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Google Tried to Patent My Work After a Job Interview

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1798 points jerryX | 2 comments | 30 Nov 18 05:25 UTC | HN request time: 0.435s | source
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thaumasiotes ◴[30 Nov 18 05:59 UTC] No.18567073[source]▶
> I was even invited to share my work directly with Regina Dugan, the director of ATAP at that time! I was excited, thinking perhaps I would be invited for a summer internship. It turned out they found my work so relevant that they offered me a job on the spot.

> It was a tough choice: I had just started the first year of my PhD and would’ve had to take a leave from the program to pursue this project. After asking many people, the advice was clear: stay in school. So I decided to turn down the offer and continue pursuing my PhD.

...this sounds like terrible advice? I have to wonder whether any of the "many people" consulted weren't professors.

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Twisol ◴[30 Nov 18 06:07 UTC] No.18567107[source]▶
What makes this terrible advice? Is there something in particular about landing a job at Google that makes it objectively better in every value system than continuing with a PhD that one is already seeking?

I left a very good position on the table after my undergrad, in favor of pursuing a graduate degree. I weighed my options and decided that I would rather spend some years in my youth learning how to conduct research -- lessons I believed, and still believe, will carry through into my future endeavors. I picked up an excellent job after my Master's (at the same place I had left behind previously!) and am very happy with how things played out.

I realize this is the best possible outcome, but what makes this general arc such a bad idea?

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1. geezerjay ◴[30 Nov 18 06:44 UTC] No.18567245[source]▶
> What makes this terrible advice?

Some PhD programs focus on non-marketable topics that don't help candidates develop marketable skills, and exist only to dump the research group's drudge work on an unsuspecting soul.

Wasting years of your life in a low-pay low opportunity dead-end job that's prone to abuse just to pursuit a pipe dream is not a great career move, particularly if the alternative is landing a job at Google.

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2. Twisol ◴[30 Nov 18 07:56 UTC] No.18567491[source]▶
This is all true! Entering into a graduate program without being fully aware of what you’re embarking on and what you’re getting out of it is a bad idea. But I would argue this generalizes beyond just grad school.

Some people enjoy scholarship and research. There are places that support this. To generalize only slightly unfairly, most of industry is not conducive to this kind of personal goal. Pipe dream it may be, but we still have artists and musicians.