
Criticizing Google got me fired - pyrophane
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2017/08/31/i-criticized-google-it-got-me-fired-thats-how-corporate-power-works/?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-f%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
======
Clubber
This is the article in a nutshell. Google funds anti-monopoly think tank. Anti
monopoly think tank writer praises the EU for fining Google for being anti
competitive, Schmidt gets guy fired by threatening to withdraw funding. I know
that's just his side of the story, but it doesn't look great for the think
tank or the Google.

If you didn't know it already, think tanks are a euphemism for propaganda
machine.

 _Shortly after my group published a statement praising the European Union for
fining Google for violating antitrust standards in June of this year, I was
contacted by Anne-Marie Slaughter, the president of New America, who said that
Eric Schmidt, Google’s parent company’s executive chairman, was furious about
the statement. Schmidt, she said, was threatening to pull his name and
substantial funding from New America in retaliation._

~~~
dsacco
I see it repeated a lot that think tanks are really propaganda engines with an
intellectual veneer, but can you back that up with specific examples?

I subscribe to the Brookings Papers, Cato Journal, Chatham House and Council
on Foreign Relations. Yes, the content is political, but discussions of
economics and policy are _necessarily_ political in nature. I think there is a
lot in these publications that is descriptive, not just prescriptive.
Certainly more rigor than you're giving them credit for.

If you're expecting an organization without any bias, that's different. But
your critique sounds as though there is no empiricism involved whatsoever. I
take issue with that, because personally I find that I learn quite a bit by
reading these, and often the value is in conflicting perspectives. I also
think it becomes a little too easy for people to hear what you're saying and
just start repeating it (as an example, see this thread where multiple people
have piled on to agree with you without any examples cited).

To make a comparison: I also subscribe to the New York Times and Wall Street
Journal, because they have different implicit (and even explicit!) biases.
That doesn't mean there isn't high quality journalism, it just means that the
nature of information is often biased.

~~~
yeukhon
Not to distract from the main point, but my experience has been NYT and WST
lean towards the left than the right, although WST is more conversative on the
financial side which is obvious.

~~~
subroutine
I recently wrote a little Python script to scrape the url from top submissions
to Reddit's /r/The_Donald vs. /r/EnoughTrumpSpam to get an idea of the most
conservative-leaning and liberal-leaning news outlets (e.g. more specifically
which news sites conservative-leaning and liberal-leaning redditors use to
support their respective narratives). Here are the results:

[https://i.redd.it/45ezt3j9hziy.png](https://i.redd.it/45ezt3j9hziy.png)

Edit: Oh and I almost forgot (and to bring this full circle) a Googler saw my
post about this and made an interactive version:

[https://medium.com/@hoffa/reddit-favorite-sources-the-
most-l...](https://medium.com/@hoffa/reddit-favorite-sources-the-most-linked-
sites-expanded-and-interactive-79070d648573)

Edit: and to really bring this full circle, this Googler made an interactive
version about HN:

[https://medium.com/@hoffa/hacker-news-on-bigquery-now-
with-d...](https://medium.com/@hoffa/hacker-news-on-bigquery-now-with-daily-
updates-so-what-are-the-top-domains-963d3c68b2e2)

~~~
chillwaves
What if one side is more reality based than the other? Which certainly has to
be the case, both sides would not have exactly equal representation of reality
based facts.

So your graph is not very helpful unless you want to pretend the Washington
Post and New York times are just leftist versions of Breitbart.

Honestly do not see the point or value in what you have done.

~~~
alphapapa
Well here's an interesting observation: the "right" subreddit cites some
sources that the "left" subreddit cites, but not vice versa. For example, NYT
and Politico appear near the tail of the "right" sub's sources and near the
head of the "left" sub's sources, but none of the "right" sub's sources appear
anywhere in the "left" sub's sources.

So, assuming that NYT and Politico are left-leaning, it would appear that the
"right" sub links to its opponents' views, while the "left" sub does not.

The implications of this are left to the reader.

~~~
subroutine
The conservative subreddit links to archive.us (notice it is 2nd on the list)
instead of the NYT, WaPo, etc. because they do not want those news orgs to
capitalize from traffic it would be sending there; instead they send their
massive conservative user base to archive. (i suppose this behavior might be
another interesting observation?)

~~~
Corristowolf
This is not just because of traffic, but to get the original story. There have
been plenty of times where the story was changed and edited after the initial
post.

------
binthere
Let's do a thought experiment: Imagine if a company had enough power to inject
money into all of the major media outlets, to the point where they depend on
this company to stay alive. Now, if this company threatens to pull the money
out if the media outlet says anything that goes against it, the company will
effectively have control over the opinions of all major media channels. This
is obviously not acceptable in a society that considers itself "free speech".
It's free from legal consequences but when you shut opinions down due to
"other consequences" you end up with the same result. A muted society.

~~~
noir_lord
The funny thing there is we worry about someone having enough money to exert
soft power on the media while allowing Murdoch to control a _huge_ chunk of
the media market in the UK (and US...).

He has far more control of the media than any single company could hope to buy
indirectly (and it'd be cheaper to just buy it directly at that point I
think).

~~~
walshemj
Why do you think Jeff Bezos brought the Washington Post - he saw how Rupert
Murdoch works.

Google should have brought the independent when it was up for sale cheap

~~~
driverdan
And look at how he's made it much worse. Clickbait headlines, political
pandering. They have some good content but I'm so sick of the bad stuff I go
elsewhere.

