This image was lost some time after publication.

Pointing out that in the last quarter Google walked away from a multibillion-dollar hotel project, closed two offices, and laid off 300 DoubleClick employees, Wired's Betsy Schiffman wonders if Google isn't cutting costs as result of a downturn in advertising revenue. Of course, the downturn has so far been limited to online brand advertising, not Google's lucrative paid search business. Schiffman also linked to our post on a tipster who tried to convince us Google is in a hiring freeze, though we thought he was possibly just a bitter non-hire. One Google employee does tell us, however, that there's been a "noticeable" slowdown in new hires setting up cubicles in Mountain View. Then there's the usual doomsayers, such as commenter Isawthat who reports the "Bay Area is jacked!"

There are no job opening for recruiters, its frozen across the board. People are about to get a huge shock. I am a recruiter of 11 years, seems like the bubble burst all over again.