Chris Poole visited the Facebook campus in 2011, while he was still running 4chan, for an hour-long talk and some questions. About thirty engineers attended. The Anonymous hacks had been all over the news for the last year or so, so a couple of jokers showed up in Guy Fawkes masks, and kept them on for the whole thing.<p>During the Q&A, Poole answered a question from one of the masked employees. After his answer, he asked, "Did that help, Steve?" Shocked, and no doubt a bit intimidated, the employee asked how Poole knew his name. His answer: "Well, I read your name on the badge clipped to your belt."<p>Poole was smart and thoughtful and I was quite impressed (not just with his eye for detail). Not surprised he lasted so long at Google.
Long time HN lurker here -- I find the mention that he was a PM with Google Maps to be particularly interesting. In case it has gone unnoticed, "Google Maps" and Google's associated business product "Google My Business" appear to be silently being developed into Google's successor product for Google+. Google My Business now allows business owners to "post" updates to their Google Business listing which appear on Google Maps as posts "From the owner," and, once posted, users with Google Accounts can interact with and "share" these posts. Google My Business also appears to be replacing Google Beacon, a physical device once needed for location-based ad-targeting, now deprecated in favor of directing businesses to connect their Google My Business listing to their Google Ads (AdWords) account.
I've spent a fair amount of time on 4chan/pol/ for over a decade and my opinion is moot is a decent guy who sold it after he tried to reign in GamerGate and was loudly criticized on the site for it. I don't think Google would have hired him if it weren't for that redeeming quality.<p>I'm fascinated by 4chan because it is a kind of underground United Nations. It's anonymous so people around the world can express themselves - even in a way I might find horrifying - and I can get an idea of concerns people have, though they might be concerns left unsaid im polite society.<p>It's anonymous but your national flag is automatically assigned, and if you hide this or use a "meme flag'
like a pirate flag, you will be criticized and ignored as a likely troll, trying a "false flag" operation.<p>4chan/pol/ is interesting, I don't know about the other boards since I don't visit them.
It’s interesting to see how Moot gets the blame for the all the things that happened after he sold off 4chan.<p>Especially when you consider how anonymous and the occupy movements were all the rage among woke leftists a few years back, and they originated from 4chan.
It's hilarious after all these years shitty journalists still believe Anonymous is a hacker group rather than just some kids trolling.<p>I mean imagine if Facebook had the option to be anonymous somehow on their platform and called everyone Unnamed who hadn't finished their registration or didn't want to.<p>You'd see Unnamed responsible for nation-state sponsored terrorism and manipulating the votes of other countries. What a joke.
> Poole's 4chan is an anonymous, ephemeral imageboard that is often given the title "cesspool of the Internet." The site is broken up into boards of various topics, and some of the more lawless boards are home to all of the worst characters on the Internet, like school shooters, child pornographers, and racists. It's also the birthplace of a lot of Internet culture, like Rickrolling, lolcats, and, more recently, Pepe the frog memes and the alt-right. The site gave rise to the Internet hacktivist group Anonymous and is often used as a dumping ground for various hacks like the Nintendo Gigaleak. Poole sold 4chan back in 2015, a year before joining Google.<p>I don't think it's fair to say this without clarifying that a lot of the Q and other deranged stuff started happening after moot left. Nor is Pepe really a recent meme (somewhere I have Pepes saved from like the mid '00s), nor is Anonymous really a <i>group</i> (but that's questionable and a debate that isn't really relevant)... I know there's very little expectations when it comes to reporting on web subcultures but come on, this is common knowledge (maybe that's why it isn't clarified?).
Him becoming a PM for Google Maps seems surprising to me considering his entrepreneurial background, but I can’t deny I’ve also considered making the jump now and then from The dev life
Wonder what he'll do now.<p>On the one hand, no one would blame him for just continuing to drift off into obscurity. On the other, he's a smart guy, and smart guys tend to be restless. Add to this that the hurricane of anti-trust lawsuits happening right now may result in a re-shuffling of the deck when it comes to the landscape of the web in a few years, and there's some real potential for new projects on the world-wide information superhighway, in a way there hasn't been in some time.
Hey moot, we know you're reading this.<p>Just want to say you did a good job, thanks for being you and doing your thing. I know it's been tough and all, so thanks for the hard work.<p>Dunno about google maps though, that seemed to have taken a dive since ~2013. Maybe look into biotech and that jazz, it needs people like you.<p>Still, be good to see what you're doing next. Keep up that hard work and effort, it shows.
weird article, who cares? I care enough to point out the following:<p>like literally what is the point of this to lead people to talk about unrelated aspects of 4chan and <i>maybe</i> how that influenced his time at Google<p>but the article describes an extremely normal and extremely extended time at Google<p>what...?
“ Poole lasted just five years at Google, which CNBC notes is usually just long enough for any employee's shares attached to hiring to vest. It sounds like Poole never found a solid landing spot at Google, as he had three different positions during his five years.”<p>Lol such a dishonest representation of FANG employment. Well above average (2 years) a year past the vesting cliff, and about average in terms of team switches