------
pythonistic
I could argue that Mr. Lynn is crying "sour grapes" over this, but he also
came very close to a point Bryan Lunduke made recently about Google[1]. Google
has the power to stop people using their products from making a living, and a
collapse or compromise of Google's infrastructure would cause untold economic
harm to the nation and world. If Google as an "information provider" fails
(search, email, telecommunications, DNS services, cloud services, etc.) a lot
of other businesses stop or collapse.

A healthy economy is a lot like a healthy ecosystem: some parts are weaker,
some will fail when stressed, but allowing the system to react naturally to
inputs will likely result in a better outcome. But when you encourage a
monoculture, single stresses can result in a complete collapse[2]. We're
experimenting with establishing monocultures in our economies with potentially
even more impact than those of the 19th and 20th centuries (like Standard Oil)
that inspired the anti-monopoly regulation and legislation: if Samsung were to
shut down tomorrow, what would be the impact on the Korean, regional and world
economies?

An all-powerful Google that can't accept criticism or action to "trim it back"
to preserve the overall economy represents a danger and Mr. Lynn was right to
point this out.

[1] -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwzJlvx4ndk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwzJlvx4ndk)
[2] -
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/12/04/the-w...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/12/04/the-
worlds-most-popular-banana-could-go-extinct/)

~~~
ryandrake
> If Google as an "information provider" fails (search, email,
> telecommunications, DNS services, cloud services, etc.) a lot of other
> businesses stop or collapse.

Seems a bit of an exaggeration. Let's pretend we got word from an all-powerful
being that Google and all of its services were going to disappear from the
face of the earth in exactly 30 days, giving everyone including users,
competitors, partners, etc. plenty of time to prepare. 30 days from now,
specifically, what collapses?

~~~
tristram_shandy
1\. Every business that's running on GCE. They can't just "move off the
service" in 30 days. This is a big one. Billions of dollars. Coca Cola
obviously couldn't move in 30 days. Nor Airbus.

2\. Every business that's running on GSuite. Let's assume this is mostly small
business, and they will have limited ability to migrate to other SaaS or run
in house replacements for these services.

3\. Everyone who was using Youtube as a primary source of income, or whose
business had a critical dependency on the Youtube platform for marketing

4\. Every piece of code that depends on Google's DNS infrastructure, and
anything that pulls DNS entries from 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4... how many devices
like this do you think there are? How many were hard coded?

5\. What happens to Android? It's a hypothetical, but potentially it could
keep going, but let's assume major disruptions for everyone who runs a
business that develops mobile applications for Android

6\. How many people (and businesses) depend on Google Maps? How many are tied
in directly to the API and won't be able to change this easily?

7\. Now how many depend on Google Voice?

8\. Gmail has more than 1 billion _active_ monthly users.

I don't know if you're actually looking for a specific list of businesses, but
that's not going to be possible for anyone to provide -- anyway, a shutdown of
Google services would be an economic catastrophe... Most people couldn't even
migrate a Gmail account in 30 days, and with Gmail alone we're already talking
a billion+ people.

~~~
user5994461
1\. AWS and Azure

2\. Outlook 365

3\. Vimeo and Dailymotion

4\. Every ISP provide DNS servers.

5\. IOS

6\. There are many alternative to google maps. Google didn't invented maps.

7\. Noone?

8\. There are many email service ready to take over.

There is nothing Google offers that can't be obtained from another provider.

And I'm not even getting into how Google has zero presence in Russia/China and
its disappearance won't impact them.

~~~
spinlock
so .... if you can actually move a business from GCE to AWS in 30 days, will
you please send me your resume? I'd like to hire you for a -- short --
contract :)

Seriously though, I think you're greatly underestimating how high the
switching cost is to move from one cloud provider to another.

------
jackcosgrove
I cannot believe people are defending Google and attacking the researcher.

The argument goes, 1) he's a researcher for a think tank, so he's pushing an
agenda and not trustworthy. 2) Google made a good business decision by cutting
funding for research that goes against their agenda.

So, for-profit enterprises can push agendas, but not-for-profit enterprises
and the individuals who staff them cannot, because agenda-pushing would
undermine the purity of their research.

That's obviously a double standard, and one that favors the powerful over the
weak.

Silicon Valley has become morally repugnant, and Google is evil. I'm on the
side of the little guy.

------
AndrewKemendo
_I and the entire Open Markets team were let go because it’s not in Google’s
interest to finance criticism of its business model. It’s as simple as that._

Right. Where's the scandal here? If you don't want someone or some company to
have monetary power over you, then don't take money from them. I understand
that it's not so simple, but at the end of the day this can't be surprising.

To wit...his prefacing comment says a lot:

 _No think tank wants to appear beholden to the demands of its corporate
donors._

Operative word being - appear. In fact they all are beholden, of course, you
just want to make sure not to appear to be.

~~~
akgerber
The scandal is that most of the policy research in the US is funded by
supposedly-neutral think tanks which are funded this way— which means new laws
will usually be designed to serve the big interests that fund think tanks.

~~~
dcre
This is it. So many people appear unable to understand criticism at a
structural level. As long as every individual or corporation is acting as
you'd expect them to act given the conditions they're in, we're supposed to
throw up our hands.

But of course we don't have to do that. We can note the various reasons things
work this way — growing monopoly power, tax laws governing nonprofits,
lobbying regulations — and figure out how to change them.

------
finkin1
> Corporations are geared to pursue their interests, and criticism is not in
> their best interest.

Obviously we should condemn this behavior, but I can't say I'm surprised. It's
good to see such a clear example of Google being unable to resist exerting its
power to protect itself from criticism, but I can't help but imagine all of
the instances of this that will never see the light of day. The reality is
that our world is filled with greed and corruption and that's not going to
change any time soon.

~~~
busterarm
It's not even about them being unable to resist. Schmidt is on record saying
that he feels that their success is a function of/reward for doing what's
morally correct and that the company should use its power to push their
morality/ideology (and that the market will reward them if they're right or
won't if they aren't).

Thinking about this keeps me up at night.

