> and he would reject—often brutally—any idea that diluted or harmed the experience.

"brutally" is the only factual part, otherwise he harmed the experience plenty, often for the sake of appearances

Goggle also had a memo on how ads were bad and rejected the idea ... until they didn't, with the same founders, so you don't need much of a leadership change for the strong incentive of ad money to dilute the resolve.