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Google Businesses The Internet

Another Google Recruiting Technique 430

Posted by michael from the got-job? dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The new edition of Linux Journal has a special insert: The GLAT (Google Labs Aptitude Test) is a Google recruiting quiz presented as a spoof of standardised aptitude tests. It is filled with math and Google-related trivia."
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Another Google Recruiting Technique More

Another Google Recruiting Technique

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  • High quality blogger. (Score:5, Funny)

    by nmoog ( 701216 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:03PM (#10294147) Homepage Journal
    "It seems Google Labs is trying to attract some high quality people into their ranks. If only I was a software guy, I'd apply..."

    Nice modesty there Michael!

  • google cache (Score:4, Informative)

    by kjamez ( 10960 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:06PM (#10294159) Homepage
    already?

    http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:ARvQ1IJEyucJ: cruftbox.com/blog/archives/001031.html+GLAT&hl=en [216.239.57.104]g oogle cache

  • Can't Find It (Score:5, Informative)

    by christopherfinke ( 608750 ) <chris@efinke.com> on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:06PM (#10294171) Homepage Journal
    The original link is dead, the Coral cache is unresponsive, and Google apparently has no cache of it. However, I was able to find this page [almaer.com], which has a little more abot the test.

  • hmmm (Score:4, Insightful)

    by blool ( 798681 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:07PM (#10294176)
    it sounds like because of bulk they arent reading the normal applications

  • Mirror (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:08PM (#10294178)
    Mirror, the site is already down. http://66.90.101.31/~whateve/mirror/ [66.90.101.31]

  • I would... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by snig64 ( 793215 )
    reply, but cruftbox.com has been /. already. :S I do hate standard aptitude tests, they are usually unrealistic and have nothing to do with what you have actually learned. Take the National Registry EMT tests, they are so "wordy" that you could pick any answer and be right in your head, but because of the one word, the answer is wrong. Anyone can tell you how to do the procedure, but picking the right answer from two right answers is a hard thing to do!

    • Re:I would... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by nmoog ( 701216 )
      I guess you didnt see the test, due to the slashdottin', but the google test is a lot more fun and includes a lot of subjective questions. (Like, how many colours would you need to fill a fuck-knows-a-hedron, and what colours would you choose?)

      They are testing your apptitude but also your character - your creativity, flair, and sense of humour.

    • Don't Worry (Score:5, Funny)

      by superpulpsicle ( 533373 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:49PM (#10294430)
      The site might have been slashdotted, but I got the Google Labs Aptitude Test multiple choice section right here.

      Q: What is the supreme search engine on the planet?
      a.) google.com
      b.) aol keyword google

      Q: What is 8^7 x 32^2 / $ -2352.8a + x + y + $
      a.) google = moneyopoly
      b.) google = infinite $$

      Q: Did you go to standford?
      a.) yes
      b.) pick this and fail

  • It's in the Mensa Bulletin too. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Stile 65 ( 722451 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:09PM (#10294190) Homepage Journal
    They've been putting puzzles on the inside front cover of the Mensa Bulletin for at least the past few months (I just joined). This month, the GLAT was stapled to the inside instead of the inside cover puzzles I'd been seeing.

    It actually has some neat questions. Lots of fun!
  • The relation of things on GLAT also discussed or thrown out on /. instantly struck me. Not that these are unique to /., but I rarely come across them in one package.

    Algorithmic haiku, "what's wrong with Unix", text adventures (the "it's 2PM... what do you do?" question and the maze one), ruminations on optimal team size, coolest hack ever, what's the next big thing for Google, a snide reference to the .com bubble, and a few math questions.

    I got mine in DDJ, not one in CUJ though.

  • Been doing this in Mensa mags for a while. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Leviathant ( 558659 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:14PM (#10294223) Homepage
    My wife's in Mensa, and one of the best things about that are the Google ads that generally take up the inside front page or two. It's a nice brain tease, and while I'm pretty sure I had a few of them figured out, I never sent them in because I like how Google hires PhDs, and I'd worry about being in over my head. I was disappointed when I didn't see any ad in the first page of this past month's Mensa mag, but overjoyed when I found the GLAT. Then I was a little intimidated. Still, I might sit and work it out one of these days, when I come up with the time for it. (As opposed to, say, killing time posting on Slashdot.)