~~~
tahabi
Can you cite a source for this claim by Eric Schmidt?

------
clarkevans
Regarding concentration of corporate power and economics, Nick Hanauer was on
the 1A yesterday [1] and had relevant commentary. He also brought up problems
with inequality a few years ago [2] and last month [3].

[1] [http://the1a.org/shows/2017-08-30/zillionaire-to-other-
zilli...](http://the1a.org/shows/2017-08-30/zillionaire-to-other-zillionaires-
pay-up)

[2] [http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/06/the-
pitchfork...](http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/06/the-pitchforks-
are-coming-for-us-plutocrats-108014)

[3] [http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/18/to-my-
fell...](http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/18/to-my-fellow-
plutocrats-you-can-cure-trumpism-215347)

~~~
SimbaOnSteroids
He also has a TEDx talk that says just as much.

------
bhhaskin
Googles growing influence in the world is darn right scary. They are a private
company so they can do what ever they want (i.e. they could delist & censor
anything the author writes) and claim free speech. If they wanted to they
could wipe someone's online identity off the face of the web.

~~~
tryingagainbro
Just a private army is missing to complete them. Essos maybe?

IMO, no company should be this powerful.

Let's not forget that Google also bought off quite a few shameless professors
during the FTC investigation.
[http://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2017/07/13/google-
favorable-r...](http://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2017/07/13/google-favorable-
research)

------
mullingitover
"I and the entire Open Markets team were let go because it’s not in Google’s
interest to finance criticism of its business model."

Coming soon: Washington Post's scathing takedown of Amazon's business model.

~~~
mulmen
Is the Washington Post a think tank now? Does Amazon own the Washington Post?

~~~
r00fus
Jeff Bezos owns the WaPo now.

~~~
mulmen
Jeff Bezos and Amazon are not the same person. This is an important
distinction.

~~~
tryingagainbro
_Jeff Bezos and Amazon are not the same person. This is an important
distinction._

No doubt you can point to some Amazon PR to prove it. In reality, they're one
and Bezos has done whatever he wanted till now (how many years was AMZN losing
money to expand???).

You can also say "Here's an WP article slamming Amazon," but maybe the old WP
would have written 5 such articles. I have no doubt that self-censorship goes
on at WP just as it went with NBC /GE /Comcast and so on. They know who owns
the paper and if someone has to remind them, it will be done.

Of course, you can be independent and think, but....

~~~
mulmen
You can make up whatever reality you want. Suggesting Bezos abuses his
influence at WaPo to benefit Amazon has nothing to do with Google deciding to
stop doing business with an organization that began working against Google's
interest.

~~~
r00fus
You ascribe malicious intent when it's just really organizational dynamics.
Most suppression of dissent is self-censorship. Most folks know when they're
about to bite the hand that feeds them.

------
iamleppert
Just look at the corporate double speak and their response:

[https://www.newamerica.org/new-america/press-releases/new-
am...](https://www.newamerica.org/new-america/press-releases/new-americas-
response-new-york-times/)

They even linked to e-mails in an effort to be more transparent but all I can
see is more confirmation about what the author said as truth:

[https://www.newamerica.org/new-america/press-
releases/intere...](https://www.newamerica.org/new-america/press-
releases/interest-transparency-new-america-releases-email-correspondence-
barry-lynn/)

------
tptacek
It's a weird situation for a number of reasons. Schmidt is clearly culpable,
but it also seems to be the case that New America was existentially dependent
on Google-derived funding.

~~~
notatoad
This was my reaction - It is my understanding that "think tanks" are
essentially a nice name for lobbying organizations. A google funded lobbyist
being fired for criticizing the company he is paid to lobby for doesn't seem
out of the ordinary. Not that i think it's good, but it sounds like a
perfectly normal event given the current state of western politics.

Or am i mistaken and think tanks are usually politically neutral pure-research
organizations?

~~~
mulmen
Even if they are politically neutral why would the think tank expect to be
funded by the target of their criticism? If they are truly neutral why would
they not seek out diverse funding sources?

~~~
tarboreus
The idea is that sources are interested in funding BECAUSE they might be
criticized. That's when they actually get something out of it. Not a lot of
actual altruists in the world, and if they exist, they're funding NGOs that
deal with clean water or hunger or something less abstract, at least in the
aggregate.

------
ABCLAW
Heck of a lot of Dog wagging here over whether or not Google could legally
apply the pressure they did.

The answer is yes, they could. Great.

The issue isn't whether or not they could. It's whether or not they should be
in a position to do so - is the concentration of power required to apply such
pressure healthy for society as a whole?

It is worth noting that at the time of me making this comment, this is not a
single point arguing directly that such concentration is healthy or
beneficial.

~~~
icebraining
But is the concentration of power really at play here? According to sources,
New America got $21M total from Google since '99\. From their funding page,
they got at least $16M from _other_ sources last year alone.

Are they really so dependent on Google?

~~~
ABCLAW
>But is the concentration of power really at play here?

Yes.

The executive chairman of the corporation they receive ~%20 of their revenue
from called and told them to get rid of the guy. The guy was gone in two days.
This isn't a grey area. [Edited revenue figure]

~~~
icebraining
_they receive >%50 of their revenue_

Do they? What's the source of that?

~~~
ABCLAW
Misread your comment! Oops.

I jumped into New America's filed 990 papers and the number at a first
estimate is around 20%. But I haven't added in any personal donations by Eric
Schmidt. Perhaps more importantly omitted is the fact that he is the chairman
emeritus of the organization.

------
EmTekker
One should really read Julian Assange's views on Schmidt and Google's think
tank. It seems like he got it right.

Here's the link to the article: [http://www.newsweek.com/assange-google-not-
what-it-seems-279...](http://www.newsweek.com/assange-google-not-what-it-
seems-279447)

~~~
cjcole
Interesting read.

