Tech Nightmares: Ghostline the flux

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How many quarters after Q1 2016 till Marissa Mayer is unemployed?
	1 or fewer
	2
	4
	Her job is guaranteed; what are you even talking about?

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

I know we're supposed to move on from locationchat, but even if you restrict yourself to democrat-run states there are plenty of viable lower cost tech hubs - most of which are already getting investment and are not cultural Siberias. Chicago, Boston, Minneapolis, Vegas, Philly, Denver...

# ¿ Feb 11, 2016 21:25

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# ¿ May 2, 2024 19:21

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

shrike82 posted:

Boston isn't cheap these days

Neither is Denver. Still not nearly as expensive as SF.

# ¿ Feb 11, 2016 22:06

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

ductonius posted:

This is called a bloated website, not internet gentrification. I have a hard time imagining a business turning away customers like this, especially since the correlation between money and high speed internet access is not 1:1.

That and the company has to pay for the pipes to send that bloated rear end site to their customers, no reason to do that unnecessarily.

# ¿ Feb 21, 2016 17:30

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Offshoring hasn't been a thing for 10 years, turns out it doesn't work well for many projects. Where it does work, it's already happening. All the reviews of reported FB posts happen in the Philippines.

The really good engineers in India cost as much as anywhere else because they can work wherever they want. Beyond the very top schools in India, whose grads go straight to the West or upper management, the engineering and CS programs are so terrible that the outsourcing firms basically have to run their own universities.

Meanwhile wage costs in Singapore are basically the same as in the US, firms used to import underpaid Indians but the government is cracking down on that.

# ¿ Feb 22, 2016 03:36

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Liquid Communism posted:

Or it's a documented fact that outsourcing and outsourcing related H1B visa violations are still going strong.

The companies we are talking about are not going to be hiring TCS or Infosys to build their software. Someone who suggested that would get laughed out of the room.

Large-scale corporate IT projects of the sort those outsourcing companies work on have little in common with the work that happens at most SV companies.

The jobs threatened by those firms are in non-tech industry corporate IT departments, which generally report to execs that have little understanding of technology but a high incentive to keep costs down.

# ¿ Feb 22, 2016 10:43

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Dirk the Average posted:

This has been my experience as well.

Mine too, the last freelance gig I had ended up going through an absurd level of paper pushing and review. Took C-level intervention to put things straight. I got paid something like 3 months late.

# ¿ Feb 24, 2016 02:49

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

I thought Google got rid of stack ranking?

Also my understanding is that the no telecommuting thing at Google is often for security purposes. A lot of their source code and data can't leave the building for very good reasons.

# ¿ Feb 26, 2016 19:00

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Doc Hawkins posted:

I recently read an entire article about coding job interview bullshit. Turns out when you give millions of dollars to idiot kids they don't necessarily know how to spend it wisely.

Well, of the candidates I've interviewed from coding bootcamps (note this would be biased towards ones based in the bay area), the most consistently impressive have been from Hack Reactor. The full course of that is 12 weeks and 17 grand, and they cheat by not taking absolute beginners ("we're more about 60-100 than 0-60," a rep told me), but if you can get in and graduate, yes, you are definitely hireable. If you're more of a beginner, check out their remote prep course, for only 600. If that still seems risky, look at CodeAcademy, which is free and self-directed.

Please PM me if you want to know more (that goes for anyone reading this).

Dev Bootcamp is opening up in Seattle and is also legit. Not as advanced as Hack Reactor but you will get a job.

# ¿ Mar 13, 2016 20:10

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Hog Obituary posted:

Did we already mention LivingSocial laying off half its staff?
http://recode.net/2016/03/16/livingsocial-is-laying-off-more-than-50-percent-of-its-staff/

So this puts them at what, 10% of their peak employee count?

They were always a total bubble company, the CEO's primary qualification was being Don Graham's son-in-law. Speaking of which, Bezos dumped hundreds of millions of Amazon's capital into LivingSocial a few years before buying the Washington Post from Don Graham...there has to be a story there somewhere.

# ¿ Mar 18, 2016 22:30

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Arsenic Lupin posted:

This is the stage where a lot of Kickstarters fall apart: they assume they can deal with Chinese manufacturing at arms' length, then they use up all their money receiving and returning shipments that don't meet their standards.

Yeah, there's actually a mini-cluster of maker startups in Shenzhen now for exactly this reason. Not a bad idea if you can handle living in China.