  • GLAT - sample questions (Score:5, Informative)

    by hajmola ( 82709 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:14PM (#10294224)
    Google Labs Aptitude Test:

    Solve this cryptic equation, realizing of course that values for M and E could be interchanged. No leading zeroes are allowed.
    WWWDOT - GOOGLE = DOTCOM

    Write a haiku describing possible methods for predicting search traffic seasonality.

    What's the next line?
    1
    1 1
    2 1
    1 2 1 1
    1 1 1 2 2 1

    You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike. There is a dusty laptop here with a weak wireless connection. There are dull, lifeless gnomes strolling about. What dost thou do?
    A) Wander aimlessly, bumping into obstacles until you are eaten by a grue.
    B) Use the laptop as a digging device to tunnel to the next level.
    C) Play MPoRPG until the battery dies along with your hopes.
    D) Use the computer to map the nodes of the maze and discover an exit path.
    E) Email your resume to Google, tell the lead gnome you quit and find yourself in a whole different world

    What's broken with Unix? How would you fix it?

    On your first day at Google, you discover that your cubicle mate wrote the textbook you used as a primary resource in your first year of graduate school. Do you:
    A) Fawn obsequiously and ask if you can have an autograph.
    B) Sit perfectly still and use only soft keystrokes to avoid disturbing her concentration
    C) Leave her daily offerings of granola and English toffee from the food bins.
    D) Quote your favorite formula from the textbook and explain how it's now your mantra.
    E) Show her how example 17b could have been solved with 34 fewer lines of code.

    Which of the following expresses Google's over-arching philosophy?
    A) "I'm feeling lucky"
    B) "Don't be evil"
    C) "Oh, I already fixed that"
    D) "You should never be more than 50 feet from food"
    E) All of the above

    How many different ways can you color an icosahedron with one of three colors on each face?

    What colors would you choose?

    This space is intentionally blank. Please fill it with something that improves upon emptiness.

    On an infinite, two-dimensional, rectangular lattice of 1-ohm resistors, what is the resistance between two nodes that are a knight's move away?

    It's 2pm on a sunny Sunday afternoon in the Bay Area. You're minutes from the Pacific Ocean, redwood forest hiking trails and world class cultural attractions. What do you do?

    In your opinion, what is the most beautiful math equation ever derived?

    Which of the following is NOT an actual interest group formed by Google employees?
    A) Women's basketball
    B) Buffy fans
    C) Cricketeers
    D) Nobel winners
    E) Wine club

    What will be the next great improvement in search technology?

    What is the optimal size of a project team, above which additional members do not contribute productivity equivalent to the percentage increase in the staff size? A) 1 B) 3 C) 5 D) 11 E) 24

    Given a triangle ABC, how would you use only a compass and straight edge to find a point P such that triangles ABP, ACP, and BCP have equal perimeters? (Assume that ABC is constructed so that a solution does exist.)

    Consider a function which, for a given whole number n, returns the number of ones required when writing out all numbers between 0 and n. For example, f(13) = 6. Notice that f(1) = 1. What is the next largest n such that f(n) = n?

    What's the coolest hack you've ever written?

    'Tis known in refined company, that choosing K things out of N can be done in ways as many as choosing N minus K from N: I pick K, you the remaining. Find though a cooler bijection, where you show a knack uncanny, of making your choises contain all K of mine. Oh, for pedantry: let K be no more than half N.

    What number comes next in the sequence: 10, 9, 60, 90, 70, 66, ?
    A) 96
    B) 10 to the 100th power
    C) Either of the above
    D) None of the above

    In 29 words or fewer, describe what you would strive to accomplish if you worked at Google Labs.

    • Same one showed up in Physics Toady this month, too.

    • Re:GLAT - sample questions (Score:5, Funny)

      by Daniel Ellard ( 799842 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:22PM (#10294269)
      On your first day at Google, you discover that your cubicle mate wrote the textbook you used as a primary resource in your first year of graduate school. Do you:

      F: Wonder why you have a PhD and you're still sharing a cubicle like a code monkey.

    • In your opinion, what is the most beautiful math equation ever derived?

      2 + 2 = 4

      But I'm a big 1984 fan.

    • Re:GLAT - sample questions (Score:5, Funny)

      by Motherfucking Shit ( 636021 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:34PM (#10294354) Journal
      In 29 words or fewer, describe what you would strive to accomplish if you worked at Google Labs.
      "Need laid. Prefer geek but chic chick who doesn't mind Searching and doesn't oppose Groups. Tight on cash, she must be Froogle. I want to create porn.google.com."

