Thinking of a Pivoting Your Career into Tech or AI? Do this.
If I were transitioning into Tech or AI again in 2026, this is exactly what I’d do.
Rhody Hill
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2d
Love this advice Nat
Latest Google Articles
The Google Archipelago
Living in the Digital Gulag: How Big Tech Trains Us to Silence Ourselves in 2026
A few months ago I finally read Michael Rectenwald’s 2019 book Google Archipelago: The Digital Gulag and the Simulation of Freedom. At the time it struck me as sharp, maybe even a touch hyperbolic. Seven years on, it no longer feels like hyperbole—it feels like prophecy.
Design a Collaborative Document Editor like Google Docs | Google PM Interview
Technical Product Questions for System Design: Follow step by step guide on how to answer system design questions in a PM Interview
Check more Technical Questions for PM Interviews
Outstanding walkthrough of the OT implementation decision! The OT vs CRDT comparison crystalizes a trade-off most PM candidates gloss over or dont even realize exists. I've used ShareDB in production and the hidden complexity isn't the algorithm itself but debugging edge cases when things break. The SPECTS framwork keeps the anwer structured without feeling robotic, which is rare in system design guides.
Google Interview Preparation Guide 2026
Introduction
Thank you so much for sharing this. I really appreciate it.
I have one doubt regarding the last line you mentioned: “If you are able to solve 2 medium or 1 hard new (you haven’t seen yet) problem in 1 hour.”
In my case, sometimes I am able to solve such problems, but sometimes the question is completely new and I am not able to relate it to any of the problems I’ve solved before. In those situations, I’m unable to solve it within an hour.
What should I do in such cases? Thanks again for the great share.*
Thank you for this resource, it is very useful and upto the point.
Google Can’t Taste the Food!
SEO for Food Bloggers
I used to explain how Google and machines evaluate content with this analogy: imagine trying to decide which cake is the best using only measurable criteria—its weight, colors, shape, or design—without ever tasting it. Because machines cannot taste and experience food. Same goes for content, they cannot really understand it.
Will Google Dominate Artificial Intelligence?
Or Will AI Kill the Best Business Ever?
Imagine a company that accidentally strikes the most valuable oil patch in the history of capitalism. The gusher generates absurd profits. Cash piles up faster than executives can invent new places to spend it. And then—inside the company’s own labs—its scientists invent something that might make oil obsolete.
Excellent primer. One small tweak: Before search, Google did have a business doing corporate search - yellow pizza-box servers that would sort and organize all the data inside a corporation. They gave this up in favor of the far more lucrative ad business after GoTo, later Overture, did very well in the paid search business. Google used the best parts of that model and tweaked it so it was better for consumers, which meant it got more traffic. Today, of course, Google does use paid search.
This highlights a unique corporate strength, the ability to target and neutralize competition way ahead of time. The online office productivity apps, like docs and spreadsheets, was a low-cost way to drain Microsoft, a company that particularly worried Eric Schmidt after his experience running Novell (which was similarly destroyed by Microsoft.) OpenAI would seem like a miss, except even Sam Altman was amazed by how GPT-3 took off. As you say, Google then reacted. Today, OpenAI is finding its own monetization difficulties, while it tries to be a "Life OS," or all-purpose agent. As with search and social media, there's now a hunt for monetization in that.
google seeming solved efficient attention
google chatbot shocks waitress by perfectly retrieving needle from haystack at shockingly low cost
EDIT: Or you know, they could be doing this in production, but that raises questions on why other frontier labs aren’t.
2025 Year in Review: A Baby, A Bull Market, and 30% Returns
How Google Saved Christmas
2025 Year in Review: A Baby, A Bull Market, and 30% Returns
Solid contrarian call on Google during the ChatGPT panic. The disconnect between narrative and actual search revenue growth in 2024 was glaring, but most folks were too busy reading the obituaries Google wrote for itself in the headlines. The 18 PE entry in April was textbook buying fear when fundamentals told a differnet story. Had a similar moment last year watching a SaaS company tank on supposed "competition" while their retention metrics were rock-solid. Market psychology tends to overshoot on disruption risk way more than it undershoots. The partial exit at 320s shows real discipline too, leaving some upside instead of the all-or-nothing pattern that burns most individual investors.
Congrats on the returns and the new addition. I also became a dad this year, turns out it’s a much harder job than investing. No edge or due diligence can prepare you for that one. Cheers to 2026.