"Schmidt arrived first, accompanied by his then partner, Lisa Shields. When he
introduced her as a vice president of the Council on Foreign Relations—a U.S.
foreign-policy think tank with close ties to the State Department—I thought
little more of it. Shields herself was straight out of Camelot, having been
spotted by John Kennedy Jr.’s side back in the early 1990s.

...

Some time later Jared Cohen arrived. With him was Scott Malcomson, introduced
as the book’s editor. Three months after the meeting Malcomson would enter the
State Department as the lead speechwriter and principal advisor to Susan Rice
(then U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, now national security advisor).

...

I knew little else about Cohen at the time. In fact, Cohen had moved to Google
from the U.S. State Department in 2010. He had been a fast-talking “Generation
Y” ideas man at State under two U.S. administrations, a courtier from the
world of policy think tanks and institutes, poached in his early twenties.

He became a senior advisor for Secretaries of State Rice and Clinton. At
State, on the Policy Planning Staff, Cohen was soon christened “Condi’s party-
starter,” channeling buzzwords from Silicon Valley into U.S. policy circles
and producing delightful rhetorical concoctions such as “Public Diplomacy
2.0.” On his Council on Foreign Relations adjunct staff page he listed his
expertise as “terrorism; radicalization; impact of connection technologies on
21st century statecraft; Iran.”"

What I get from this is that Schmidt has (had?) very deep links into the US
State Department.

This was new to me so thanks.

~~~
EmTekker
Yes, I was amazed too. He also published the whole 2 hours+ long audio
recording of the whole thing. So you can actually listen to the whole thing,
the things he is referring to in the article.

------
suzzer99
That corporate and individually funded think tanks have any impact on actual
policy is troubling all by itself. It's just a fancy way of lobbying.

------
yahyaheee
Power always collects, while I disagree with this action from an idealist
standpoint this is the way the world works currently. Frankly I would rather
have Google grabbing up all the power than anyone else I can think of. I
understand that they will become exceedingly corrupted, but we need them in
charge right now. The world has serious problems and they are well poised to
fix them.

~~~
TheAdamAndChe
My issue with this is that even if Google is currently acting in the world's
best interest(which is arguable with its recent blatant attempts to shape the
direction of our culture), power eventually changes hands. Someone eventually
will control Google that will exploit that power to the detriment of the
country and the world.

~~~
spacemanmatt
By "recent blatant attempts to shape the direction of our culture" is it fair
to assume you mean firing the man-child author of that manifesto? I was
thinking that had much more to do with controlling their own culture than
forcing it on anyone else. They didn't make that a public thing, it blew up on
them.

~~~
TheAdamAndChe
> firing the man-child author of that manifesto

Please try to avoid inflammatory language, there's no reason to make this a
flame war. We can discuss why we are right or wrong without attacking each
other or other people.

Yes, I was speaking of the manifesto. The fact that Google fired him instead
of discussing why he was wrong for holding opinions that much of the Google
workforce hold themselves shows that there is probably merit to his claim of
an ideological echo-chamber. Google holds incredible global power to shape and
control populations. Given that, it worries me to hear of an echo-chamber
forming in a corporation so powerful.

------
abandonliberty
tl;dr for all you commenters not reading the article:

Barry worked for "New America, a think tank and civic enterprise committed to
renewing American politics, prosperity, and purpose in the Digital Age."

He criticized Google, a significant patron of the think tank, and got fired
when Eric threatened to pull funding.

This has little to do with at-will employment and much more about the impact
of having most research privately funded in a capitalist environment.

~~~
spacemanmatt
If you justify capitalism, this entire story is mundane. I am surprised to
hear so much complaint about a private employment termination. I guess it's
just the sound of so many bubbles popping. It's like no one knew how think
tanks work.

------
jondubois
Think tanks should be funded by governments and they should liaise with
industry in an impartial, academic way. Any corporation which tries to fund a
think tank should be accused of bribery or corruption.

~~~
gbacon
Is it your position that elected officials; appointed clerks, ministers, and
magistrates; and academics are entirely impartial with zero self-interest? Are
we ruled by detached philosopher-kings?

------
throw2016
This is more proof if needed of how damaging most think tanks are to public
discourse and the incestuous relationships that prop them up.

They are very much part of the regulatory capture framework in operation
around power centres. It seems as easy as adopting highly deceptive orwellian
sounding names and shamelessly pushing agendas while pretending to be
independent.

Consumers and citizens end up paying for all this subterfuge in increased end
user costs and are basically paying for organized attempts to mislead them.

------
roadbeats
I'm very curious about if there are any Googlers who raise their voice about
how Google is maintaining its monopolistic status.

~~~
spacemanmatt
Google enjoys a classic natural monopoly. They had a category-winning search
product when it mattered and their success has been built around that market
lead. Microsoft has a long history of trying to tie them to monopoly abuse,
for which Microsoft was sued by the DOJ. Not much has stuck in the U.S. but
Microsoft has seen limited success in convincing (some argue lobbying or
outright bribing) European officials to punish Google.

~~~
gbacon
Google was created by a couple of grad students, a demographic not generally
able to overcome hurdles of high fixed or startup costs.

