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from the Mathamagician-of-Digitopolis dept.
Jim Edwards writes at Business Insider that Google is so large and has such a massive need for talent that if you have the right skills, Google is really enthusiastic to hear from you - especially if you know how to use MatLab, a fourth-generation programming language that allows matrix manipulations, plotting of functions and data, implementation of algorithms, creation of user interfaces, and interfacing with programs written in other languages, including C, C++, Java, Fortran and Python. The key is that data is produced visually or graphically, rather than in a spreadsheet.
According to Jonathan Rosenberg, Google's former senior vice president for product management, being a master of statistics is probably your best way into Google right now and if you want to work at Google, make sure you can use MatLab. Big data — how to create it, manipulate it, and put it to good use — is one of those areas in which Google is really enthusiastic about. The sexy job in the next ten years will be statisticians. When every business has free and ubiquitous data, the ability to understand it and extract value from it becomes the complimentary scarce factor. It leads to intelligence, and the intelligent business is the successful business, regardless of its size. Rosenberg says that "My quote about statistics that I didn't use [last night] but often do is, 'Data is the sword of the 21st century, those who wield it [are] the samurai.'"
(Score: 2) by physicsmajor on Sunday October 19 2014, @04:31AM
Indeed. Particularly with Google's Python roots, familiarity, and friendliness it is unbelievable to me that Google could possibly prefer MatLAB over the slick, easy to use, and scalable architecture available today via Python and the SciPy Stack. Hook into R for stats, use Cython to wrap or write lower level code as necessary, and... why does MatLAB exist, again, except for vendor inertia?
Google directly funds development of the SciPy Stack as well, through the GSoC project. They definitely know about this.
Was TFA paid for by MathWorks?
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday October 19 2014, @05:03AM
Perhaps there a bad branch of Google going astray?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Sunday October 19 2014, @11:27AM
I looked at the article (note, the list of homemade Halloween costumes is a much more interesting article) and its some former pointy haired boss.
So I'm not sure it means much.
A typical example. I wrote a SQL query to do something weird with two data sources and my bosses bosses great grandboss heard that some of his peasants use sq... sq something and databases. A quick google and obviously if you want to get hired here you need mssql or posgresql or nosql or something. Actually no, its a mysql install, but whatever.
Reading technical details into the idle mutterings of a non-technical guy.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday October 19 2014, @03:28PM
The one App you need on your résumé if you want a job at Google [businessinsider.com]
"Google's former svp/product management Jonathan Rosenberg" and the eduction is MBA + Bachelor of Arts degree with honors in economics.
I think the conclusion has to be that yes statistics and math skills is very useful. But Matlab isn't necessarily the tool for the job.
VLM, Any ideas on the path from peasant to money hoarding? ;-)