[akchin]

Ha - I think you might be thinking about 2009-2011 or so. That was the Google+ effort (under VicG) and thinking that games (like it did with Facebook) would be a key driver of growth. I think this was also around the time of the bad $180M+ acquisition of Slide to get Max Levchin. Lots of folks used this "social games" and the Google+ track to launch stuff and get promoted quickly and then after it shuts down, find another place within the org where they can now hang out with the nice salary that comes with the promotions they got. :-)