiful area, weather, and proximity to work.

sure, it's kind-of boring suburb, it isn't europe, but i thought it was quite nice.

. . . but the second part with the prop65 warning is pretty silly.

As someone from outside California, who lived there for a while, I have to say that it is pretty jarring the first time you see it. Now, it doesn't take long to get used to it and realise what a joke it is, but that first impression sticks.

Yeah, i applied at the MV office a few years back and it was just hell on earth. Huge office park of nameless buildings and their big perk was a free lunch at a picnic table in a warehouse with 2000 computer programmers. I really don't get the appeal.

It's even worse now, they crammed down more desks and got rid of many things that made the office nice. With the return to office we got greeted with a "remodeled" campus, but cool spaces are just now cookie-cutter meeting rooms or really oddly placed new desks.

Ah prop 65 warnings. They are literally everywhere in California. I wish I could say it's the most stupid thing in California, but unfortunately there are many more. California's voters like it that way.

Can you tell us more about the cancer elevator, please?

“Prop 65 warnings” are a California-ism where they got the people to vote on a good idea(tm) of having a carcinogen database, and then soon after that, a lawyer saw he could sue everyone and win and did, so to prevent that everyone puts unconfirmed carcinogen disclaimers on everything to the point that it is useless.

Fast forward to me being flown out to California and having to make a judgement call at the cancer elevator.

Other examples from this: https://www.tswfast.com/content/proposition65

  Steel Products
  Steel products can expose you to nickel, known to the State of California to cause cancer, and lead, known to the State of California to cause both cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm.

  Power Tool Parts
  WARNING: The metal parts of these products contain chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm. Wash hands after handling. None of these products are to come in contact with food and drinking water.

  Electrical Cords
  WARNING: The wires of these products contain chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm. Wash hands after handling.

I see. A most peculiar dystopia, indeed.

The "good idea" part was maybe the database. The "horrible idea" part was mandating notifications without defining any lower limits or exposure measures, and allowing anybody to sue for the absence of warnings. It was not just "discovered" by some lawyer, it's how the law was written. And Californians had ample time to fix it since, btw, but never bothered.

Not that there's any excuse but I can imagine this was a recruiter who had to fill a bay area position. There are plenty of higher ups in the NYC Google office.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com