My feeling was multiple generations of optimizing for promo packets had made the entire culture cynical at G and Amazon. It's one thing when people give lip service to the right things but sometimes the wrong things are rewarded. It hits another level when leaders are actively coaching and advocating cynicism. Throw in layoff fear on top of that and now it's a political mess.
Mmm. The way users are talked about at web and software companies now is almost nothing like 20-30 years ago. Aside from a few times when things got a bit too annoying (like maybe a few hours every month or so) I barely remember the negativity at all. We almost never talked about users, just the product. There was wayyy less cynicism and anger in the workplace.