For the same reason, I don't think creating a censored search engine for the Chinese market is bad in itself. If you accept that the Chinese government isn't going to change its mind on censorship any time soon, you can still try to do your best within that constraint, e.g. by finding a site with the censored content that's not on the blacklist yet.
If Google wants to play in China, they will have to bend to the whims of the CCP. No amount of employee foot-dragging will change that fact.
> For the same reason, I don't think creating a censored search engine for the Chinese market is bad in itself.
This is one the arguments that got trotted out by Google employees last time Dragonfly made headlines. The CCP is putting people in concentration camps[1]. Dragonfly would help them do that better.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/muslims-...
You think the Chinese government will accept Google deliberately making it more difficult for them to surveill and imprison dissidents?
You're out of your mind if you believe they would allow this in any way. They would sooner turf Google out on its arse than tolerate any interference.
The Chinese government WANTS Google. Think about why that is.
Incredibly naive in my opinion.
Google is not a democracy, its a pulicly traded company. It's no better than a dictatorship. Further more, a developer does not 'influence' the Chinese government in any way, which is what Google will be beholden to.
The good developers are better leaving to contribute elsewhere. At least when Google is nothing but amoral, unethical, grreedy developers with no social conscience then we can start treating the company as it deserves.
Honestly what I see happening, if Google isn't allowed to position themselves for a rentry into China, is Baidu eventually making an international debut. They have been developing an entire google-esque eco system in a bubble for years now. If Google was there, they wouldn't have such a strangle hold there, and wouldn't become an international threat.
Because the CCP and its members are heavily invested in quite literally everything that isn't a foreignly owned business operating in China.
I think people are forgetting that each of those Google (former) employees have shares and are also shareholders and shareholders will start to get pissed when management is screwing up and will call for a new CEO or new execs or a new board to be put into place that will get Google back on track: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/16/technology/tech-workers-c...
> I doubt the employee protests will win out here in the long run.
If they lose more employees it can be argued that they're ignoring their fiduciary duty to the shareholders by tarnishing the brand of Google which makes hiring more difficult which leads to less profits.
There's already activist shareholders asking for more gender diversity data for example: https://www.fastcompany.com/40474369/activist-investor-deman...
They have class C shares, which do not have any voting rights. Shareholders without voting rights have absolutely no power to influence policy.
> If they lose more employees it can be argued that they're ignoring their fiduciary duty to the shareholders by tarnishing the brand of Google which makes hiring more difficult which leads to less profits.
You're making a lot of jumps of logic here so I'll split things up:
> If they lose more employees
They're not bleeding employees so quickly that it will cause a problem, the overwhelming majority of Googlers will not leave over this. There's just a few of them, enough to make headlines but not enough to cause any real issue.
> tarnishing the brand of Google
They'd have to tarnish it a lot to get people to stop wanting to work for Google. Even with the latest headlines and controversies, it's still one of the best paying companies out there with awesome benefits, interesting work, and prestigious status. Even employees who are uncomfortable with some of the choices the company is making will think twice before giving all that up.
> which leads to less profits
In the long run this might be true. I'll use the counter-example of Microsoft though: they were the demon for decades and are still one of the most valuable companies in the world. If a tarnished brand for employees guaranteed less profits, they would have died a long time ago.
You're right, they're using class C for compensation: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/markets/052215/goog-or...
But that doesn't prevent employees from buying up class A voting shares, though:
> A shares receive one vote, C shares receive no votes, and B shares receive 10 votes
There's more investors and employees than there are the founders so perhaps it's possible for them to get enough A shares to outvote the super-vote B shares? Unlikely, but possible...
Thanks for offering your opinion, I agree with your thoughts.
Nope. The company has control over how many class A and B shares exist, and currently between Sergey, Larry, and Eric they control over 50% of the voting rights as determined by shares: https://www.morningstar.com/articles/820137/which-stock-shar...
So there's absolutely no way any employees would be able force anything through a vote. They'd need to convince at least one of those three people.
Is that sad though? Really? I'm not exactly tearing up at the thought.