# ¿ Mar 22, 2016 19:53

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

WarpedLichen posted:

I thought he pulled some vital package that was actually important, but the big deal was over a leftpad function? That looks like some coding exercise for an intro programming class.

Are the people who code utility functions in big open source projects really that important?

This is what happens when a language has a poo poo standard library, you get projects with tons and tons of dependencies for basic utility functions.

# ¿ Mar 24, 2016 17:58

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

shrike82 posted:

It's pretty clear she wasn't ready for the position. Reminds me of Fiorina in many ways.

She was the VP for search at Google. How the gently caress does that not qualify you to run Yahoo? People like you who assume every woman is a brainless diversity hire are the problem with this industry.

# ¿ Mar 24, 2016 21:33

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

shrike82 posted:

When the board released its slate of candidates for CEO, it ended up being Sandberg, her, and two other women candidates who slip my mind. They were probably trying to pick an exotic choice to sex up the company which was already in bad shape.

That just says to me they rigged the deck to get her, no way will Sandberg be leaving Facebook for anything but political office.

# ¿ Mar 24, 2016 22:07

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Barudak posted:

She's also made a string of terrible and extremely expensive acquisitions. Like I've been going to Yahoo sales meetings for years and every year it's been here is x thing we bought and clearly have no idea how to monetize nor can explain why you'd want to pay for it and you should give us money and then mysteriously next year it's gone replaced by the new useless x thing.

And her media strategy was to make yahoo more archaic than it was which is like gee I wonder why that failed miserably.

She also made super expensive exec hires who then got shitcanned a year later with huge golden parachutes.

# ¿ Mar 24, 2016 22:08

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

I'm in Chicago and the junior dev market is plenty hot here. Junior devs don't stay junior for long either, you can easily be making 6 figures after 2-3 years out of a bootcamp or CS bachelors.

As for passing Google/Amazon/etc interviews that's a separate skill from doing the actual work, it's not like your average Googler reverses a linked list on a whiteboard every day.

# ¿ Mar 28, 2016 00:04

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

asdf32 posted:

I have to say, software is about as safe as it comes. Better languages and tools have automated some aspects of development but complexity goes up exponentially with functionality and consumer expectations are constantly higher. You can get canned e-commerce (or forums) sites for example but even moderate customization turns into full fledged development engineering quickly. And now most half decent websites resemble full fledged applications.

And even after decades of software encroaching into every area of our lives it's not close to ending. Software complexity in automobiles for example is already significant but is about to explode with new types of automation like parking/braking/driving. Military projects are now as much software as anything else and government programs like healthcare require sprawling online systems. Meanwhile half the systems that have already existed for decades still have gaping holes in quality or functionality which only more development will fix.

Yeah, Valley types underestimate just how far behind the enterprise is when it comes to web stuff. Many people in SV already consider Rails obsolete but in the enterprise world it's bleeding edge.

# ¿ Mar 28, 2016 02:51

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

blah_blah posted:

Sure, I'm familiar with that. But it's not at all equivalent to the earlier quote, mainly because there is no counterfactual. Google accepts well under 1% of people who apply to jobs there, and probably under 2% of people who even make it to a screen in the first place. They certainly don't 'A/B test' their hiring process.

Citation needed, I've heard wildly varying stories of technical interviews at Google, from white boarding to take home code challenges to easter egg code games triggered by searching for certain Python related keywords.

# ¿ Mar 30, 2016 03:03

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Wank posted:

While this awesome thread is on the topic of interviews. Does anyone have any tips of working out how on the ASD someone is? One guy slipped through my interview process who is good enough but has certain autistic tendencies that really affect his performance and cultural fit.

One way I kind of dealt with this was by bringing in a female staff member to the interview and seeing how they interacted with her. Many very technical guys simply wouldn't look at her even looking at me when answering her questions. Another give away seems to be entirely too long resumes or resumes with irrelevant detail. This seems to be a huge problem with hiring tech people, but I don't seem to hear much about it.

EDIT: This is all shorthand for technical guys who don't play well with others. Not about actual diagnosis etc. Everyone has important skill sets but some people, just.. don't fit. I jokingly blame autism. It doesn't have to be. But goddamn does it feel like it. It's really hard to work out in a couple of one hour interviews.

This is why you take people to lunch..

