Google co-founder Sergey Brin revealed he once found Gemini, Google's own AI model, on an internal list of coding tools engineers were banned from using. Speaking on the All-In podcast last year, Brin said he was surprised to see Gemini on the company's internal "no list" and spent weeks trying to get the rule removed. After failing to resolve the issue himself, he turned to Google CEO Sundar Pichai, who supported him and helped get the restriction lifted. Brin said the episode highlights how internal rules can sometimes lag behind a company's AI strategy. Recalling the incident, Brin said he had returned to writing code at Google when he noticed that Gemini was listed among tools engineers were not supposed to use for coding. He added that while nobody actively enforced the rule, it still existed on an internal webpage. Brin said he eventually asked CEO Sundar Pichai to handle the issue, stating, "I definitely told Sundar. He was very supportive. I was more like, I talked to him, I was like, I can't deal with these people, you need to deal with this." Brin responded to a host's remark about a junior employee saying no to the founder, saying, "That's a sign of a healthy culture actually. Anyway, it did get fixed and people are using it."