My Life in a Google Spreadsheet
not holistic, but always changing and evolving
The day I discovered Mindy Seu’s Cyberfeminism Index was the day my brain was rewired forever, and like Seu (and Zack Fox), I started cataloguing my life’s work in a Google spreadsheet. Over the last…
I absolutely love this. I have created so much over the years and have not kept track or record of all of it. I would love all of it to be stored in one place! About to watch and subscribe to channel and pleaseeeeeee tell me you have a shareable spreadsheet so we can do the same!
This was such a great read, you’ve inspired me to create a Google Doc filled with books I’m reading this year, with a recap of what I read. I’m in a space of learning and researching again and what a flex to create a progress report for myself to stretch myself in what I’m reading and learning. Thank you!
10 ways to use Google Keep
First in a look at cheap/free and simple tools for intentionality.
“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”, said Leonardo da Vinci, and this is a belief that can guide our life and work as we venture into the new year. I wrote about my goals for 2026 last time, but the more I think about them, the more I think I have just one goal:
Brilliant breakdown of Keep's speech-to-text capabilities. The hands-free brainstorming approach is underutilized, most people dunno that combining voice input with checklist mode creates instant outlines during walks or commutes. I've found the real bottlneck isn't the transcription quality but the lack of punctuation control when speaking, you end up with run-on thoughts that need heavy editing later. The photo OCR feature is a gamechanger for capturing whiteboard notes in meetings tho.
Regarding Google, recently there's been this opinion about Gemini overtaking ChatGPT.
I found this post on X with the following caption:
"Gemini moved from 6% to 22% of GenAI web traffic in a year while ChatGPT dropped from 87% to 65% which to me shows user changing behavior. Gemini shows up where questions already live inside Search, Chrome, Android & Workspace so new AI usage does not require a new habit, a new app or a new URL but it simply shows up."
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But I wonder the real reason behind this rise in traffic could be something else. Gemini has offered 18 months of free* subscription to Pro for Indian users.
(UPDATE: Some clarifications on the Gemini Pro "free" offer. Not all Indians get Gemini Pro for free. People who use Jio (a telecom provider, the Indian equivalent of T-Mobile, Verizon ), get 18 months of access to Gemini Pro "including Gemini 3 Pro, 2TB Google One storage, NotebookLM, and advanced image/video generation via Nano Banana/Veo 3.1".
Jio has about 40-41% Market share in India, highest of any other telecom provider.)
And it's one of the largest markets. So the rise in traffic could simply be because of that.
So, it may not be because of Geminis superior tech or access to Search, Chrome, Android & Workspace. It's simply due to free subscriptions. In that case, there's a good chance that these numbers could drop once the free offering ends, given how price sensitive Indians are.
Really sharp take on Google's durability, especially in this enviroment where everyone's fixated on AI hype. The Calico mention reminded me of a biotech investor I know who's always saying Alphabet is the most underpriced life extension bet in public markets. Most people dunno about these moonshot subsidiaries and just see search dominance, missing the compounding optionality underneath. When narrative shifts this hard, patient holders always win.
An Unpredictable Year: Google, Meta and OpenAI
Emerging technology can be unpredictable. I’m going to write about the unpredictability of two areas: 1) Smart Glasses and 2) AI Leadership.
21 Lessons from 14 Years at Google
On code, careers, and the human side of engineering
When I joined Google ~14 years ago, I thought the job was about writing great code. I was partly right. But the longer I’ve stayed, the more I’ve realized that the engineers who thrive aren’t necessarily the best programmers - they’re the ones who’ve figured out how to navigate everything around the code: the people, the politics, the alignment, the amb…
Having started as a software engineer in the late 1970s, including experience as a project manager, executive, management consultant , and entrepreneur, I think you got them all right except for two. They are the most common that people fail to understand, especially in the software industry. Regarding number three, it is always better to build it right the first time without bugs than shio bugs. All software development companies and clients feel speed is everything so they don't do adequate line testing during the process building in bugs that are impossible to find and never resolved. It's a major flaw and tradition in software development. Number 20 is true but conveys the wrong message. Process is there to guarantee the desired results, regardless of the person executing the process. The risk is that the process isn't followed or the process wasn't designed correctly. The software industry relies too much on heroes and long hours and not enough on proper processes. For example, lean development is not a process, it's a methodology. Other than these, the rest are the same conclusions I reached even though my experience started much earlier. Because people haven't changed and management hasn't earned any of the important lesson lessons. I spent much of my career solving impossible problems that management created only to discover these rules that your network, politics, and managing up is how you create a career, not by doing a good job designing and developing software. One final point that wasn't mentioned is that good software that solves problems comes from properly interviewing potential users, asking them how they experience frustrations and problems in their everyday process, whether that is a personal process or a business process, not how they would solve the problem or if they would buy the software. Those questions are worthless.
