Cockroach Labs CTO: Google became too comfortable, I wasn't being challenged

Cockroach Labs released the serverless version of its eponymous database for general availability last week. The Register took the opportunity to catch up with CTO Peter Mattis – a Google veteran who is also behind open source image editing software GIMP. Mattis started the Cockroach project with former UC Berkeley roommate …

[Pascal Monett]

"They just have too much money flowing around their system"

One of the very rare times when too much money is a problem.

[AMBxx]

Re: "They just have too much money flowing around their system"

>> $5 billion valuation with a $278 million funding round,

Looks like it's still a problem for them now. It's only a database, plenty of competition.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "They just have too much money flowing around their system"

‘One of the very rare times when too much money is a problem’

It doesn’t feel rare to me.

Look at kids of the rich, sports stars who get a big contract, board executives who know they’ll get s large payoff with success or with failure.

Look at countries. Decadence and eventual decline are a consistently recognised part of the cycle that Europe is clearly going through now.

Look at banks. Being ‘too big to fail’ leads to all kinds of bad behaviour.

The incentive to earn money is a big (though not the only) motivator for people to work hard and achieve significant results but having earned (or inherited) a comfortable amount of money is one of the most reliable reasons why people slow down and work less hard.

The nuance is that too little money is an immediate and sometimes fatal problem while too much money is usually only a problem over a longer period of time which may only be visible in retrospect.

[low_resolution_foxxes]

Re: "They just have too much money flowing around their system"

An eloquent way of putting it.

I've always liked the saying "Hard times make hard people. Good times make weak men."