Attempting to slap the “natural monopoly” label on Google shows that the term
is either meaningless or just bunk economics. Either way, it’s a useful foil
in the ham fists of interventionists with a bad solution in search of
problems.

------
triggermuch
Im going to openly state that i am not an expert in business dynamics but I
have worked in a few industries that seem to have a system that, while being
technically not being a monopoly or breaking laws (usually slowly carved into
being legal or they are working at deregulating it to be that way) are doing
really shady unfair scheming in order to have the dominating company. This is
the goal of a capitalist model. so trying to make your company be the only
option is a big success for the people that profit from that company. Its not
good for innovation or society in the long term but in America that is the
system that is there. This is why regulations have to get set up though,
because a company (pretty much 94% of them) if just were allowed a "free
market" will at all cost and no regard for what the negatives for society ,
will work to make a profit and get to a level where least amt of effort and
cost bring in max profit to them. It's not evil or even always conscious it's
just human nature. look at the millions of people that built the railroads and
cities and slaved to make an empire for a small few as they die penniless and
broke. Its not right or fair what Google did, but the dude saw someone talk
smack and it not only hit ego but could cost profit, so he smacked back. There
needs to be a different model altogether, not a shaming someone for doing what
any of us would in that spot.

As they say dont hate the player, hate the game.

I am also not saying i have an answer to finding that model and i dont think
with the current climate of tribalism, it's not going to happen until im old
or dead. So if you dont like it, stop bitching and try and fix it. You do know
that Karma isnt a real thing? some amazing people have nothing but crap happen
to them all their life, others are disgusting pigs and have nothing but
continued success. Yeah sucks, now buck up cuz google being a meany, is really
not a news story. Go find a job creator to create the guy a job.

------
bspringstead
Hypothetically, letting some anti-Google rhetoric through might legitimize an
otherwise supportive stance. Say I'm 80% evil and I fund a think tank. The
think tank's reputation was 100, and now it's 60 with regard to statements
about me because my funding it makes it seem biased. If it published a story
that says I'm actually 4% evil, then it gets a reputation boost, I'm not
looking as bad as I actually am, and I'm well positioned to let the
organization do positive spin when I really need it. I would say that Google
and similar .orgs actually usually do this. But Google and Amazon are getting
really, really nervous when people talk about monopoly. If anti-trust comes
back into vogue, and it could possibly, then it's an existential threat for
these empires. They have to carefully manage their carrots and sticks on this
issue, and with this one, they went with the stick.

------
frogpelt
So, let's consider why Google would fund an anti-monopoly think tank in the
first place. It's so they can wield influence by using their dollars.

It's similar to why rich people pay lobbyists. The lobbyist can pull strings
with legislators that offset the millions of opinions of less-rich
constituents.

It makes sense from a purely business perspective.

------
zellyn
Are think tanks legally required to be impartial? Are they generally expected
to be impartial?

I was under the impression that funding a "Think Tank" was a way to funnel
money into research, paper-writing, policy promulgation, etc. that favored
your position. Are they something else?

~~~
CorvusCrypto
I'd imagine that funding and investments are a way to pressure research to
favor your stance as a company. While think tanks can operate under their own
rules, as an investor you'd probably not want to spend more money if the
result isn't helping you in some way.

Phrased a different way I think technically it's not a requirement to follow
your investors' goals, but it's pretty much a necessity so your hands are
tied.

------
outside1234
We see now that "Do no evil" was a sham and a cover story, for in fact, doing
evil.

~~~
spacemanmatt
and Microsoft is neither micro nor soft. This is not a deep observation.

------
stretchwithme
If it's a valid criticism of a significant issue, why would it be necessary
for the target of a criticism to fund it? Surely there would enough injured
parties who have a reason to fund it.

~~~
mulmen
What if the significant issue is that the injured parties do not have the
resources to speak? The validity of criticism should not be linked to economic
power of the injured.

~~~
stretchwithme
Anyone can voice a criticism. And ask others to assist.

Ask. Not compel. You no longer have freedom of speech if you are forced to
promote ideas you don't believe in.

~~~
mulmen
I agree that the target of criticism should not be required to fund that
speech and that the freedom of speech also applies to the right to not speak.

My comment deals with your second sentence.

> Surely there would enough injured parties who have a reason to fund it.

You suggest that criticism is valid only if the injured have the economic
power to speak. This is a dangerous way to determine validity because it forms
a feedback loop where those with economic power suppress the speech of those
without.

------
cat199
Sooo... if anyone at google wants to make the 'I feel lucky' link for
'streisand effect' go to this article, that would be a great easter egg.. just
saying..

------
vproman
People seem to be confusing free speech (expression without interference by
government) with the ability to say whatever you want without consequence. The
pushback from the executive chairman is no less a form of free expression than
the writings of the author. This doesn't mean I'm in favor of increasingly
large corporations, but this article undermines the argument against massive
corporations by presenting a motive that is easily dismissed.

------
bspringstead

        I used to buy video games at a Gamestop next to my neighborhood supermarket. At one point, they had an employee that seemed to love to make unnecessary negative comments about my taste in games. It's a manager's prerogative to fire the employee for providing a bad customer experience, just like it was mine to just get my games somewhere else. Ultimately donors are think tank customers, and this is all perfectly fine: the world where I am forced to go to the same store, or a Gamestop manager has to tolerate an employee that tries to deter people from buying non-Microsoft products, is probably worse than one where someone on a think tank has to measure what they say.
         There's learnings to had here though: The case of a think tank relying on very few donors is no different than a B2B startup that relies on a single enterprise company: You have a tremendous risk, the funding can disappear at any time, and for any reason. Anything other than diversification puts you at risk, and it's not really the customer's fault if you put yourself in a very weak position.
         This also affects far bigger fish, like media companies and even legislators. And that's why we should have care when it comes to both media consolidation, or mechanisms where very few people can have a very big influence on the outcome of an election. But it's not as if we live in a world where the only way to have a think tank that produces policy proposals is to clear everything with Google.

