One thing that stands out to me about these sorts of tell-all threads is that they're often made by guys for whom Google is their first job out of school. They tend to hyperventilate.<p>Google sounds like a nice place to work, but maybe not significantly better than other good tech companies. In particular, the claims of "OMG everyone is <i>brilliant</i> and <i>insanely happy</i>" ring a little hollow, when so many of the original people have left the company for better opportunities.