This email was sent from a non-Google email account to Arrington’s Gmail account, he said. A few years ago, I’m nearly certain that Google accessed my Gmail account after I broke a major story about Google.'The proof, he said, was that a former Google employee - who was his source and was apparently drunk at a party - approached Arrington and said he or she had been 'shown an email that proved that they were the source' by people at Google investigating the leak. In the real world, Google has struggled mightily with privacy concerns: A TechCrunch reporter accused the company of dipping into his Gmail account to see if he had corresponded with a Google employee, as reported by Liz Gannes:Īrrington wrote late last week: 'I have first hand knowledge of this. Meanwhile, back at Hooli, Gavin got wind of Richard’s beta testing by monitoring his workers’ emails. that's the problem with 26-year-old CEOs. In fact, beta-tester blogs say it's very common for engineers to test in an echo chamber and get slapped when the wider world tries to use their product. Remember when the upgrade to iPhone iOS 8 rendered phones un-phone-able? How about when Apple ditched Google Maps in favor of its own map app, causing rage across the devicesphere that ended with the project lead getting canned? Such good times. These disasters caused by inadequate beta testing are rife. Richard is so thrilled with his fellow geeks’ assessment of the product that he goes from reluctant beta-releaser to enthusiastic mover-upper of the release date, which seems like it’ll be a nice big disaster for the freshly re-minted CEO. What is Slack valued at these days, $3.8 billion? But she assures Richard that her opinion isn’t worth much, as she passed on investing in Slack. The only person who sees the beta and doesn’t like it is Monica. Trouble is, it’s so limited, it mostly only gets seen by other engineers, who love it for the same wonky reasons Richard does. But when Guilfoyle’s girlfriend reveals that she’s enjoying it, he allows a limited beta release. Initially, Richard balks at the idea of allowing anyone outside the company to try the software. There are bugs, tons of bugs, and the way to eliminate bugs is to either hire a flotilla of testers (which is what real game companies do) or release a beta for folks to try out and rate.

The Pied Piper product is humming along toward launch under Richard’s finicky guidance. To catch up on the recaps, you can see them all here. This week, the Pied Pipers release their beta and struggle with ethical issues. Each week, we watch 'Silicon Valley' on HBO and then reflect on the ways the show mirrors - or doesn't - the real Silicon Valley.

Silicon valley season 3 episode 7