Because Microsoft were (are) evil, and they tried to market themselves as being different.
They are not.
They are not.
< https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_YmDcCpD1gc >
So in a sense, if you get past an age of naivety and if you don’t want a Google job purely for self-interested gain, then Google’s approach has always fallen on deaf ears. I guess their recent actions have just made it more obvious in the mainstream.
People act as if it's always been a tagline below the corporate logo on every Google webpage and communication.
From what I've read, it was a half-joking contribution from Paul Buchheit in the early days, when they were brainstorming about what the company ethos could be. It apparently caught on internally with staff.
I'm personally glad that it's been dropped, because it's overblown and it feels like the whole thing has been tedious forever.
Any large and highly profitable company will be doing something 'evil' in the estimation of someone who's looking for it.
In my experience, absolutely nothing gets into a handbook or a code of conduct unless you go waaay out of your way to put it there, through legal & compliance, HR, senior leadership teams, etc.
There’s zero chance Google treats this like a cheeky wink.