By your own story, it's not a myth. Not everyone has one, and your boss had to be supportive of you working on it, but there are a bunch of internal systems that are supported by 20% time. It might be more appropriate to frame that 20% as giving 120% (aka working on it on Saturday instead of Friday) for some of the things, but it's a real thing that exists. Just because not everybody has such a project doesn't make it a myth.
Re:Google is freaking out about ChatGPT
by pwdisswordfishc on Sunday January 22, 2023 @01:02PM
(#34480242)
Just because something vaguely resembling the popular story seems to exist doesn’t make it not a myth.
Re:Google is freaking out about ChatGPT
by AlbertCory on Sunday January 22, 2023 @03:03PM
(#34481652)
The "myth" is that everyone has a 20% project. We could find lots of people and stories in the press who really believe that.
Re:Google is freaking out about ChatGPT
by therealdrag0 on Sunday January 22, 2023 @01:39PM
(#34480681)
How much of that is googles fault and how much of that is that it’s hard to have a good idea for a personal project and follow through with it?
When I was in my 20s all my friends (young single kid less, so plenty of free time) would often TALK about wanting to do a project but few ever did.
I wouldn’t be surprised if for most people the marginal sense of accomplishment and meaning is just higher by working on their day job (which is already cush) than trying to hack a random idea together.
Re:Google is freaking out about ChatGPT
by AlbertCory on Sunday January 22, 2023 @05:58PM
(#34483222)
> it’s hard to have a good idea for a personal project
There was actually a 20% marketplace page, where projects seeking 20%-ers would advertise. It wasn't necessary to have an idea yourself.
Just guessing here but sounds like you had to have interest in someone else’s crappy/uninteresting idea, which likely was rare. It’s like those cofounder matching sites, most people have a crappy/uninteresting idea they want others to help them with. People without ideas go there and immediately turn away.
Re:Google is freaking out about ChatGPT
by AlbertCory on Sunday January 22, 2023 @07:43PM
(#34484047)
There certainly was some of that: dumb ideas that were going nowhere.
Also a lot of genuinely interesting projects had managers with no idea how they could use a 20%-er. Especially if they didn't really believe the person was reliable.
Re:Google is freaking out about ChatGPT
by summerlight on Monday January 23, 2023 @03:07AM
(#34486563)
Another thing to consider is that it's usually 100%+20%, not 80%/20%. It's because you can do whatever you want to do with 20% time but that's usually not going to help your perf unless you can convince your director/org as well, not just a manager.
20% Time is a myth and always was. Yes, occasionally someone would talk about "their 20% time" but it was rare, and usually just meant "spending a few hours on something else." Admittedly, once in a while someone really did spend 20% of their time on something else, and management was not allowed to complain.
Once, in about 2006-07, I was at a table with about 8 software engineers and asked for a show of hands, "How many have a 20% project?" There was one hand.
What it WAS useful for was checking out a project you might want to transfer to.