In the note, shared internally and viewed by the New York Times, Brin urges staff working on Google’s Gemini AI projects to put in long hours to help the company lead the race in artificial general intelligence (AGI).

Some have praised Brin’s commitment to pushing the company’s success, but others argue that his approach reflects an outdated and harmful mindset.

“The hustle-centric 60-hour week isn’t productivity—it’s burnout waiting to happen,” wrote workplace mental health educator Catherine Eadie in a post shared by LinkedIn’s news editors.

Others said they feel that hard work is essential for success, with a COO of a business analytics business writing, “Brin is just being honest—successful people have always put in long hours."

  • @Triasha@lemmy.world
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    292 months ago

    60 hours is the sweet spot for maximal control over your employees life with only the normal amount of suicides.

  • @CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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    82 months ago

    JFC, and with the assholes in the government in collusion with these fuckers, they are likely to be able to make it mandatory.

    The 4 day workweek is likely more optimal for humans, at least until we are post-scarcity.

  • Dr. Moose
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    32 months ago

    Lmao dude trying to claw back some relevance with bait.

    Sergei Brin has not accomplished anything since Pagerank and it must make him feel very small especially since his ass got dumped quite recently.

    Sad little billionaire.

  • @AdamBomb@lemmy.sdf.org
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    192 months ago

    Last summer there were a bunch of stories reporting findings that companies that experimented with a 4-day work week saw productivity gains over the traditional 5-day, so this billionaire’s opinion sounds out of alignment with reality

  • @Treczoks@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Ahh, the typical manager misconception. Nope. Long work hours don’t equal high productivity.

    But I can understand that misconception, as it takes those people up there many more hours to get a single useful idea compared to those under them who actually do the work and earn the money.

  • @BeardedGingerWonder@feddit.uk
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    182 months ago

    60/5=12/day 8/day for sleep Let’s say it takes me an hour each way to get to and from the office. Maybe 1hr for dinner

    Now I have 1 hour/day to do everything else I need to do? How did this guy invent Google?

    • @Wav_function@lemmy.world
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      82 months ago

      You don’t have staff to clean your house, cook your food, take care of your kids, pay your bills?

      What are you some kind of poor?

    • @NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      You sleep at the office or work 6 or 7 days. People aren’t often doing 60 hour weeks by working 12x5 and then 2 off.

      Edit: Google even has those sleeping pods!

      • @BeardedGingerWonder@feddit.uk
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        62 months ago

        Ah, my bad.

        So just have to do 50% more work for no additional pay, give up one of the two days I get to spend with my kids and require me to incur additional expenditure on childcare.

        And he’s suggesting this to quite possibly the most employable software developers on the planet? Kinda sounds like a fucking moron.

  • @Matriks404@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    I have found out that my productivity goes down after about 6 hours of work. And even if the productivity is seemingly the same (e.g. when I worked at cigarettes factory), I unsurprisingly made more mistakes when tired. Although I must say I am more tired when I do boring shit (or nothing lol) in office job than on production line, but it’s just me.

  • @Empricorn@feddit.nl
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    122 months ago

    I’m sorry that Sergey Brin apparently doesn’t have hobbies or family/friends that care about him, but 60 is still wrong. We have computers and work multipliers and have perfected efficiency… We don’t need to spend the majority of our lives toiling anymore! Some would argue against 40, but at least that gives a balanced workday: 8 hours of work, 8 hours of sleep, 8 hours of leisure. And I say all that as someone who actually likes their job…

    • queermunist she/her
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      152 months ago

      Commuting should be included in the 8 hour work day. I shouldn’t have to give up some of my leisure time to drive to work.

      This would also incentivize denser cities.

      • @boonhet@lemm.ee
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        22 months ago

        Commuting should be included in the 8 hour work day

        This would also incentivize denser cities.

        How come? You’d be paid the same regardless, be away from home for the same time regardless; suddenly it makes sense to move further away from work.

        • queermunist she/her
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          12 months ago

          Because you won’t get hired if they have to pay you to drive longer hours. Employers would be incentivized to hire locally.

