Hmm, maybe different people have different contracts. In our case, the 1 yr cliff was about the signing bonus, not the vesting.

That's a very unusual deal. Most Google offers were (up until I think August/September 2017) structured as base + target % annual bonus + cash signing bonus with first/second paycheck (which you would need to pay back prorated if you left before a year, but this isn't a cliff) + equity with a 1 year cliff before vesting on a schedule that depended on the exact amount, but varied from annually to monthly.

This was true for new grad offers as well as for most experienced hires. I believe I've heard of different structures for cases where Google was doing essentially an equity buyout, but those were absolutely the exception, not the rule.

Are you sure you are remembering correctly?