[HN Gopher] From Google to Twitter ___________________________________________________________________ From Google to Twitter Author : nikivi Score : 91 points Date : 2022-11-04 20:22 UTC (2 hours ago) (HTM) web link (ma.nu) (TXT) w3m dump (ma.nu) | tdeck wrote: | It was a real culture shock to go from a smaller company to | Google, and this article illustrates why very well. Almost every | other bay area tech company does local development on Mac | laptops, uses something like Slack extensively, and outsources | tooling. Despite its constant hiring Google is so insular that | there are many long time Googlers who are not only unused to | these things, but completely unaware that they're the norm | outside Google. | redtriumph wrote: | Unrelated to the posted link but relevant since it involves the | author. Author is one of the few who was terminated early Nov. | [0] and now is part of lawsuit against Twitter for mass | firing.[1][2] | | [0]. https://ma.nu/blog/bye-twitter | | [1]. | https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.40... | | [2]. https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/4/23440304/twitter-mass- | fir... | [deleted] | pearjuice wrote: | >Was this a violation of a corporate policy? Not unless it | could be proven that the downloaded message file was moved away | from the corporate computer | | A bit later | | >21:17 Disconnected from everything mid-meeting, laptop goes | blank | | Clearly his tool was designed and intended to download emails | to explicitly take it off the corporate computer. What point is | there in releasing a tool for downloading documents ON the | corporate computer ("wanted to save some important documents | before potentially losing access") when you entirely lose | access to that corporate computer in case of termination. This | in combination with the cartoons and other rebellious antics as | noted in his blog posts I'm not surprised he got fired. | 6510 wrote: | I suppose firing lots of people works better if the tools aren't | inhouse creations. | c4ptnjack wrote: | This is definitely one of the most interesting and insightful | descriptions of working at a FANG company ive read. | | The only note worth mentioning is confusion around the pod | system, which I think actually sounds surprisingly effective for | creating "culture". The op looks for an engineerimg explanation | to justify meeting up with a group of disparate employees working | on different projects, at different levels, and in different | facets of the company. To me it sounds like a genuinely | productive way to create relationships and "water cooler" | interactions by letting it not have some ulterior motives related | to the product. | | That might be bias and optimism on my parent, and I'm sure the | reality isn't that pretty either. | jokethrowaway wrote: | Something I noticed over the past 14 years is that I feel | managers are becoming increasingly less technical. | | Sure, they did some coding at some point but I doubt many were | ever very proficient and just managed to coast until they become | managers and had to drop the farce of knowing how to code. | | The amount of junior level mistakes and architectural issues I | spot around are incredible. | | I wonder if it's a reflection of the increasingly complex tech | landscape or a reflection of the increasingly politic and "soft | skills first" corporations. | jeffbee wrote: | Why would managers be technical? The skills required of | managers are totally distinct from the skills required to | design and implement computer systems. The idea that you | promote ICs into management is a weird, bad one. | [deleted] | wolfram74 wrote: | I feel like management that can roughly estimated difficulty | of a task, or at the very least distinguish possible from | impossible is an asset. | kikokikokiko wrote: | In my experience, since I have 3 side projects going on at | the same time I'm employed full time, the best possible | scenario is to have the worst technically able manager | possible. For the last 3 years, I've been allocated to 3 | different projects (on my full time job), all under the | same manager. The guy is clueless, and I and my team | members can give any estimate whatsoever for a task | completion, it's always accepted. On top of that, I'm full | remote since the start of the pandemic. Life is great and | I've never been so productive... for me and my projects of | course. On the other hand, the company that employs me is | the one that suffers. Twitter seems to be just like my | company, and at least my employer has the excuse of being a | typical government owned inneficient piece of garbage. | icedchai wrote: | Where can I apply? | kikokikokiko wrote: | I'm not american nor I live there, but I'm pretty sure | the public sector is a mess everywhere. Just embrace the | cynicism and have a great quality of life. | doctor_eval wrote: | Firmly disagree. While a manager doesn't need to be a | productive engineer, they do need to be able to call out | bullshit. And that is really tough if you don't