    • Re:GLAT - sample questions (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:37PM (#10294383)
      In 29 words or fewer, describe what you would strive to accomplish if you worked at Google Labs.

      Profit

    • Re:GLAT - sample questions (Score:5, Informative)

      by Meneudo ( 661337 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:47PM (#10294416)
      Heh... this one reminds me of something from KOTOR...
      1
      1 1
      2 1
      1 2 1 1
      1 1 1 2 2 1

      one
      one one
      two ones
      one two, one one
      one one, one two, two ones
      three ones, two twos, one one
      312211
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:GLAT - sample questions (Score:5, Insightful)

      by chickenwing ( 28429 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @11:15PM (#10294549) Homepage
      Whenever I hear about Google recruiting, it kind of depresses me. Reminds me of something [jwz.org] Jamie Zawinski said:
      you can divide our industry into two kinds of people: those who want to go work for a company to make it successful, and those who want to go work for a successful company. Netscape's early success and rapid growth caused us to stop getting the former and start getting the latter.
      • Whenever I hear about Google recruiting, it depresses me because Google doesn't seem to understand that Geek Chic is over.

        I say you can divide this industry into two kinds of people: those who want to hold down a job and have a life, and those who want their job to BE their life. Google is looking for the latter.

        • I'm sorry to hear that you're stuck in a job you don't like. OTOH, if it were possible to have a job you actually liked, with co-workers you can relate to, you probably wouldn't that be that cynical. And if you were less cynical you might just find that.

          Most geeks are ridiculed by people who cannot understand our way of thinking. It would be a nice change to be in an environment where that was not so. Google understands that. They created an environment where geeks thrive. Now they are expanding, and are a

    • Re:GLAT - sample questions (Score:5, Funny)

      by servognome ( 738846 ) on Monday September 20, 2004 @12:17AM (#10294810)
      Write a haiku describing possible methods for predicting search traffic seasonality.
      Ice Cream in Summer
      Football in fall and winter
      Porn for all seasons

    • Re:GLAT - sample questions (Score:5, Funny)

      by cubicledrone ( 681598 ) on Monday September 20, 2004 @01:43AM (#10295154)
      You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike. There is a dusty laptop here with a weak wireless connection. There are dull, lifeless gnomes strolling about. What dost thou do?

      Schedule a meeting about process improvement and try to horseshit my way into a middle management position so I can wedge my fat ass into a molded chair and order from the salad bar.

      Which of the following expresses Google's over-arching philosophy?

      Make people jump through hoops to get a temp job.

      How many different ways can you color an icosahedron with one of three colors on each face?

      This has anything at all to do with being qualified for a job?

      What colors would you choose?

      Gray, to match the cubicle.

      On an infinite, two-dimensional, rectangular lattice of 1-ohm resistors, what is the resistance between two nodes that are a knight's move away?

      Lab rat.

      It's 2pm on a sunny Sunday afternoon in the Bay Area. You're minutes from the Pacific Ocean, redwood forest hiking trails and world class cultural attractions. What do you do?

      Go back to the want ads so I can find a job where I don't have to be tormented by obscure questions before the food runs out.

      In your opinion, what is the most beautiful math equation ever derived?

      Paycheck - expenses = savings

      What will be the next great improvement in search technology?

      Finding a job.

      What is the optimal size of a project team, above which additional members do not contribute productivity equivalent to the percentage increase in the staff size? A) 1 B) 3 C) 5 D) 11 E) 24

      According to middle management, whatever increases the budget.

      In 29 words or fewer, describe what you would strive to accomplish if you worked at Google Labs.

      Nothing, because the moment anyone "strives" for anything other than the donut list in the modern workplace, they get fired.

      Glad to see companies are slowly making the process of building a career a game show.

  • Physics Today has it too. (Score:5, Informative)

    by ajdecon ( 233641 ) <ajdecon@g[ ]l.com ['mai' in gap]> on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:25PM (#10294294)

    The September issue of Physics Today [physicstoday.org] also had a GLAT insert. I guess Google's trying for all sorts of backgrounds...

