It's my understanding that that's about the point in time when the hiring bar started rising
I thought it was the opposite. Google always emphasized GPA and where you went to school. They loosened things up quite a bit during their great hiring sprees of 2006-2007.
Maybe recently they've reverted to their old policies because they hired so many duds during that time period.
My Noogler class (Jan 09) was biased towards people with actual work experience. There were a couple of freshly-minted Ph.Ds, but most of us had been working for 4-10 years, and AFAIK the only fresh-out-of-undergrad had already done a couple internships with them. Very different from the demographics of the rest of company, where I occasionally get teased (lightheartedly) for having worked at a company other than Google.
I thought it was the opposite. Google always emphasized GPA and where you went to school. They loosened things up quite a bit during their great hiring sprees of 2006-2007.
Maybe recently they've reverted to their old policies because they hired so many duds during that time period.