The hiring process was enjoyable: fun conversations with smart people. Unfortunately, there's a magic decision process in Google, and fantastic interviews can still merit an opaque "no" without logic, reason, or feedback (even when feedback is explicitly promised by recruiter as a condition of going forward). Every single discussion was upbeat, fun, exciting, completely positive. Rarely have I laughed so hard in interviews. The fact that the refusal was surprising, opaque, and the promise of feedback was not delivered shows that the real power is held by those who never talk to the candidate, making decisions by proxy and eye-witness interviews. Very frustrating, and offers nothing to the candidate for improvement. Google very much cashes in on its wellknown and desired working environment, but they only want students fresh from school.