speak the | language. | | Multiple times I've had engineers tell me something was | impossible, or strictly necessary, or too hard, when it | demonstrably wasn't. If you let too much of that happen, your | product suffers. | furyofantares wrote: | Two major concerns of running an organization: | | 1) The top knows what the organization is capable of and can | set achievable goals 2) That the bottom is incentivized to do | things that achieve the goals of the company | | A manager being technical helps #1, information flows upward | more accurately. | | I think #2 is more nuanced, but when you have a boss, you are | directly incentivized to please the boss, not directly | incentivized to achieve the goals of the company. Those can | be different things and the less technical a manager is, the | more different they can be. | | This isn't an argument for just promoting individual | contributors, though, since lacking management skills also | makes both of these problems worse. | | It is an argument for flatter organizations. Maybe that's a | better way to look at it, every layer of management makes 1) | and 2) more difficult. (A fully flat organization wouldn't | have either problem at all.) But if a manager has both | management and technical skills, it's more of a partial | management layer. | icedchai wrote: | Smaller orgs should be mostly flat. When I see 20 person | companies with too many "directors" and "managers", it's a | bad sign. Too many bosses, not enough workers. | | The smaller the org, the more you want someone that | actually _understands_ the work being managed. Maybe your | team is getting work done fast, but it 's not done right: | no documentation, few tests, architectural flaws, | performance issues, security problems... Someone should be | able to understand the trade off made, and be able to | explain them. When one of your engineers gives you an | estimate, you need to understand if it's reasonable. Is it | too optimistic? Is he blowing smoke up your ass and | spending 2 months on a 2 week job? Poor management sets | arbitrary deadlines and wonders why they aren't met. | cbtacy wrote: | THANK YOU!!!!!! | dragonwriter wrote: | > The skills required of managers are totally distinct from | the skills required to design and implement computer systems | | Some of them are, sure, but one of the skills necessary to | effective management is understanding of the work being | managed (especially the work at the immediate subordinate | level and, if it exists, the next level down.) At the | executive level, that probably doesn't require more than very | casual awareness of any of the line work, but at the level of | first and second line managers it absolutely does, and its | usually a lot easier to find a worker with the right talent | to learn the additional skills of management than a "generic | manager" who can OJT learn the domain. | | I've spent most of my adult life in and around tech orgs, and | the next even half-competent line- or second-level manager | that didn't start out as an IC I meet will be the first. | jeffbee wrote: | I know a lot of people agree, but the most effective | organization I ever worked in had managers who _only_ knew | how to order furniture, arrange travel, and sign expense | reports. The less effective orgs have all had managers who | at some level or another believed they were involved and | knowledgable about the work. | | The person who can estimate effort and risk, and sort the | truth from the B.S., is your tech lead. The person who can | do the seating chart, and relay the work products of the | tech lead up the chain, is the manager. | poszlem wrote: | You get downvoted, but I share your observation (been | programming for ~20 years). Sad to see HN deciding to downvote | a perfectly valid opinion instead of engaging with it. | | It absolutely makes a difference if the manager knows the | domain in which he works. The fact that there is a lot of inept | managers that started as programmers does not really discredit | that. | paxys wrote: | Pretty much exactly what I expected. You can replace Google with | any other "old school" big tech company (Apple, Microsoft, | Amazon) and Twitter with everything that came after it (Uber, | Airbnb, Pinterest, Slack and every other successful or failed | startup in the last two decades) and the comparison would look | the exact same. | dilyevsky wrote: | Apple and Netflix do not engineer their tooling in house. Googe | and Fb do to a large extent and Amazon is somewhere inbetween. | So no, not exactly the same | aresant wrote: | This person writes a twitter specific cartoon that he hosts on | his website | | They are quite pointed and amusing and he does not discriminate | in throwing any of the counter parties in this story under the | bus -> | | https://twittoons.com/36 - on previous CEO | | https://twittoons.com/38 - on the media | | https://twittoons.com/3 - on being public | | https://twittoons.com/32 - on Elon | [deleted] | MonkeyMalarky wrote: | Something about that just makes me uncomfortable, I'm not