New Civilization News: No Google    
 No Google9 comments
7 Oct 2005 @ 17:37, by Flemming Funch

Seems like Google didn't want to hire me after all. Well, it was a fun thought, and I wish I at least had gotten to the point where they'd fly me somewhere to see their operation. Or to where they gave me an offer I could or couldn't refuse.

I suppose, like most big companies, they have different people who look for candidates than who actually make the decisions. The first guy who called me was super positive, and seemed to be ecstatic about my background. They had basically a whole bunch of jobs of various kinds, in various locations, and I could pretty much pick. But then again, that was probably just the headhunter guy, who didn't decide anything.

Anyway, their approach is a series of interviews, which also are tests. I.e. they ask you lots of hard technical questions within what is supposed to be your area of expertise. And if that works out, they'd fly you to one of their headquarters, to spend a day talking to people and seeing what they're doing. And then they'd give you some kind of offer, if you survived the process.

So, I've spent several hours on the phone with them. Last call was a 45 minute interview on systems, with one of their systems managers of some kind. I'm pretty sure I aced that.

But then, a couple of weeks later, I just get a brief, one paragraph form letter e-mail from some different person than the guys I had been dealing with. Essentially: "Thank you for your interest in Google. After carefully reviewing your experience and qualifications, we have determined that there is not a fit."

I suppose they passed it on to the actual decision maker, who didn't like my resume. Or maybe he took one look at my blog, and decided, no way. Or he did a search on my name in Google, and found all sorts of weird stuff. I don't know.

Well, good, I can go on bitching about big corporations without having to censor myself because I work for one.

I would really have liked to figure out Google's well-guarded secrets, though.

And, curiously, a couple of hours after getting the e-mail from the guy, my one website I was having trouble with suddenly re-appeared in the Google index. Bing, traffic suddenly doubled. Makes me wonder if the guys at Google sit there with a whole picture of my Internet life on their screen while I'm talking with them. My gMail account, my Orkut friends list, my Blogger comments, my browsing patterns, my desperate pleas to Google support. Nah, probably just a coincidence.

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9 comments

7 Oct 2005 @ 17:42 by jstarrs : Well, selfishly speaking, I'm glad...
..that you weren't swallowed up to be lost in the entrails of the behemoth Googlezon for ever & ever but I'm sorry it didn't work out for you - thanks for sharing your adventure.
ps. I guess you mean Opentopia is up & scoring decent hits again?
We should get on with zeeque sometime...  

7 Oct 2005 @ 18:23 by fleer : Guess you noticed it
:)
They got the power... :/  

7 Oct 2005 @ 20:59 by ming : Googlezon
Yeah, a bit scarey how much power they have.

Yes, Opentopia popped up on the map again. And in the meantime I also did some reasearch and figure out in part why it disappeared. It wasn't just me, but hundreds of sites with directories were wiped out by Google on July 28th. They apparently changed their algorithms, and decided that directories were cheating somehow. You know, thousands of pages linking to large numbers of sites. Maybe even copies of other directories. Like, they specifically went after anybody who had a mirror of DMOZ. Which I do. And which Google does, btw, as that's basically their directory offering. But they didn't wipe out their own ranking. Actually they did at first, but they quickly corrected that.  

8 Oct 2005 @ 09:05 by Vibrani @70.34.255.40 : Googlized
Hi Ming, maybe it's better after all that you didn't become Googlized...you might have to pick up and move again and after a couple of years since your last move, that's probably the last thing you'd want to do (anyway). Your experience made me wonder if people working for Google actually effectively communicate with each other.  

8 Oct 2005 @ 22:46 by ming : Moving
Yeah, I wasn't particular looking forward to moving to Dublin or Zurich, although they might be perfectly nice place. I'm quite happy where I am.

It was a slightly mixed experience, yes. Both interesting, but also it didn't impress me all that much. Sounded like it would be fun to work there, but also they might in many ways just be like many other big companies.  

9 Oct 2005 @ 10:53 by jstarrs : Hope you got the mails about the..
..workgroup/contacts problems on NCN today?
Cyber attack? ;0)  

12 Oct 2005 @ 05:17 by bushman : Hey Ming,
it looks like they are talking about putting a Google headquarters in Scottsdale or Tempee, talking lots of jobs, like wallmart , etc.. lol. But it isnt final yet, was just a local news blurb, mentioning that Google was looking for a large parcel of land in Scottsdale for operations headquarters of some sort, wanting to compeet with Ebay was mentioned as well.  

12 Oct 2005 @ 06:06 by Vibrani @70.34.255.40 : Google facts???
http://www.google-watch.org/bigbro.html  

21 Dec 2005 @ 22:05 by Will-be-Was @210.9.57.16 : GOOGLING AROUND
Hullo, I was hoping you would have advice as to a good Global-centric (or least including Europe!) search engine to use. I am tired of Google just pushing the U.S. first. And BTW - my nephew just got a job with Google & he has been in New York for only about 1 month (he formerly lived in Sydney, Australia).  

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