Sergey Burkov: How much more popular is pizza foie gras?

    Sergey Burkov, head of the Moscow Google Development Center , talks about the Google Developer Day today, the areas of work of the Russian representative office of the company, and much more.

    Sergey Burkov, Google RussiaGoogle Developer Day is held globally - at several offices, including the head office in California. It is held in order to tell independent developers about the possibilities of working with Google - with the help of various APIs.

    The current Developer Day is the second in a row, however, for Russia this is a new event: the last "Developer Day" was held in California and was devoted exclusively to the company's mapping services. This event is dedicated to other APIs. With the help of “Developer Day” we want to tell independent developers as much as possible about what can be done on our platform. We want to make the Internet more convenient for end users and we fully understand that we cannot do everything on our own. Many new ideas come to the mind of developers who do not work with us yet, so we provide them with a platform - and then they will come up with new applications.

    What are the main areas of work of the Moscow Development Center? I understand that you very often answer this question, but still ...

    Our goal, first of all, is to make all those products that are available in the USA accessible to Russian users. Another important part is the development of new technologies for the entire company.

    Regarding the localization of products: we opened the Russian edition of Google News, added a bug correction system to the search engine, released the Google Toolbar with a Russian dictionary and several gadgets for iGoogle. And now - maps of Russia, including search and mapplets, i.e. programmers can start work on creating Russian-language “maplets”.

    During the presentation of the Russian office of Google, you spoke in detail about working conditions and about hiring a company. What is the situation with vacancies now?

    Since then nothing has changed: Google is still recruiting employees, and only the best of the best. The bar is quite high: a lot of questions are asked in the interview, which takes place in several stages. In this case, the interview process is quite democratic: several engineers interview the applicant, each of whom subsequently writes a report; based on the averaged data from these reports, a decision is made on hiring.

    Do you have enough of the number of specialists who have been interviewed, or is there still a “personnel shortage”?

    In Russia, there are enough talented developers, just as yet not everyone works at Google.

    On the one hand, we have enough specialists who can handle complex tasks - which, in general, should be noticeable on Google Maps. But if there are more, we will take them to work. We will take everyone who passes the interview, there are no restrictions.

    How many students do internships at the company now? What universities do they come from, what are they working on, and what secrets do they have access to?

    We have trained several students from leading universities. For example, from Moscow State University. For example, with mehmat. They are working on the same things as regular staff. To get an internship, you need to go through almost the same complex “filter” as when applying for a job.

    You have been with Google for a little over a year. What do you consider your highest achievement during this time?

    Probably cards.

    And in terms of personality?

    In the personal ... Most likely - the fact that the office is growing, manages to create a very good team with talented programmers. Manages to organize the work correctly, as is customary in Google.

    Do you now have your own projects or do you give all your time to the company? After all, there is a rule of "80/20".

    Yes, an employee can devote 20% of his time to his projects, but these projects are still created for Google. Google News appeared precisely because of this rule. The main idea is that the engineer should not ask permission for new projects from the manager.

    As for me, then 150% of my working time is spent on management.

    That is, the luxury of 80/20 is available only to developers, but not to managers?

    (laughs) In general, it is available to me, but just ... it does not add up.

    Those startups that you had before joining Google - can you tell us a little about them?

    At first there was Bilbo Innovations , in it my partner was Alex Frid - also a native of Russia, a graduate of the physical education department. The company was manufacturing pedals for computers. The pedal is needed for people with disabilities, people suffering from arthritis, in general - for those who find it difficult to click the mouse or press some keys on the keyboard: the device can be programmed by clicking the mouse, by pressing a key.

    Along with Fried, Invincible Data Systems, a cryptographic company, was created. This company created an analog of the Microsoft Encrypted File System, and it was created earlier than the Microsoft product. Subsequently, Invincible Data Systems was sold to a larger "player" -VASCO Data Security (last year, VASCO was among the ten fastest growing companies in the world).

    The third company was Dulance, which created a search engine for products. Google bought it - and we all made up the backbone of the Moscow office.

    And before the creation of all these companies, you taught the physics of quasicrystals. Quasicrystals and Google? ..

    (laughs) No, no. This is a pure science that Google does not need.

    Although in general there is a good story about pure science. In the 40-50s of the last century there was such a mathematician by the name of Hardy, who was involved in number theory. He boasted that number theory is pure science, pure mathematics, useless to anyone and not having any practical application. He was very proud of it - but cryptography, based entirely on number theory, appeared.

    Today it became known about the purchase of Panoramio . In your opinion, are there any startups in Russia that could be of interest to large companies?

    Yes, they are few - but they appear, and it is very nice.

    Even 4-5 years ago it was believed that in Russia, China and India there are many talented programmers, but no ideas; people executed “offshore” orders, but did not create their projects. Now the situation in Russia has changed: there are interesting companies.

    Why is all this happening?

    Honestly, I don’t know.

    After all, startups in America are a relatively new phenomenon: Silicon Valley appeared in the 60s. All innovations took place inside General Electric, Xerox, AT&T, etc. Then society somehow evolves, business models appear, but I don’t know how it all happens.

    How do you feel about the "Google conspiracy theory"? There are a considerable number of publications expressing concern that the company is collecting an increasing amount of information, which will subsequently be used “for other purposes”.

    In the world, in general, there are many theories that have no real basis. People like to come up with something about flying saucers, and so this is from the same opera.

    Yes, Google deals with a lot of information about the user, but it is not “sewn” to specific people. The information that is stored with us is generalized. When a person makes a request for “pizza in Paris”, we are absolutely not interested in who he is: we are more interested in how much a request for pizza is more popular than a request for foie gras. Information that is tied to the user is kept to a minimum - and there is a strict company policy regarding access to it. This access is reliably guarded; not all employees can get it.

    We are not going to spy on people, but, of course, we are interested in generalized information, since it helps to set up a search engine, give out more targeted advertising - and this makes everyone better.

    What did the company do best? Search, contextual advertising?

    Undoubtedly, the search engine - and it takes the most effort. The simplicity of the white page with the input field is apparent: very tricky algorithms are hidden behind it, behind it is the work of thousands of engineers.

    That is not Google Adwords and Adsense? After all, it is they who make a profit.

    They are also excellent, but still their basis is search.

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