
This is your pilot speaking.  Now, about that holding pattern... - epi0Bauqu
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/this-is-your-pilot-speaking-now-about.html
======
vegashacker
Honest and classy apology. Nice, Google.

~~~
boundlessdreamz
Yeah. Honesty is nice. Owning up to failures is extra nice.

The twitter fiasco of first removing a feature because it was "confusing"
[according to them] and then backtracking and saying that it was removed
because of engineering problems was interesting to watch.

~~~
jm4
Honesty is not nice and neither is owning up to failures. It's expected. It's
a sad state of affairs when there are enough people and companies that hold
themselves to a lower standard that the ones that do what they're supposed to
do are somehow worthy of some extra recognition.

------
aristus
Sounds like someone fucked up a BGP update. Happens all the time:
<http://www.google.com/search?q=bgp+update+outage+level3>

~~~
dfj225
Is it me or does it seem that when you are something like Google there should
be a process to prevent just this sort of thing?

~~~
igorhvr
I hate when someone suggests adding process to fix a problem - and I saw this
quite a few times already.

Most people clearly understand the benefits of adding process, but very few
seem to realize the costs.

If I tried hard I am pretty sure I could create a checklist with 1000 items
for each developer to go through, and no one could argue against any of the
items - individually, they would all be ok / necessary / correct. However, if
I forced every developer to go through the list every time, for every change,
they would - rightly so - feel crushed.

With very few exceptions - where a new process is really granted, I see people
trying to substitute either thinking or automation by process. Which is a
recipe for bureaucracy, and in my view a good part of why working for a BigCo
can be so miserable sometimes.

A new process should be a last resort, after we answered yes to: a) Is it
really beyond us to automate this?, b) Is there some flaw in human beings that
will ensure this will repeat? c) Are the consequences of this mistake _really_
serious?

~~~
thras
It turns out that you can reduce the number of surgical instruments left in
patients by 33% by implementing checklists. Surgeons won't do it because it
feels beneath them.

~~~
bkudria
And it is. We have computers for this. Specifically, RFID chips, and readers.

Surgeons are very very expensive, so their time is too.

~~~
andreyf
_Surgeons are very very expensive, so their time is too._

Surgical instruments, on the other hand, are easy to replace ;)

------
phatboyslim
Likely hypothesis -- three thousand third party application developers who use
google web services just got phone calls regarding application speed issues.

~~~
jasonkester
Ah, but that's also the nice thing about relying on somebody else's API: When
it breaks, it's not your job to fix it.

Back in the dot-com days of '99, I built and maintained an app that was pretty
much identical to what Google Maps released 5 years later (yeah, with tiles
and javascript dragging & all that). The downside is that the backend was
pulling from this crap GIS system that was always overloaded.

So it would bog down under load. And it was my problem. And it hurt.

So 10 years later, I run a little site built on the Google Maps API. Today it
bogged down under load. And it was sunny out so I went out rock climbing
because a whole team of smart people were scrambling to fix it for me and it
wasn't my problem.

Sometimes "not my problem" can be pretty nice.

~~~
yan
You climb? Where at?

I always wanted to pitch the idea of having a YC meetup at a climbing gym.

~~~
jasonkester
Kinda everywhere. I travel most of the year, following the sunshine to spots
with good climbing, surfing and wifi. I'm in the Lake District (Northwest
Engand) at the moment.

I seem to find myself in the 'states for about 3-6 months most years, usually
in LA. If there were a hacker crag session when I was in town, I'd be there.

~~~
yan
I'm a climber who loves surfing and hacking. Looking for hires? haha.

A climbing meetup is something I've been planning. I will probably ping the
local (nyc) folks to see if they're interested.

