'Dear Mr. Pichai...': Google CEO Sundar Pichai shares 25-yr-old email interaction with his father

Google is celebrating its 25th birthday and on the occasion, Sundar Pichai wrote a public memo remembering his personal stories of the time when he moved from India to the US as a student. Pichai shared one of his first email interactions with his father who was back in India. The interaction was short but the process wasn't as snappy as we expected it to be today. 

In the memo, Pichai recounted the time when his father got his first email ID and the father-son duo had their first conversation. Pichai said, "I’ve been thinking a lot about how far technology has come over the last 25 years and how people adapt to it. Years ago, when I was studying in the U.S., my dad — who was back in India — got his first email address. I was really excited to have a faster (and cheaper) way to communicate with him, so I sent a message." 

The best part of this entire episode was his father's response. Pichai added, "And then I waited…and waited. It was two full days before I got this reply: “Dear Mr. Pichai, email received. All is well.”

The technology was slow by today's standards but even then two full days to get a response via email is slow. A curious Pichai called his father up to understand what caused the delay. He said, "Perplexed by the delay and the formality, I called him up to see what happened. He told me that someone at his work had to bring up the email on their office computer, print it out, and then deliver it to him. My dad dictated a response, which the guy wrote down and eventually typed up to send back to me."

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Pichai then compared this entire interaction 25 years ago with something recent he experienced with his son. He said, "I was with my teenage son. He saw something interesting, took some quick pictures and shared them with his friends. Then they exchanged a few messages, and it all seemed faster than the time it would take me just to pull out my phone."

The juxtaposition between both these instances highlights the massive leap the technology sector has experienced in the past 25 years. Pichai said, "How I communicated with my dad all those years ago compared with how my son communicates today shows just how much change can happen across generations. Technology that takes us years to adapt to is second nature for our kids. Ideas my dad marveled at as science fiction — taking a call from your watch, or telling your car to play your favorite song — make my children shrug."

He further added, "Those shrugs give me great hope for the future. They set a high bar for what the next generation will build and invent...and I can’t wait to see what will make their children shrug, too."

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