  • What makes a good Google employee.. (Score:5, Funny)

    by hyu ( 763773 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:27PM (#10294309)
    "It is filled with math and Google-related trivia." So, really, you are being tested on how well you can use Google to find the answers. Brilliant!
  • same questions as posted above.
  • Can we come up with what SPLAT means... as it relates to websites that get posted on Slashdot?
  • Would the test be ineptitude test with math questions like "If Bill says he's interested, what time is tee time?" and "If Dale is the IT director at a company who's stock is valued under $1, how many drinks do you need to feed Dale before he signs." Bonus question... "How many drinks do you need to feed Dale before he tells you his company isn't going to buy?" Super bonus questions "How many drinks do you need to feed Dale before he says that he's looking for employment else where?"

  • Google is evil. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Greg@RageNet ( 39860 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @10:57PM (#10294467) Homepage
    Google only hires PHD's; The difference between PHD and PHB is only two bits.

    -- Greg

    • I assume one of them is the Evil Bit?

    • Re:Google is evil. (Score:4, Interesting)

      by wass ( 72082 ) on Monday September 20, 2004 @02:54AM (#10295405)
      The difference between PHD and PHB is only two bits.

      Wrong, the proper capitalization is PhD, meaning lowercased 'h'. Assuming ASCII, the 'h' goes from 0x38 for 'H' to 0x58 for the properly cased 'h'. So the difference between PhD and PHB is really 0x22.

      Thereby proving that there actually is something more than just a shave and a haircut between the PHB and PhD.

      And yes, this is probably the dorkiest slashdot post I've ever written.

  • Google question (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 19, 2004 @11:02PM (#10294481)
    From the test:

    "Orkut" is:
    A. Turkish for slow
    B. Turkish for painfully slow
    C. Turkish for unusable
    C. Turkish for "written in painfully slow and unusable ASP.NET"

  • Jumping through hoops (Score:5, Interesting)

    by slyckshoes ( 174544 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @11:08PM (#10294517)
    Honestly, I was happy when I got a job after college where I could do real work (design/architect & implement) and quit jumping through stupid hoops to prove how smart I was. I've answered my fair share of brain teasers, pattern recognition, cute/stupid questions. This is crap that pisses me off. I'm sure google wants smart people, but they're going to overlook all the people who just get shit done when it needs to be done (and do it well) because they're going for the people who are creative. I'll take someone slightly less smarter with a good work ethic who realizes that work is more than just answering stupid riddles.

    And yes, I may be slightly jealous that I don't work at Google, but honestly this type of thing really turns me off. I guess I'm not what they're looking for then.

    • Re:Jumping through hoops (Score:5, Insightful)

      by fzammett ( 255288 ) on Sunday September 19, 2004 @11:30PM (#10294611) Homepage
      You may not be right for Google, but you sound right for the business world.

      You'd be surprised home many of the recently hired at my office are of the Ph.D variety. You'd also be surprised that the vast majority of the projects they are in charge of are failing miserably because they can't simply get things done. Oh, they can draw some kick-ass UML diagrams, and they can use all the latest buzzwords with the utmost proficiency...

      Then there are a couple of us that have been around for 10 years or more with the company. We are the ones that frankly get it done in crunch time. We are the ones that have never been part of a failed project because we busted our asses when it came to it (but just generally worked smart throughout the process so it rarely came to that anyway).

      Sure, I'm bragging a bit here, but it happens to be true. Theory has to meet experience and proven ability, it can't exist in a vacumn. It's nice to hire MENSA members who can rotate geometric shapes in five dimensions in their head and choose the correct figure, but give me the guy who can read through online docs efficiently and can pound out the code when it counts and I don't care if he has a Ph.D or flunked out of high school.

    • Re:Jumping through hoops (Score:5, Insightful)

      by dead sun ( 104217 ) <aranach@gma i l .com> on Monday September 20, 2004 @12:16AM (#10294808) Homepage Journal
      I've answered my fair share of brain teasers, pattern recognition, cute/stupid questions. This is crap that pisses me off. I'm sure google wants smart people, but they're going to overlook all the people who just get shit done when it needs to be done (and do it well) because they're going for the people who are creative.

      No slight intended, but methinks that maybe you're missing the point of these cute, stupid little brain teaser questions. It's certainly one thing to sit down and slam out something that you either know how to create or can come up with a way to create it relatively easily. It is another thing entirely to solve or approximate a solution to a fundamentally difficult problem and then implement it.