sure | I would appreciate it if were his peer. | the_mitsuhiko wrote: | More importantly that person created the well known Goomics: | https://goomics.net/ | fazfq wrote: | >They are quite pointed and amusing and he does not | discriminate in throwing any of the counter parties in this | story under the bus | | You are right, there even are comics poking fun at the | moderatorial slant of the site! Oh wait no, there isn't any. | firefoxkekw wrote: | A few extracts from the webpage, for a TLDR; | | > but Twitter "TLMs" ("tech lead managers") are more managers and | less "tech". | | > I feel like engineers at Twitter are less diligent at adding | comments and documentation to their code. | [deleted] | hericium wrote: | orblivion wrote: | This article is dated March 1. Maybe they changed? | hericium wrote: | Uh, I indeed missed the posting date. Thanks for pointing | this out. | [deleted] | partiallypro wrote: | This particular person has been posted about 3-4 times today, at | least that's made the front page. I've seen more posts on this | person than on Musk himself today. | jonny_eh wrote: | I'd rather read about a random squirrel than Musk... if even | for just one day. | cpeterso wrote: | That post was from March 2022. The author has since been laid | off: https://ma.nu/blog/bye-twitter | fisherjeff wrote: | Wow, I'd missed the update on that post and hadn't realized | he's a named plaintiff on the class-action suit against | Twitter. Nice. | nixgeek wrote: | Based on the note he posted from HR he was fired for cause and | wasn't "laid off" by the usual definition of same -- he was | told by HR that he had violated several company policies and | his employment was being terminated immediately. | | [1] | https://ma.nu/blog/img/2022-11-01_bye_twitter/termination_em... | heavyset_go wrote: | Apparently some of the layoffs in Twitter are being portrayed | as for cause[1], which follows the trend of SpaceX's layoffs | that tried not to be classified as layoffs by instead firing | employees for cause. | | [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/29/technology/twitter- | layoff... | weezin wrote: | Yeah given the context I think it is obvious that he got | fired for advertising an extension that makes it easier to | download your emails. | triyambakam wrote: | Have you seen the cartoons? I think the extension was | probably the "last straw" | marricks wrote: | Cool that the new free speech-haven twitter doesn't allow | advertising extensions internally or cartoons. | | Some proponents of free speech really only care if | _their_ speech is curtailed and care little about anyone | else 's. | luckylion wrote: | The blue not-really crossing out of the data of the other | persons involved is great. My god, who wouldn't love to work | with such an individual. | sulam wrote: | Hmm, you have a way to pull email addresses out of that | picture? | space_fountain wrote: | Yes, I'm not sure highlight it by saying anything more is | worthwhile, but yes it's possible to pull the name from | this. Interestingly for me at least not the email, but | still | encryptluks2 wrote: | Sharing so much information about a company you work for | publicly may have been considered a fireable offense. Gives | hackers a lot of insight on how to infiltrate a company and | what their weaknesses may be. | the_mitsuhiko wrote: | What did he share? | shric wrote: | > Q: What do you mean by stack-ranking engineers? What were the | criteria? | | > A: Raw number of lines of code over a certain period (a year | I think) | | Wow. | beebmam wrote: | Genuinely incredible this happened in 2022. Holy shit. Which | shitty manager was responsible for this a performance metric | at Twitter? Should have been the first on the chopping block. | vineyardmike wrote: | You're kidding right? The rumors are Elon and co were | responsible. So not on the chopping block. | mozman wrote: | Have a citation? I understand Elon isn't the most popular | figure here but my sense is this is adding fuel to fire | and should be backed up. | beebmam wrote: | Firstly: please note that companies have no obligation to | reveal this information, and therefore will not. | | Secondly: If a manager under Musk made this decision, | Musk is responsible as well, unless he renounces it and | holds the people who made this decision accountable. | dpe82 wrote: | It definitely still happens; one group I recently worked in | at Google used LOC and CL (pull requests) counts as a | metric during calibration. With predictable results. | icedchai wrote: | I worked at a zombie startup in the early 2000's. One of | the "managers" was in charge of tracking engineer | performance. He would look at the number of lines added or | modified. We were using CVS at the time. One guy would just | add or remove white space to get his count up. Eventually | this manager _was_ laid off. | [deleted] | [deleted] | bena wrote: | And in between the original post and your post is this post: | https://ma.nu/blog/not-going-anywhere | | Which is just kind of funny | polote wrote: | We are in a