Seems odd that nobody is mentioning Google's in-house makerspace, hackathons, and 20% weeks (where engineers without 20% projects, or who prefer time-boxed commitments, take a week once a quarter to work on stuff). I ran a 20% week project last year - or maybe the year before? - and there are several really fantastic people working tirelessly on the Garage and other makerspace stuff to ensure that the 20% mindset is alive and kicking.
I totally understand the "management killing freedom of experimentation" comments, but they are only one side of the story, and a side explicitly pulled from disgruntled Xooglers at that.
The Garage is one of the things I miss most about Google - both the makerspace itself, and what it represents. We hosted several internal hackathons there, both within and outside the intern season and had great success.
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