In 2012 I was in charge of social media for the Google Developers team. This was the part of Google that supported developers outside the company who built stuff with Google technologies. I spent most of my career working with outside developers. That’s what I did most of the time at Apple, Microsoft, General Magic, and some other more obscure places.
Part of my job was writing and editing posts on the Google Developers Blog. Also I was running the @googledevs Twitter account, and +GoogleDevelopers on the late, great service called Google+. So like any good social media intern, I was trying to come up with new content every day.
One day while driving to work, I passed the Android building on the Google campus and noticed something new and weird on the lawn. Well, there was always weird stuff on that lawn: for many years, Android named its OS releases after desserts, in alphabetical order. So there was Cupcake for C, Donut for D, Eclair for E, and so on. In the spirit of fun and bizarreness, Google placed a large statue for each dessert on the lawn of the building.
The name of the tasty new release was always highly anticipated and rumored before it was announced. And as I drove past the building, this is what I saw on the lawn:
I thought hey, this is breaking news! They must have announced the new version: Jelly Bean for the letter J. That’s gonna make a great post on Google+ and Twitter, I thought! So in a social media brain frenzy, I pulled over, got out of the car, snapped a photo, and wrote a quick post featuring the quirky new statue.
By the time I made it to my desk, I was already in trouble.
The product manager for Jelly Bean (which is an amazing job title) saw my post and emailed me to say they hadn’t actually announced Jelly Bean yet. So I had leaked confidential information, the sort of thing that tech companies take very seriously, and why did I post such an embarrassing photo anyway? It turns out the statue was actually supposed to look something like this. Oops.
I found out this statue had been on the lawn under a tarp for a few days awaiting its unveiling. And then that morning, summer heat or vandals or hyper-aggressive squirrels struck, knocked the poor droid over, and the contents came spilling out. I had no idea; I thought the spilled-beans display was a clever motif. And as for revealing confidential info, this was in plain view on a public street. So I assumed it was fair game for me or anybody else to photograph and post.
The product manager for Jelly Bean disagreed with all that and insisted I take the post down. I pointed out that was a bad idea and would surely invoke the Streisand effect. I pushed back further and suggested that if they wanted to keep confidential things confidential, maybe they should not place them unsecured on a public street. Eventually he backed off, and the post stayed.
More than 12 years later, I was out for a walk on the Google campus when I came upon an old friend, gazing into the distance. It was standing fully upright, head on straight, innards a bit faded but intact. Looks like it’s happily living in the woods now.
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Five comments out of five likes, no spilling here, Scott!
Great post ! And that was such fun time to be on campus . Thank you for sharing all these magical stories.