      To put it in vulgar terms, Google likely doesn't need people to just get shit done, they need creative solutions to problems that don't have a straight forward answer. Do you honestly think figuring out how to retrieve highly relevant web pages from the whole net based on one or two silly little keywords, in fractions of a second no less, is something you just sit down and program? Do you even think it's something you can beat the current top players at by simply engineering it with current methods? No, it's far more akin to those little problems you hate so much. Sure, there's naive solutions that give a lackluster result, but to do it well it's all a game of tradeoffs, new and novel approaches, application of known approaches or extensions of known approaches in the right instances, a dash of brute force, and who knows what else. If it was straight forward and something just solved by getting shit done then Google and its staff of many PhDs would likely be vanishing due to the costs of keeping all those PhDs around opposed to another company running slimmer and just doing it. Instead they're number one in the search engine world because of their pioneering efforts.

      The people who enjoy and excel at those questions, seemingly silly on the surface but generally with deeper implications, are the type that are typically good at doing the sort of research that needs to be done to solve the tricky steps.

      Again, none of this is meant as a slight and there really is need for people who are good at architecting and implementing solutions with good work ethics. Many applications are at a point where the technical challenges lie in integration of known solutions and those certainly still need good, hard working architects. On the other hand there's still a definate need for people who like toying with silly questions because that generally translates into enjoying playing with the nuances of more research oriented stuff, simply because they're so often similar. Frankly, if you dislike those stupid little problems then you may well dislike the research experience of bashing your head into brick wall after brick wall trying to come up with a novel solution to a problem which has no real feasible solutions at the moment.

      • Put a bit more positively -- the grandparent poster might dick around with interesting problems less at work. But dicking around with ideas (well, as long as they're in the field you're researching) *is* relevant and valid as an activity in research. It's incredibly annoying if you're doing software development to have an employee doing this. If you want a FTP server written, you really don't want your employees trying to see whether they can optimize file copies in a database. At a CS research lab like
  • I also got a copy of this "test" in Dr. Dobb's.
  • WWWDOT - GOOGLE = DOTCOM

    If I were to actually solve it, I would write a small program to try all possible solutions. Given that there are 9 variables between 0 and 9, it wouldn't take long on an average pc.

  • "test" breaches Australian law (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 19, 2004 @11:56PM (#10294724)

    I was quite stunned to see the form in my magazine.

    The job screening exam clearly breaches Australia's anti-discriminiation laws (simplifying somewhat, Google is asking some questions unrelated to my potential performance as an employee, therefore the questions must be for some discriminatory purpose). I'd be surprised if the same were not true of the US.

    What this screening exam did for me was to confirm Google's corporate stupidity.

    Google is now first on the list of places I'd never want to work -- what concern is it of their's what I do with my spare time.

    I've no idea what Linux Journal thought they were doing by accepting the insert.

    • The job screening exam clearly breaches Australia's anti-discriminiation laws (simplifying somewhat, Google is asking some questions unrelated to my potential performance as an employee, therefore the questions must be for some discriminatory purpose). I'd be surprised if the same were not true of the US.

      What this screening exam did for me was to confirm Google's corporate stupidity.

      And so now, a potential employer is aware that you're the sort of person that likes pulling out obscure rules to be an assh

  • Here are the images... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Argyle ( 25623 ) * on Monday September 20, 2004 @01:09AM (#10295009) Homepage Journal
    You guys killed my site, but I've put them up on another domain I have.

    Please mirror the images. Thanks.

    GLAT Images [cruftmedia.com]

  • My Google recruiting experience.... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 20, 2004 @01:22AM (#10295063)
    I recently interviewed at Google and got an offer, but didn't go. I think they sort of dropped the ball.

    At the risk of sounding arrogant (and, there's no way I'd post this if I weren't doing so anonymously), I was a very qualified candidate. I solved all their puzzles and made an incredibly positive impression on everyone there I visited. Simiarly, Google made a very positive impression on me. It's been my dream to work for them for many years and I finally had the opportunity!

    Then, things sort of turned a little bit worse. I was also being courted by a Very Large Software Company. VLSC also made me an offer. It was better, but the money wasn't the issue. Every few days, someone from VLSC would call me to tell me how important it was that I go to work for them. How excited they were about me and extolling the virtues of VLSC.

    First my future boss called. His boss called. HIS boss called. And *that* guy's boss called! At this point it was someone very high up in the company. All of them had the same message: we really want you to come here. They started sending little gifts to my house.