          • @boonhet@lemm.ee
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            02 months ago

            So you’re saying you want prospective employers to tell you “Sorry, you live too far, we hire only within 5 city blocks”?

            There should be non-discrimination laws for distance, otherwise anyone not living in the city center would be truly fucked in the hiring process AND your employer would get to tell you that if you move farther away, you’re fired.

            • queermunist she/her
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              12 months ago

              I want denser cities, the whole point is to discourage people from living outside the city.

              It would require a transition period so people have time to leave the suburbs and small towns, but we need as many people as possible on as small a land footprint as possible in order to restore habitat, reduce transportation emissions, reduce the cost of transportation infrastructure maintenance, and otherwise reduce the amount of land and energy and time wasted on people driving 30 miles to work every day.

              • @boonhet@lemm.ee
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                12 months ago

                So you want the entire world to be forced to live in equivalents of Manhattan, or ideally, Kowloon Walled City?

                Also, you say you’re against people driving to work, but the other potential consequence is that people in medium density cities are going to be told that they’re no longer allowed to walk to work.

                Look, population density in general is good. Forcing it by telling employers they’re now both allowed AND encouraged to discriminate employees based on where they live is going to have so many unintended consequences there’s no point in even entertaining the thought. If they’re not allowed to discriminate, people are going to intentionally move far enough away to have a 4 hour commute each way.

                There’s no winning here, the only way to make things better is to lobby for better zoning laws if you live in a country where those commonly prevent high-rises or mixed-use neighborhoods. That benefits everyone, regardless of whether they want to live in an apartment smaller than a standard shipping container, a luxury penthouse, or in the suburbs.

                If you want maximum density, you need cities to be built from the ground up like they do in China. START with the skyscrapers, instead of building them when enough people live there for there to be demand.

                • queermunist she/her
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                  2 months ago

                  I don’t really believe private car ownership should even be allowed and should be replaced entirely by either dense cities where we can walk to our jobs or public transit, preferably trains. That way we can still have small towns, but you have to take the train now.

                  Ultimately you’re right, the only way to make things better is using central planning like they do in China. There is no market reform that can save us.

                  That doesn’t change the fact that commuting should be considered part of your job. You can’t work without it.

                  Unless you work remotely,! Oh look, another thing that would be incentivized by paying people for their commutes.

      • @Empricorn@feddit.nl
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        22 months ago

        Not to brag, but it is for me! But I’m also not paid a large amount. And it absolutely should be for everyone…

  • @twinnie@feddit.uk
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    332 months ago

    I’d work work 60 hours a week if I was going to get paid the millions they make but I’m not doing that work just to make someone else rich.

    • Snot Flickerman
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      2 months ago

      It’s beyond just making millions for someone else, it’s about literally building their replacements.

      In the note, shared internally and viewed by the New York Times, Brin urges staff working on Google’s Gemini AI projects to put in long hours to help the company lead the race in artificial general intelligence (AGI).

      They want an AGI that will do all the work “for free” and they don’t have to worry about pesky human workers who want things like “human rights” anymore.

      • 100_kg_90_de_belin
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        32 months ago

        Most big players in the AI field have already said that they are not going to reach the goals they set for environmental impact by 2030. The “for free” part simply means that Earth will become unlivable for human beings sooner

      • @FirstCircle@lemmy.ml
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        2 months ago

        Yep, just plug 'em in and they’ll work 24x7x52 without a complaint. That’s the goal.

        “The race” to AGI is just the race to unemployment and complete subservience to the TechBro super-rich and their ilk.

    • @reiterationstation@lemm.ee
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      62 months ago

      Let’s see, can’t grow your own food, can’t make your own clothes, can’t fix your own home, have to pay property taxes no matter what, have to pay for health insurance or you die…

      They have a lot of people between a rock and a hard place. Might even be all of us.

  • @pyre@lemmy.world
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    82 months ago

    people like this shouldn’t be allowed to finish their sentences on their own terms. it should be cut short by an extreme force.