Google at 12

Link to September 26 San Jose Mercury News article, "Google at 12: A company navigating the conflicts that come with age".

Excerpt: They called it "the airport test."

When Google filed its incorporation papers 12 years ago, the company that would grow to a $24 billion-a-year business consisted of three Stanford computer science graduate students, all in their mid-20s. But even back in September 1998, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google's co-founders, and Craig Silverstein, Google's first employee, had a clear idea how they would carefully pick their hires, choosing people compatible with the culture they planned to create.

"We had the airport test, which was Larry's test, I think, or maybe it was Sergey's test," Silverstein said. "Which was if your flight got canceled, and you were stuck in the airport for three hours with this guy or this girl, how happy would you be about that?"

As Google marks its 12th birthday this month -- a milestone that in a lifetime represents the end of childhood -- the tightknit, idealistic culture forged by the airplane test remains one of the company's foundational strengths. Many key players in its top management date to its earliest days, veterans of 100-hour work weeks and parking-lot roller-hockey games, who shared a vision of a company that could change the world.

But just as those former 20-somethings are now looking at 40, with spouses, kids and other middle-age responsibilities, so too have their views of business matured. With the growth in Google's reach and power, their idealism is now forced to vie with coldblooded calculation, observers say.

Ever notice how these reportorial transitions almost always involve anonymous 'observers', 'experts', 'analysts', 'authorities', 'scholars'.....whatever?   And the Ken Auletta quote doesn't directly address the 'coldblooded calculation' observation.