# ¿ Mar 30, 2016 03:05

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

lancemantis posted:

I think the real complaint with a lot of technical interviewing is just how pervasive algorithm puzzles have become, and lots of nerds who are involved in the interviewing process being terrible interviewers, using the puzzles as a crutch for good judgement. Being a good interviewer takes more practice and experience than being the one interviewed really, and plenty of organizations dont really acknowledge this.

The questions are either highly trainable or "ah ha" questions that might involve knowledge of some mathematical or other trivia to solve as well as the interviewer would like. Some interviewers can't help but be clever. Sometimes its just trivia about languages that someone will be rusty on, even if it's something you "should" know.

It's quite simple, Google/Amazon/Facebook ask them, thus we have to as well in order to be a Real Tech Company. Combine that with the HR people saying "well nobody ever got fired for doing things like Google does" and there you go.

edit: BTW, does Larry Page still personally approve every hire at Google?

Soy Division fucked around with this message at 03:13 on Mar 30, 2016

# ¿ Mar 30, 2016 03:07

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

ToxicSlurpee posted:

The problem with the little algorithm puzzle challenges is that once one becomes popular enough you'll have incompetent people just memorizing the answers to as many of them as possible. Aside from that some of the time limits are just ridiculous. Just because I can't remember a little bit of trivia that would make doing that puzzle trivial in 20 minutes doesn't mean that I'm a lovely developer.

I can see using little code tests to make sure a person understands basic coding things like, you know, the syntax of the languages, for loops, recursion, functions, etc. but some of the questions I've seen asked on code tests are absurd.

Granted the other side of it is that just because somebody can figure out the little algorithm puzzles doesn't mean they can engineer gigantic programs properly or write readable, maintainable code.

Yeah there are already study guides out there that cover all of the commonly asked algorithm questions. It's basically like the consulting case interview at this point, what's being tested is not your ability at the job but your ability to identify a problem's type and shoehorn it into a pre-memorized solution technique.

After all it's not like you need to be Alan Turing to memorize and drill the 20 most common data structures and algorithms that appear in interviews.

Coincidentally this style of learning and assessment is what people who get into top CS schools and get hired by Google tend to be good at, otherwise their test scores wouldn't have gotten them into Stanford and past Google's GPA bar.

# ¿ Mar 30, 2016 05:03

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Paradoxish posted:

If it even occurs to you that there might be more than one way to write fizzbuzz or, hell, if any solution at all occurs to you in a minute or less then fizzbuzz and that whole class of problems are not for you. They're screening questions designed to quickly rule out candidates for development jobs who literally cannot program. It's pretty much "did you completely lie about your qualifications y/n?"

It also screens for the people who refuse to answer it because it's below them and the people who blast through it and make stupid mistakes like not putting the and condition first in the conditional.

# ¿ Mar 30, 2016 16:58

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Vape Bag posted:

Wait� are ping-pong tables a good or a bad sign?

A rule of thumb I heard recently is neither, but it's a bad sign if a company specifically highlights them to prospective employees and investors.

# ¿ May 5, 2016 03:09

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Bird in a Blender posted:

The building itself doesn't become unsafe necessarily, but the unit itself can become unsafe. Does the unit have its own water heater, or furnace? Does it have a CO monitor? Is it getting checked for bed bugs that could then infest the whole building? Frequent guests are going to increase your chance of bed bugs because they could be bringing them from their own home. Is the unit being kept clean, or are guests leaving it messy and the owner isn't cleaning it thoroughly, which can attract vermin? These are all important things that need to be taken care of when running a hotel out of an apartment.

I'm pretty sure that all of these are regs that Airbnb doesn't actually object to. What you see instead a lot is cities trying to ban Airbnb entirely or put incredibly onerous restrictions on them.

# ¿ May 13, 2016 02:37

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

I'm actually fairly certain that the eye thing is plastic surgery, she looks like she's had some work done.

It's not a gendered thing, Elon Musk has pretty clearly had plastic surgery as well.

# ¿ May 13, 2016 22:34

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

H.P. Hovercraft posted:

could this also account for her speaking voice sounding like Bill S. Preston, Esquire

Modern science hasn't mastered vocal cord surgery yet, otherwise a lot of transpeople out there would have much more convincing voices.

Edit: I don't think Holmes is trans, just pointing out evidence that the technology isn't there yet.

# ¿ May 13, 2016 23:14

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Marenghi posted:

People get plastic surgery on their retinas now?

I would have assumed it was the lights of the camera reflected in her eyes being wide open. I've seen it in model pictures, photographers used to edit it out now they enhance it to give a halo effect. That or she has those contact lenses with built in highlights.