This was some of the best stuff I've read all year. Even after writing software for so many years, I still fall into these holes of novelty and cleverness; for instance, this morning I realized that my need for a more "semantic" folder structure for a new project was just forcing me to create a custom build command that was creating unnecessary complexity. But, why.
Thanks for these great reminders.
Google boosts Gmail with Gemini AI summaries
Edition #238 | 09 January 2026
A very Happy New Year !! We are enrolling 3 students at 1199 USD.
That 70% acceptance rate for Gemini suggestions is seriously impressive but probably reflects email being a lower-stakes environment than docs or code. I've noticed similiar patterns when deploying internal tools where users accept AI suggestions more readily for routine communication tasks than for technical documentation. The real test will be whether this holds up once the novelty wears off, and whether people are actually reading what gets sent or just rubber-stamping outputs.
Google cuts Android code cadence
Plus: Tough times for Tailwind as AI hits developer traffic
Hi folks,
Personal Science Week - 260108 Google Effect
Measuring whether technology makes us dumber
Technology has put every fact instantly accessible, to the point where it’s tempting to no longer remember things for ourselves. Why bother when you can just “Google” it?
Do people really use IT in navigating to places they go all the time, like grocery stores? I can't imagine doing that but am admittedly eccentric in not using the GPS functions in my car at all, even when visiting places I've never been. On those, however, I will see where they are located using Google Maps before starting out.
A Brief History of the AI Search Wars
Reddit and Google vs. SerpApi
SerpApi had a huge year in 2025 and, let's be honest, you've never heard of them.
Brillaint breakdown of how legal strategy sometimes tells you more about busines model thn the business model itself. The fact that Reddit's betting on DMCA protections for Google's SearchGuard rather than direct scraping claims shows how much leverage they actually have (not much). I ran into similar issues with API throttling at a prior gig, and realistically once the legal fees start piling up even before trial, the smaller player is already bleeding out.
Google Ads for B2B. The 7-Keyword System
A practical Google Ads system for B2B founders to capture high-intent demand using low-volume, hyper-relevant keywords.
BGW Playbook: Guerrilla tactics for the growth-obsessed. Deploy now.
Inside the world’s collective brain - A surprisingly hopeful picture of humankind
What We Ask Google by Simon Rogers
Welcome to The Rebel Reader – one big non-fiction idea a week to make you look at the world (and your browser history) a little differently. This one peers straight into the global subconscious.
AI: Samsung vs Apple global 'AI' smartphone race. RTZ #958
...driving Google vs OpenAI distribution in 2026+
Looks like Google Gemini AI is getting a distribution boost from Samsung Galaxy smartphones and devices that is bigger than might be understood.
The distribution game is where the real battle happens in 2026. Samsung's 800M Gemini-powered devices gives Google massive reach, but the memory chip shortage adds an intresting constraint that could limit how aggressively they can deploy on-device AI features. What strikes me is how this mirrors the 90s browser wars, distribution trumps quality when you're embedded at the OS level and most users stick with defaults.
Brilliant post. I really appreciated it. So Google will win the AI race because it controls Android, the most widely used “computer” OS in the world. If AI becomes an ambient, default layer on smartphones rather than an app people choose, Google’s distribution advantage could matter more than model quality, especially at global scale. People are concentrating too much on what the best model is. In five years time, all AI models will be brilliant and AI will just be a utility. Google will win because of it OS and distribution, just like Microsoft won the browser wars in the 90s because of Windows.
I would also add that Google also has the physical infrastructure and TPU advantage as well, which is another positive for the tech company.
My top 10 Recipes
My top 10 Recipes ranked by Google
I love all the year-end lists. There is something about a year’s worth of data that excites me. But before we get to the lists…
3 Product Manager Mistakes That Ruined My Interviews
From a Google Product Manager, ex-Amazon
I’ve failed multiple product manager interviews.
Google Ads for B2B. The 7-Keyword System
A practical Google Ads system for B2B founders to capture high-intent demand using low-volume, hyper-relevant keywords.
BGW Playbook: Guerrilla tactics for the growth-obsessed. Deploy now.
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