Google contains multitudes. I don't doubt that your personal experience was the opposite end of the spectrum from mine.
I maintain that firing is an extreme resolution here (taking the claims at face value of course). Surely this employee has demonstrated the capacity to deliver impact and could be redirected if properly incentivized.
As a Xoogler you should know that the "impact" they want is, making leadership look good, what you shipped or even whether or not you shipped is nigh irrelevant.
I don't see anything about the product that made Google leadership look bad? I don't see that anyone else external to Google thought so either, before they fired him? Firing him makes them look bad, however.
Create a product that people loved? This could have been redirected to make leadership look good. This event demonstrates that impactful products can be extremely polarizing - you could become the hero or the villain or a bit of both. You can no longer be a quiet contributor.
It does not contain people who flout Google's privacy, security, or intellectual property policies. Those people are, quite rightfully, un-contained from Google with speed they can't muster for anything else in the company.
I maintain that firing is an extreme resolution here (taking the claims at face value of course). Surely this employee has demonstrated the capacity to deliver impact and could be redirected if properly incentivized.