world were some employee can claim ownership of a | the job in someone else company. Absurd | mc32 wrote: | That's from April. So it's not relevant to their recent | firing. | puszczyk wrote: | Can you point me where specifically did he do it? | bcrosby95 wrote: | I claim ownership of all the jobs. Including yours and | everyone else that comments on HN. | | Wow, what an absurd world we live in where I'm able to do | something like this. | [deleted] | [deleted] | [deleted] | thrown_22 wrote: | >I know I am not the type of employee who has the most to | fear from any potential incoming changes, and I'm very | privileged in many ways. Still, what makes the company's | culture is 100% us. If we're not going anywhere, neither is | the culture. And because people like me may be in a | relatively more secure position, I feel like it's our job to | speak out to say that 1) we're not going anywhere, and 2) if | there are disruptive changes coming our way, we will look out | for teammates who may not be as privileged. | | This is a very good summary of the liberal woke mindset: | people deluded into thinking they are important and | untouchable when they are replaceable cogs. Give it a few | more firings and this guy will be the next generation of | deplorable. | [deleted] | dwaite wrote: | > This is a very good summary of the liberal woke mindset: | people deluded into thinking they are important and | untouchable when they are replaceable cogs. Give it a few | more firings and this guy will be the next generation of | deplorable. | | (Sans labelling) this mindset has existed for a long time; | for instance, labor unions have existed in the US since the | civil war in order to allow workers stronger collective | bargaining rights, and have been a federally protected | right since 1935. | thrown_22 wrote: | I must have missed the part in the post where he talks | about collective bargaining. All I saw was how much | privilege he had and how it will protect him from being | fired (it didn't). | absurddoctor wrote: | A more generous reading is that he was saying he didn't | plan on quitting and didn't plan on changing his behavior | to fit into any culture changes that he might disagree | with. The mentioned privilege is that he could afford to | be fired if that was the result, not that he was | protected from being fired. | awinder wrote: | I think you missed the part where you should slow down | and comprehend before firing all culture warrior | torpedos, he's talking about not living paycheck to | paycheck & having a great CV where he can get another | job. | luckylion wrote: | The privilege he mentions is being so rich that he works | only for entertainment/access to power, not for money. | That does protect him from the potentially nasty side- | effects of being fired. | [deleted] | icedchai wrote: | And at a company (Twitter) where the core product has been | stagnant for years. There's basically been zero innovation. | paganel wrote: | Also, previous HN discussion [1] about the author's cartoons | while he was at Google. He also has a wikipedia page [2] | | [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27778774 | | [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manu_Cornet | VikingCoder wrote: | I think Manu's original "org charts" diagram needs to be | updated to include Twitter. | | Perhaps Musk on top with a gun, shooting everyone on the | bottom? | leoh wrote: | A lot of this (eg especially the in house stuff) comes from | Google starting over a decade before twitter. | | OSS just wasn't as good then | | A lot of OSS now is from folks that had experience at google or | were aware of what was going on there -- or who built things so | that they could make things like the best folks (at the time). | Some OSS is even from Google of course (eg k8s, chrome dev tools, | etc.). | | Landscape is of course very different now. | | Google is slowly moving towards more OSS and external vendors as | stuff gets better | Raed667 wrote: | Also google has +27k software engineers. | nikivi wrote: | Was surprised twitter used Phabricator and Jira given how bad the | UX of those is. | ajkjk wrote: | Phab's is pretty good, in my experience. At least for | engineers. Jira is of course atrocious. | xtracto wrote: | I remember using and managing Phabricator a couple of years | ago and its UX was horrible. Also, wasn't its developemnt | kind of discontinued at some point in the pass? | tracker1 wrote: | I'm now working on a team using Jira with a kanban setup.. | have to be honest, first time in decades that I've seen/used | Jira and not wanted to pull what's left of my hair out. | redanddead wrote: | what's a good alternative to Jira? | tracker1 wrote: | Depends on your size, needs, scale, visibility and other | requirements... | | I've seen good/bad usage of Azure DevOps. You can also | use Trello, or actual cards/tape on a wall. It's just the | first time I haven't hated Jira. | nikivi wrote: | I personally love https://height.app now ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-11-04 23:00 UTC)