~~~
euyyn
Without the weird formatting:

> I used to buy video games at a Gamestop next to my neighborhood supermarket.
> At one point, they had an employee that seemed to love to make unnecessary
> negative comments about my taste in games. It's a manager's prerogative to
> fire the employee for providing a bad customer experience, just like it was
> mine to just get my games somewhere else. Ultimately donors are think tank
> customers, and this is all perfectly fine: the world where I am forced to go
> to the same store, or a Gamestop manager has to tolerate an employee that
> tries to deter people from buying non-Microsoft products, is probably worse
> than one where someone on a think tank has to measure what they say.

> There's learnings to had here though: The case of a think tank relying on
> very few donors is no different than a B2B startup that relies on a single
> enterprise company: You have a tremendous risk, the funding can disappear at
> any time, and for any reason. Anything other than diversification puts you
> at risk, and it's not really the customer's fault if you put yourself in a
> very weak position.

> This also affects far bigger fish, like media companies and even
> legislators. And that's why we should have care when it comes to both media
> consolidation, or mechanisms where very few people can have a very big
> influence on the outcome of an election. But it's not as if we live in a
> world where the only way to have a think tank that produces policy proposals
> is to clear everything with Google.

------
akras14
I used to think that Sundar Pichai was pushing all questionable things at
Google. I now realize that roots of the problems may be deeper.

~~~
rifung
Disclaimer: I work at Google.

Would you mind explaining why you thought that of Sundar Pichai? Not trying to
defend him or us I am just curious as this is the first time I've heard that.

------
gourou
> Wherever you work, whatever you do, your livelihood and your liberties are
> every day more at risk as long as we allow a few giant corporations —
> especially in online commerce — to continue to extend their reach into and
> over the world of ideas.

The last sentence is particularly interesting given The WaPo is owned by Jeff
Bezos

------
arca_vorago
The other angle about Google (and others like Facebook) is the hidden and
incestious relationship it has with certain government subfactions. Inqtel
always comes up, but that's just the surface of a likely much deeper well.
With that in mind, moves like this have a much more sinister tint.

------
justinjlynn
A think tank isn't a tank for thinking in; it is a weapon that fires rounds
made of thought.

------
jotjotzzz
Have we ever imposed antitrust laws since the early 2000s (Microsoft)? These
laws have not caught up with the Internet age, gigantic corporations like
Google and Amazon have been expanding freely spreading quickly, they are too
big to fail at this point.

------
squarefoot
A huge number of blogs and sites make money through Google (adwords etc), so
technically they're funded also by Google. Does this mean that they cannot
host any criticism against Google or risk being shut down?

------
dang
Big discussion about this yesterday:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15131370](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15131370)

------
dahoramanodoceu
Everything is political, even your choice of browser and web search. It's a
common misconception in America that politics occur in those white marble
palaces and that politics is something one does with their mouth and a phone.
No.

That is the representation, the socialization, of power. "Politics" as we call
it is the regularization of power, but power dynamics occur more forcefully
everywhere _but_ there.

------
mikeash
Why is this so interesting? They criticized a major customer and got fired.
This would be distressing if it was a newspaper or scientific research
organization or something, but I have no expectation that a "think tank" would
have a hard wall between customers and output.

Does it just come down to some people having a completely different idea of
what a "think tank" is and why it exists?

~~~
mulmen
I think this prompts an interesting conversation about corporate power to
influence speech. Also, think tanks impact more than just the people funding
them so the customer model doesn't fit as neatly.

------
shp0ngle
Can you criticise Amazon or Jeff Bezos on wapost?

~~~
nvarsj
Err who cares? It's irrelevant to TFA and has been discussed ad nauseam.

------
dghughes
"Don't be evil" is still in the Google code of conduct.

Legal as Google's demand was it seems to qualify as evil or at least
unethical.

~~~
calbear81
Except for the definition of "evil" is pretty grey. If Google believes that
their worldview is the "good", then people who challenge that viewpoint are
necessarily harming the good and therefore shutting them down would not be
evil at all.

------
bspringstead
If its a reasonable thought and opinion it shouldn't be shot down as something
rude. it's your choice to say what you want

------
ProAm
This is no different than criticizing your employer, don't be surprised when
they fire you for that.

~~~
jhawk28
Criticizing your employer is considered protected speech in the US.

Edit: I stand corrected. "Some" forums of criticizing your employer may be
considered protected. You may need a lawsuit to enforce that protection....

~~~
pwthornton
It's not. You can't just criticize your employer with impunity.

Only a very narrowly tailored set of criticisms related to whistleblowing,
labor practices and a few other areas are protected.

~~~
spacemanmatt
For the purpose of 1st amendment protection, you can criticize your employer
with impunity. You can criticize the government with impunity, too.

What most people mean when they talk about their freedom of speech is the
privilege of speaking without losing their job. I find it to be a tragic if
not fatal misunderstanding pervasive to discussions about speech.

------
frgtpsswrdlame
One of the aspects of this I'm most interested in is when Google started
donating to New America. It seems obvious to me that Google is giving money to
political organizations in exchange for influence and that both parties here
share blame. But if Google started giving money to New America and Eric
Schmidt joined the board knowing that New America was funding an anti-monopoly
group then I think that makes Google and Eric look a lot worse.

How many think tank papers have been quietly shredded because the author
didn't have the courage Barry Lynn did?

