Sunday 23 January 2011

Google: Eric Schmidt to step down as CEO; Larry Page (co-founder) to replace him

[Post published by Liviu on Liviu's [Computer Science] Blog]


Noooooo.. What did I say? Noooooo...

Indeed, Eric Schmidt is to step down as CEO in April 2011... I've just stumbled on an article on TechCrunch [article] and said to myself: What? Is this true? Wtf?

Searched a bit inside the The Official Google Blog and what do you know? - it IS true [Google Blog: post]

Hey, it's even on Twitter [post] :)) Eric on Twitter - that's such a great joke given some of his speeches / interviews / key notes... Wait, Eric Schmidt has a twitter channel? [channel] Funny, I've heard him many times mocking Twitter. A ha ha :)) What next? He'll become an active Facebook user? :))


All in all, my personal opinion (published on my computer science blog [1]) is that Google has become what it is today due to Eric's skill as a leader - I've watched may presentations and/or interviews of him in the last 2+ years and I'm impressed by his skill and intelligence.

I see his leadership and management style [2] to have been and still be the force which manages Larry, Sergey and developers' energy, ideas and desires to aim sky high. He took the company from a 200-employees start-up and developed it into a super power - indeed, he had brilliant developers to work with, constantly hired new brilliant developers, empowered innovation etc. - I see all these as big pluses.

I regret Eric Schmidt is leaving [4], but am also curious on Larry Page's [3] leadership impact on the innovation pattern of the company. Thanks Eric, good luck Larry!

Wait, April 4th they said? That must be wrong - I surely hope they meant April 1st :)) Really!




A great funny comment on TechCrunch - I removed the Caps and some words, while inserting a couple new words to make it funnier:
  • Apple: wowowow, omg billions billions billions. Increase of X, increase of Y, omg Apple is blowing people out of the water. Buy, buy, buy!... oh and CEO is taking medical leave and leaving the company in the hands of a longtime business partner that nobody has heard of since... wait, what's the other Steve's name?... 
  • Google: earnings are quite good, but...that's just secondary... omg the CEO is stepping down and leaving the company in the hands of one of its co-founders, also his 10-years business partner and actively working at Google’s day-to-day operations, and omg the world is so going to end. Sell, sell, sell!




In the news


Guardian's take on the subject [Guardian: article]

Ok, they talk again about spam in search results... Have they tried Bing? It's worse :))
Are they idiots? All they see is search and Android as successes? Well, there's also
  1. GMail - btw, the anti-spam service is great; really, try Yahoo, Hotmail etc. and then tell me your opinion
  2. Calendar
  3. Reader
  4. Translate - I wish I had this when studying French in highschool :)) Oh, yeah, that would've been awesome.
  5. Docs
  6. Maps
  7. YouTube (they bought it, yes, but improved it a lot)
  8. Picasa
  9. Analytics (bought it, but improved it a lot)
  10. Blogger (bought it, but improved it a lot)
  11. Google Apps - Hey, I run both my domains on Apps and I'm grateful for the free service
plus there are some I never tried, but seem great given the demos during Eric's speeches and/or separate presentations/demos:
  1. Goggles
  2. Voice search
  3. Voice real time translation
  4. Google App Engine
and the 2 lists could go on...

Why does Guardian say that? Because the new hype is social. Oh gi'me a break!
Social is and will be cool.
Social is and will be a great feature of the future development of Internet, indeed.
However, ignoring all other aspects of our lives looks stupid to me.

The Guardian: Such a laissez-faire attitude won't work once you get bigger, as the Buzz example shows. - Congrats Guardian for killing the innovation spirit. We appreciate it! Hey, grow up, failure is part of life; one has to try multiple times in order to get it right!
I, for one, surely hope Google to keep & improve this laissez-faire attitude in order to deliver more great & free products/services!




[1] That's a subtle joke, since I have 2 blogs: one treats my personal (but not too personal) life, and the other one treats computer science-related topics. Now you get it? A personal opinion on the computer science blog :)

[2] Hey, Eric Schmidt had successfully lead big projects and/or companies before - [Eric's bio at Google; Wikipedia: Eric Schmidt]

[3] Side note: Hey I never noticed that PageRank [Wikipedia: PageRank Algorithm] is called after Larry Page - I've always interpreted page as page [M-W: page] - always analyzed how things worked, but rarely paid attention to where the naming comes from. I can barely stop laughing now.

[4] Am I too old to accept the replacement of people I admire?  Have I grown too old already not to take a huge leap towards innovation?

3 comments:

andreiolaru said...

But... but..., Eric... Please don't go, the developers need you, they look up to you. You are my role-model too... Before, I used to welcome with joy our new Googly overlords, but now, when they are not headed by Eric any more, my allegiance may change...

(additional points for finding 2 paraphrases)

Liviu said...

A ha ha, that' so funny. However, you misinterpret the message.

I respect Eric's leadership and management skills. I do believe he still has the intelligence and vision to lead for many years to come.

I also respect Google's bold move to withdraw from China. That takes balls.

However, since the decision has already been taken and there's no turning back, I'm curious how Larry Page shall do. I wish him luck since I need those great Google products/services.

andreiolaru said...

But I was not trying to reinterpret your message. It is really my take on what happened. I actually am sorry he's stepping down. Eric was so funny and cool.