If his primary concern had been Google Reader staying alive, he arguably had "false sense of comfort" back then, and this is exactly what I am saying. He made a mistake in evaluating risks.
The news is not for him, of course, as it would have been useless. The news is for anyone else who feels like safely innovating within a big company with _any_ culture today. There is a trade-off that you always take. Know it well when you make it. It can be much easier to leverage a big company's resources; on the other hand, your product may not follow your initial vision or get a bullet in its head. "The culture seemed cool back then so I was fooled by recruiter propaganda telling me I have control, blah, blah..." is not an excuse.
EDIT:
To clarify, all of this post presumed it would have been successful if he'd done it outside Google, something he seems to imply by his statement. I want to reiterate that I personally object to this very assumption, so I think he made the right trade-off, in which case, it's all fine, but he should not post a rant that implies doing it outside Google would have been catch-free.
The news is not for him, of course, as it would have been useless. The news is for anyone else who feels like safely innovating within a big company with _any_ culture today. There is a trade-off that you always take. Know it well when you make it. It can be much easier to leverage a big company's resources; on the other hand, your product may not follow your initial vision or get a bullet in its head. "The culture seemed cool back then so I was fooled by recruiter propaganda telling me I have control, blah, blah..." is not an excuse.
EDIT: To clarify, all of this post presumed it would have been successful if he'd done it outside Google, something he seems to imply by his statement. I want to reiterate that I personally object to this very assumption, so I think he made the right trade-off, in which case, it's all fine, but he should not post a rant that implies doing it outside Google would have been catch-free.