Alphabet Is Google Again
Also Bridgewater performance and CEO tweeting.
On the one hand it is perfectly reasonable to think—and I do think—that Google was a world-changing innovation, and in a good way. Just the basic product, I mean, the search engine. I remember a time before Google, and I am reasonably confident that I am a lot better off for the existence of Google. Other Google stuff—the maps, the email—is also pretty good. I use them a lot and rarely regret it. If you invented Google, you can feel pretty good about yourself.
On the other hand it is also the case that running Google in 2019, or in 2015, means running a gigantic algorithmic advertising company. Like the invention was about improving search and liberating the world’s information and so forth, but the business is about selling ads. Sometimes in grubby ways, I guess, but always in … I want to say boring ways? Not necessarily boring to everyone, and I am certainly not going to criticize people who find aesthetic beauty in the structures of commerce, but if your thing is coming up with world-changing innovations then do you really want to come into the office every day to work on optimizing ad revenue?