We've regressed to worse than cubicles because it is not "possible space wise"?
Considering the average salary of a programmer, it sounds totally possible space wise.
Besides, how about they drop the ping pong room, the Nerf shooting range and the like first?
Ping pong room, Nerf shooting ranges are all "fancy" rooms they use to give the modern, fun working environment message (or lie). If they need extra space, I am sure most companies would demolish even bathrooms but don't touch those "fun rooms". And I agree that it's bs.
Private offices are not the only sane alternative to open offices.
Rooms for two to three persons, such that they each have their own private working space (ie. they have desks and no one has to sit back to the door) is a pretty good arrangement IMO.
Result: No team got any room (except heads and managers)
Bottomline: Equal opportunities should get offered to every team or drama happens. People don't mind if managers and heads have their own rooms (not even shared rooms) for some reason but if any other team have shared room but they don't have, then it causes drama.
There are open offices with privacy (covers around your table) and just 10s of people sitting next to each other on a row with tiny tables.
Problem with no privacy is, people tends to talk next to each other compared to open office with privacy (people use messengers more often then). This creates a lot of noise in the office which causes needing of headphones. And of course there is always some person that shouts from first to last row about some joke.
If you are not giving constant smoking breaks your only breaks at work time is visiting some non-work website (facebook or news site etc.) and when you visit one of these sites, your colleagues just start eyeing up your monitor, or you get eye contact with your boss (Murphy's law). Thanks to big screens nowadays, someone can see your screen 3 rows behind you whenever you switch to not work related website.
Having private office for everyone won't be possible on space wise and I believe author and other people just needs open office with covers around. Sitting at row of tables like at internet cafe is bad impact on your performance for sure (and also privacy wise).
Last but not least, I should say that, because of productivity reasons (usage of personal phones, social sites etc.) is a big bs. for having open offices. As long as you do your duty on time with good quality, you should be allowed to use your personal phone or facebook or whatever. Blocking usage of these items or websites doesn't assure of better productivity.