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Comment by mosura | Hacker News Reader

The meta question here is what is the Google of 2005 today? Is it really OpenAI? Does it exist at all?

The meta meta question is how long was Google ever really in the state that so many engineers remember as a golden age?

My take is the 2005 google does not and cannot exist again because it was born in an era where the underlying tech became so much more powerful. Any company that happened to invest creatively in tech during that era became unfathomably wealthy.

I joined google in 2022 (and have since left), even as a newcomer it was obvious that not only was the golden era over, but the era after the golden era was winding down too. The atmosphere wasn't "The reckless innovation is over but lets make the product as great as we can" - it was "Just don't break anything and squeeze out 1 or 2% improvements where possible"

> Any company that happened to invest creatively in tech during that era became unfathomably wealthy.

Except countless companies did - many went out of business, and few became Googles.

The historical context is essential but there are so many factors that set them apart.

Indeed countless companies went under investing in tech, on various iterations of the exact things that later became enormously successful, e.g. iPhone. Success is only guaranteed in retrospect.

It’s more than money - you need people making the right technology and product decisions. For smartphones that was clearly the case - not that apple just dumped in more money.

"The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese."

Isn't that a good thing? When millions of people are relying on those products day in and day out, I think we don't want them to be reckless. Leave that to others.

Well, it’s a more nuanced answer. Over time, regularly squeezing 1-2% out of search results in an vastly inferior product which flips from primarily serving its users to serving its payers. Eventually, that will mean certain death as others are willing to take on bigger bolder risks. We have pretty good evidence from other long established companies that this constant pressure to extract money from products is a failing strategy.

I don’t believe it exists, google was a unique product of its time — much like Bell Labs which also does not have a contemporary.

It doesn’t exist.

There is an opportunity to build it.

I think the problem with this gen of companies isn’t tech, it’s culture.

As a spectator, the golden age has to have ended around 2013/2014.

Tech culture is so rampant with ruthless capitalism that it'll never happen again. You used to at least have the sense that there was a will to innovate and experiment. Now it's just oiling the machine.

2014 is interesting for tech because...

- College students just in it for the money hadn't taken over yet

- Low interest rates led to lots of investment

- Most people had broadband in developed countries

- Most people had cell LTE smart phones in developed countries

- Compute tech (CPUs, memory) was mature, adequate, and stable

In most countries there are hardly glamour tech culture jobs, capitalism has always been there.

Developers are seen as yet another office job, and unless you make it into manager, you will be always looked down has not having made a name for yourself.

Written as someone approaching 50y, that has been trying to avoid the management trap forever.

There isn't one yet / We can't see it. You're trying to predict an Industry (like the Tech Industry) that will grow beyond $1 Trillion and a company that provides a fundamental and ubiquitous tool (like Search).

Waymo. Important work that's on the verge of changing the world.

It's still Google.

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