Why I'm Forced to Say Farewell: Google Management Has Lost Its Moral Compass

cheekygeeky

Google will want him terminated immediately and will probably make him some settlement (combined with a threat) to keep his mouth shut, going forward. Meanwhile, the media will be clamoring for interviews and more sound bites.

saltyoldman

. Weapons or other technologies whose principal purpose or implementation is to cause or directly facilitate injury to people. So if our enemies had no qualms at all about doing this, wouldn't it make sense that we have weapons that can at least counter, and potentially fight back? Would it be facilitating injury if the AI is used to stop an ISIS linked attack in our homeland? > "Don't be evil" Can evil also be interpreted as letting your government be impotent in protecting you?

taid9iK-

Good for you. Us. I always wondered what being pacifist means specifically in this space. Thank you!

moomoo11

well at least the TC and stock appreciation was worth it right? sorry not being a jerk but many of these kinds of posts just come off as performative and attention seeking. you could have just quit, literally everyone knows how FAANG operates. These are the most successful companies in the history of the world. What do you expect? DO you need a PhD to figure this out?

aucisson_masque

It's great to follow your own moral compass, whatever the cost. Much harder than taking the money and blindly following management decisions.

JuniperMesos

> The culture was transparent and open to diverse discourse, and from the start it was made clear that, as Googlers, we were not only welcome but expected to bring our own identity and values into the job. Google management lost its moral compass in 2017 when they fired James Damore for writing a memo critiquing their gender diversity efforts. They were never serious that employees were expected to bring their own identity and values into the job, they only thought this with respect to identities and values they were already mostly-aligned-with.

ams92

“I got the bag and now have developed a conscience"

readthenotes1

" Don't be evil" The slogans are on the walls because they are not in our hearts. Google has not changed its moral compass in 20 years. You just didn't want to admit it

mv4

Translation: now I can FIRE.

spiralcoaster

In other words: All of my stock has finally vested, and I am independently wealthy enough to signal that I'm quitting purely based on my morals, since there's no way anyone could have known Google wasn't some ethical bastion of hope in 2017.

lbrito

>“Don’t Be Evil” wasn’t just a slogan (...) —it was a north star for teams making hard calls I've developed an involuntary, muscle-level reflex that forces me to close the tab immediately when I read these "not just X -- it was Y" LLMisms. I realize the author might be human and am sorry if that's the case, but I can't help it.

sunshine-o

> Sundar Pichai in 2018 stated very clearly that “AI applications we will not pursue: … > 3. Technologies that gather or use information for surveillance violating internationally accepted norms. Really? Algorithms for ads and mass surveillance were always at the core of Google model. And there is not really such thing as "internationally accepted norms", Google, as a pioneer, literally defined them at the time.

BiteCode_dev

I refused an interview from google in 2010ish, because it was already dubious with all the tracking and advertising they were doing, as well as the rising censorship. So if you decided to go in 2017 with all that happened since, your moral compass was already broken with google's. Snowden already revealed what all that data was used for with program like PRISM. You already seen the total lack of interest in preventing scams in their ads as long as it brings money. You've seen the antitrust fines. The tax avoidance schemes. The election influence concerns over youtube content. What I read is "I know have made enough money from Google immorality, I can virtue signal by taking an early retirement and pretend I'm a great person".

localhoster

Not that I care in particular But claiming that google lost it's "moral compass" just now is a claim only rich people can make because they retire, not quit. Google is literally the largest, most organized, tracking and profiling company in the world. Which they tend to grow even larger with the rise of LLMs. Turning a blind eye of that for the opportunity or whatever, and than claim that _just now_ they lost their moral compass, is being a hypocrite.

grebc

Do people forget Eric Schmidt ran this company for how long?

cryo32

Google management never had a moral compass. They just pretended they did until it was no longer convenient.

mrkiouak

As someone who worked at Google, it is absolutely ridiculous to claim Google only lost its moral compass in this decade, let alone suggest it HAD its moral compass in 2017 when the guy was wired. Complete joke, do some introspection.

storus

Is he a canary in the coal mine, announcing things that are coming?

bflesch

So the guy was Google's planted ~expert~ lobbyist for the European Commission and now he's rich enough to quit, and makes a blogpost about it because people are rightfully skeptical about his motives?

mhitza

> Director of Android Platform Security Is this the person I have to complain about for the removal of fulldisk encryption in Android 13?