~~~
radicaldreamer
The whole think tank industry is like this. This is one of the main reasons
why things like single payer don't have the intellectual backing of rigorous
white papers and advocacy -- there isn't a whole lot of money to be made for
corporations lowering the cost of healtcare.

~~~
cwyers
> there isn't a whole lot of money to be made for corporations lowering the
> cost of healtcare.

I don't know if that's true. There are a lot of companies that would save
money if healthcare was cheaper -- pretty much every company in America is a
health-care consumer. It's just that benefits are diffuse and the downsides of
lower-cost health care are concentrated.

~~~
aaronblohowiak
large firms would lose talent to smaller firms.

~~~
digikata
Then the smaller firms could be acquired. As it is, because of the slowing
new-company generation, large firms have been getting fewer and fewer options.
Small firms can take risks to create new products and processes which can then
be acquired and taken up and expanded by large companies. Generally its much
more difficult for a large company to do that creation part in-house. So
insufficient small firms end up affecting the large-firm capability in the
end.

~~~
SimbaOnSteroids
Unfortunately this type of long term benefit for the large corporation doesn't
affect the next quarterly report and is ignored in favor of more short term
gains.

~~~
digikata
Productivity gains seem to be dropping and one theory is that companies are
getting larger, but aren't able to pickup efficiency/new value generation
boosts from acquisitions like they once were able to (at an economy wide
scale, not talking about the acquisitions of any specific company or even
sectors here). It is difficult to make any certain conclusions here though.
But if true, they will have to care sooner or later.

------
hobo_mark
From the title I had initially assumed it was about the infamous memo. For
anybody else who might get the same impression: it's a different story and
it's actually worth reading.

------
gaius
Google might as well cancel _all_ funding to think tanks now - because no-one
will believe a single pro-Google word they say.

~~~
mrguyorama
If only we could be so lucky. Think tanks are often shown to be biased or
otherwise "poisoned", but the average person will refer to and quote what they
WANT to believe.

Is it even possible for a group like a think tank to remain "clean"? How would
they get their funding?

~~~
gaius
The RAND Corporation seem to be universally respected, how do they do it?

~~~
dragonwriter
The RAND Corp is a military long-range planning project that got separated
from Douglas Aircraft to avoid conflict of interest that would jeopardise
Douglas’s eligibility for contracts, and then took on a life of its own. It
still does a lot of federal work ubder governments of both parties, and's kind
of important to that that it's not seen either as an shill for a particular
ideology or a shill for particular corporate interests. That is, while
advancing particular viewpoints is the purpose of some think tanks and the
financial interests of others, it's neither for RAND.

------
bitmapbrother
If this person expected any other result from his ridiculous action then he
was delusional. If my salary is funded by Google and I publically publish a
celebratory post congratulating the EU for fining Google then I fully expect
to be fired.

------
drpgq
Maybe he can get together with Damore and commiserate.

------
sigi45
Adblock and than i need a subscription? no.

~~~
vaishaksuresh
Washington post gives you a long trial period if you are an Amazon prime
customer. The subscription is cheaper if you are a student. Support good
journalists, they are people too. Either give them ad revenue or get a
subscription. If you don't work for free, don't expect others to.

~~~
gertef
This screed isn't good journalism, though. For the best that people get
blocked by the paywall.

~~~
vaishaksuresh
Then don't read and don't complain about their business model. Simple.

------
balls187
This feels less about Google, and more that Eric Schmidt is a petty, little
man.

~~~
oh_sigh
Yes, petty in the same way that uou are pretty when yoi fired the painter you
hired to paint your house when he starts to replace your roof.

~~~
balls187
That comparison doesn't make any sense.

Eric Schmidt didn't hire Barry Lynn. New America did.

Perhaps a better analogy: The same way I would be petty, if I fired a painter
I hired, because he showed up with wearing a Colin Kaepnernick Jersey and my
neighbor the police officer, who lets me borrow his lawnmower, was furious.

~~~
spacemanmatt
A better analogy: Your boss' boss is also your boss.

------
_mb
I'm confused why this story has so many upvotes... someone criticized a
company then said company fires the person. BAU?

------
harry8
And nobody commenting here works for google, has worked for google or hopes
to. Not one comment. Because obviously they would be disclosing their
interests. Wouldn't they?

Disclosure: People commenting in favor of their employer without disclosing
that fact s __ts me to tears.

------
5trokerac3
Not at all surprising if you've read When Google Met Wikileaks[0]

That being said, how delusional do you have to be working in a political think
tank and think it'll be ok to cheer a multi-billion dollar fine against your
main financial contributor. This guy got pummeled by his own hubris.

[0] - [https://www.amazon.com/When-Google-WikiLeaks-Julian-
Assange/...](https://www.amazon.com/When-Google-WikiLeaks-Julian-
Assange/dp/1944869115)

------
beepboopbeep
Only thing a company owes you is what is in your contact and vice versa. I
don't understand what people don't get about this. If you criticize the
government and get thrown in jail, that's a violation of free speech. But If
you complain about your employer then they can fire you. If you don't like
your employer, you can leave. That's how it works. End of story.

The guy is publishing an article in a major news publication about his
experiences during all of this. His free speech is quite obviously not being
suppressed.

~~~
monus
What is the point of think tanks then? Just get paid by companies and do their
propaganda but expect people to believe your thoughts are free because it's a
"non-profit"?

~~~
EpicEng
Well, that's a good question for the think tanks. I imagine they always want
more funding, so they reach out to corporations, and ultimately find
themselves in conflict. I'm sure they'd argue that, without the corporate
money, they wouldn't exist in the first place. Catch 22.