Eyelid folding, it's incredibly common in Asia. Her eyes have that crazy wide open look in every pic I've seen including more candid ones.

# ¿ May 14, 2016 01:06

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

William Gibson himself wears Acronym and has name-dropped them on multiple occasions, they've been around for some time.

# ¿ May 15, 2016 18:43

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Cultural Imperial posted:

vancouver's greatest startup hasn't received any funding since 2014. Are they going to blow up soon?

Maybe they've decided they don't need more. Lack of a recent funding round isn't evidence of anything on its own.

# ¿ May 22, 2016 23:22

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Absurd Alhazred posted:

You do if you want to keep your equity.

Or if the valuation/term sheet isn't to your liking. Or if you don't want the prospective investor on your board. Or, like you said, maybe your current funding/revenue is adequate for your present roadmap and you don't want to dilute for no reason..

# ¿ May 22, 2016 23:46

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Tuxedo Gin posted:

Equity is if you have a profitable product, which is not a thing with unicorns. The goal is to get as much VC as possible until you get bought or fold.

Many unicorns have profitable products, I'm fairly certain Airbnb does for example. The investment is usually used for customer acquisition, some types of which are more legit than others. Setting up sales/marketing in new markets = ok, Uber style unsustainable discounts on the core product is bubble behavior though.

# ¿ May 22, 2016 23:49

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Tuxedo Gin posted:

If they have sustainable profits, then they aren't necessarily unicorns. Just overvalued tech companies.

Airbnb is likely just as unsustainable as Uber since it survives in a legal gray area that could get legislated to hell at any time.

The thing is that many jurisdictions have passed laws accommodating Airbnb now, and at least they aren't reliant on an army of questionable independent contractors..

# ¿ May 23, 2016 00:02

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Bushiz posted:

When I was over there I got into a conversation with some Expats and apparently the way to beat the system is to be white. You can show up, do your 40 hours, and go home, and people will act like it's a curious quirk or, like, some funny joke you tell and it won't be held against you at all.

Oh, it will most definitely be held against you by your colleagues, even if they don't say so to your face. But the bosses generally overlook it. You're a status symbol for them.

# ¿ May 27, 2016 20:33

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

uninterrupted posted:

Random question: cool fun Virginia startup that's really into ping pong?

Haha I was thinking the same thing - don't work there but have a friend who does.

Braintree here in Chicago seems to have done well enough under Paypal but Oracle..ouch.

# ¿ May 31, 2016 00:27

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

I know of a company that has all of the above but also mandatory 8-6 in office working hours, just saying.

# ¿ May 31, 2016 00:52

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

a foolish pianist posted:

So I know this thread is about bad startups, but I work for a good one. Are there resources for recent ML phds (which is me) or similar academic folks who are trying to not be huge idiots about salaries and stock options and things? I'm four months into this job, and outside my specialty, I know precisely jack poo poo about business and finance.

Value your equity at zero, it's basically a lottery ticket especially with the prevalence of dirty term sheets. Even (almost especially) at unicorns.

# ¿ May 31, 2016 06:24

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

A Man With A Plan posted:

Can you take a nap from 1-3 everyday though? Cause I def would.

Whoa dude, why aren't you at your desk crushing it bro?

# ¿ May 31, 2016 06:26

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Subjunctive posted:

Tell me more, I like dirty term sheet stories. What was up with Theranos' sheets?

Her stock was common and all the investor's was preferred, so if the company takes a writedown or goes bust she doesn't even get the table scraps, sucks for her!

# ¿ Jun 1, 2016 22:18

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

Subjunctive posted:

I don't think liquidation preferences are really evidence of a dirty term sheet. You'd be hard pressed to find a sheet without them over the last 20 years.

The founder having no preferred stock at all is unusual, you have to admit. I guess we don't know if she had some and cashed it out, though.

# ¿ Jun 1, 2016 22:36

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

It's only ever come into play for me with very early stage startups, I've been involved with two and the founder was always agitating for preferred stock. Don't claim to be an expert.

# ¿ Jun 2, 2016 01:33

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# ¿ May 2, 2024 19:21

Soy Division: Aug 12, 2004

eschaton posted:

She comes from money. Why else do you think she gets to drop out of Stanford to start a company at 19? And where she got all of her advisors/investors/board members?

Not only that but didn't her father work at Kleiner or something?

# ¿ Jun 2, 2016 02:08

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