    Meanwhile, I heard nothing from Google. Their recruiter called me occasionally but never replied to my emails or indicated having read them on phone calls. I asked if it would be possible to speak to anyone else in Google who I might speak with about the type of work I'd be doing or the people I'd be working with. No one ever contacted me. Now, they were getting ready for their IPO so I suppose they had better things to think about, but the overwhelming impression I got was "Your loss if you don't work here. Whatever, come if you want." Meanwhile, VLSC made it clear it would be *their* loss if I didn't work there and that they'd do everything they could to make it the best place ever to work.

    It was incredibly painful to have to give up my dream of working for Google. But ultimately, VLSC convinced me that they were more excited about the work I could do and that I'd have a better opportunity there to do it.

    I really wanted to want Google. They made it very hard.

    I hope someone from Google reads this and maybe can pass this on to HR folks. It's not something I feel comfortable attaching my name to.

  • Google presentation or recruitment session? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by SpaghettiPattern ( 609814 ) on Monday September 20, 2004 @04:23AM (#10295638)
    I attended a Google presentation at SUCON [www.suug.ch] where a Google drone held a very shallow presentation of the tech stuff behind Google.

    In a nutshell, he hinted that they use Linux, that they have loads of cheap systems which 1) they expect will break down and 2) are cheap to fix, that a large part of the systems indexes content and that another large part of the systems serves content. And Google is hiring.

    He constantly repeated that because they went public he was not allowed to be specific. And he wasn't. There was a watchful Google woman that apparently took note of everything that went on and assisted at the proclamations of secrecy. And Google is hiring.

    Then he touched the Google policy and hinted that Google has a sort of principle of "not being evil". In my words, this means Google has considered being evil and decided not to be (maybe for the time being). Did I mention that Google is hiring?

    Oh yes and they were hiring. Yes hiring, hiring and hiring. There were even forms (as if the audience didn't know where to look for them on Google). And of course he couldn't say anything about the rates, due to... But Google is hiring.

    At the end of the presentation I thought:
    • Google kicks ass in low cost high performance computing.
    • Gmail will give them experience in how to handle confidentially in low cost high performance computing.
    • They (and not RedHat) have everything in order to become the next MS. (Monopoly on a technology and loads of quickly earned bucks.)
    • I guess that their going public results in less fun at the company.
    • Why do they need/want more money? They are doing OK as it is!
    • I decided to let Google have loads of fun with their money and not to take anything of that away from them by applying.
    • Oh yeah, they probably want the best for the lowest price. Both in HW and HR.
    And not to forget: Google is hiring.

  • Is this really recruiting... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ndykman ( 659315 ) on Monday September 20, 2004 @06:30AM (#10295955)
    I'm a bit skeptical. Well, maybe they only took the first X amount of these things in, because it won't take long for all the answer to get posted. Seems more like marketing to me. Kind of "we have the smartest people, aren't we cool."

    Of course, there is lots of kinds of intelligences. I read the Emotional Intellgence book, and it was a bit of an eye-opener. Yep, there's all kinds of smart.

    I hate to admit it, but there may be a reason that some of those blasted sales and marketing guys and gals make serious money. We like to think that it's lucky, or BS, or kissing ass (and it could be), but sometimes, it's because "people smarts" can get you far.

    Sure, this makes sense for a research lab starting up, but here's something to ponder. MS, IBM and HP all have labs too. And how effective they are is how well they can transfer ideas into development. HP had lots of idea, but consistently could not execute on them. IBM and MS do much better.

    You can have too many cooks, after all. For every thinker, there is a doer that is just as valuable, if not more so.

    Oh, and Google, now that you are public and MS wants a piece of your action, here's a hint. Arrogance and "we're better than..." can hurt you really, really bad. Just ask Netscape, err, AOL, err, well, you know. Don't get too cocky.

    I think of Richard Fenymann at times like this. Nobel Prize winner, who admired an illiterate MC in a local bar for his social skills and how he worked. True smarts is always being ready to learn, regardless of how or what is taught.

    Yea, maybe I'm jealous because I can't do those types of puzzles very well. But I still have enough brains to know that there is room for all types, and diversity wins over sheer brain power in the long haul.

    Of course, I'm not that brainy. Hell, I'm still posting here, for the love of... 8-)

  • GLAT vs, Google Output (Score:3, Interesting)

    by peter303 ( 12292 ) on Monday September 20, 2004 @09:03AM (#10296542)
    GLAT: Number of blank lines for testee's answer: 5.
    Number of "found pages" for typical google search: 523,984

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