------
gojomo
Related questions:

Should pseudonymous commenters in threads like this disclose if they, in fact,
work for Google?

Should downvoters? (I've sometimes noticed mildly Google-skeptical comments
here sinking in a rush of downvotes, without refutation, and wondered to what
extent Google's sheer size suppresses certain discussions.)

------
_sdegutis
> Big businesses can threaten free speech when they accumulate too much power.
> For Google, that moment has come.

This feels like a bit of an exaggeration in this situation, no? I mean, some
states have at-will employment where they can just fire you for any reason
they want. And if you're doing things that are _actively_ working against
them, of course they're going to want to part ways with you. And even in
states without that, I'm sure there's some clause in their contract that says
"if you speak out against us we have the option of terminating you." That's
not really a free speech issue at that point, right? Their free speech isn't
being hindered or taken away at all. Rather, a business is making business
decisions based on your speech, which happen to effect you.

EDIT: to clarify, I'm all for the world getting more ethical. I was just kind
of arguing a semantic: free speech is mostly known for being a civil liberty,
and Google _technically_ isn't restricting that in this case.

~~~
SilasX
Well, yes and no.

The philosophy behind freedom of speech is (to greatly simplify) "it's so much
better for the advancement of ideas when people can say controversial things
without being afraid of material reprisals."

One _way_ to promote the ideal is to not push _legal penalties_ against those
who say such things. That's the basis of the legal protection of speech, and
specific countries' laws thereon (in the US, the First Amendment).

But you get the same disaster, and failure of the ideal, when non-governmental
actors do it. If everyone fears going into poverty when they say something
controversial, well, we're in the same crappy-ideas-that-no-one-criticizes
dystopia.

Hence my frustration at those who give the lecture about "lol First Amendment
is just for the government" and "lol why should they have to pay you when they
don't like your ideas?" Yes, they're technically correct, but it's comically
missing the point to "stand up for free speech" but also cheer on the
technically-legal ways you can make someone suffer for disagreeing with you.

That _doesn 't_ mean we should force you to keep buying from those whose ideas
you don't like. It _does_ mean we shouldn't be sanguine about orgs using
financial power over someone's livelihood to keep their (potentially) good
ideas from being spoken.

~~~
pfisch
This is sort of ridiculous. You don't have to keep someone on your payroll who
is actively speaking out about white supremacy.

There should be social consequences for your speech, just not legal ones.

~~~
AlgorithmicTime
Social censorship of speech is nearly as dangerous as government censorship of
speech. We need to have a robust norm of not trying to silence people for
dissenting viewpoints

~~~
pfisch
So if my employee is advocating murdering me and my entire family that is
cool? I have to fund someone who is actively trying to get political support
to put me in a concentration camp?

------
hibikir
I used to buy videogames at a Gamestop next to my neighborhood supermarket. At
one point, they had an employee that seemed to love to make unnecessary
negative comments about my taste in games. It's a manager's prerogative to
fire the employee for providing a bad customer experience, just like it was
mine to just get my games somewhere else. Ultimately donors are think tank
customers, and this is all perfectly fine: A world where I am forced to go to
the same store, or a Gamestop manager has to tolerate an employee that tries
to deter people from buying non-microsoft products, is probably worse than one
where someone on a think tank has to measure what they say.

There's learnings to had here though: The case of a think tank relying on very
few donors is no different than a B2B startup that relies on a single
enterprise company: You have a tremendous risk, the funding can disappear at
any time, and for any reason. Anything other than diversification puts you at
risk, and it's not really the customer's fault if you put yourself in a very
weak position.

This also affects far bigger fish, like media companies and even legislators.
And that's why we should have care when it comes to both media consolidation,
or mechanisms where very few people can have a very big influence in the
outcome of an election. But it's not as if we live in a world where the only
way to have a think tank that produces policy proposals is to clear everything
with Google.

~~~
etjossem
The retail example is an oversimplification. When the consumers of a company's
product are also its primary source of revenue, nobody is under any illusions
about who that company is responsible to. You are the person most impacted by
Gamestop's customer experience, and you are also the main way Gamestop makes
money. Your satisfaction is paramount, so it makes total sense for a company
to fire people who don't deliver. Similar example: there's nothing
irresponsible about insisting your public relations firm writes you a
flattering press release, because everyone understands that a press release is
paid for by the company it concerns.

A think tank is a different sort of animal. The donor is _not_ the main entity
impacted by the policy proposals the think tank produces. Just like a
responsible media outlet must have a notion of journalistic integrity, or a
legislator's office should feel beholden to its constituents, a think tank has
a responsibility to provide sound policy advice to its readers.

You can take the position that "think tanks do not have any level of
responsibility to the people who consume their policy proposals" but I
certainly would not follow you there. Policy institutes present themselves as
rigorously data-driven nonprofits and write with an impartial air. If
criticism / negative results are known to lead directly to a loss of funding,
then it is disingenuous for the think tank to present itself as impartial, and
I would consider it compromised.

We tend to solve this problem with regulatory agencies that represent the
impacted consumer (and _not_ the source of revenue), though I would note that
this is the very solution the author was fired for praising.

------
megous
It's like some Jewish organization funding Nazis and then being surprised (and
angried!) that [Nazis] bit the hand that fed them. It's somewhat
incomprehensible.

Perhaps people assume that Google funded this org because of the ideas it
spread, and not for some profit motive, or for some outcome. So now it seems
it was never about the ideas. I mean, the left is for anti-monopoly laws,
therefore that something like this might happen should have been pretty clear.

So it's either stupidity on part of Google, or perhaps they fund such
organizations in order to have control over them. (invisible hand of self-
censorship, because money)

