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My Experience at Apple

ex-apple-engineer.medium.com

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Re: My Experience at Apple

#431

Post by m463 »

SkyPuncher wrote: post #153
ma2rten wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got an offer from Apple. The hiring manager told me "You worked at a startup before, you'll have no problem working overtime". I didn't end up taking the offer.

I work at a startup right now and can count the number of times I've had to work overtime with a null-pointer - 0. Well run startups can still compete by making smart, focused decisions.

> can count the number of times I've had to work overtime with a null-pointer - 0.

Sounds to me like you've malloc'd all of memory.

Re: My Experience at Apple

#433

Post by resynth1943 »

> One day I went to use the woman restroom my “iBuddy” was there. She told me “die!” and slammed the door in my face.

Dunno about anyone else, but this really doesn't add up for me. I can't imagine that happening in real life. It doesn't make sense.

That threw me off the whole story. Hoping it's real, though.

Re: My Experience at Apple

#434

Post by ryanSrich »

exApple-anon wrote: post #9

Posting anonymously for obvious reasons. Unlike others, I actually find this story fairly believable. When I first joined Apple, straight out of college - a good program, top three in the country - I was abused similarly. I joined a team that was on a project behind schedule. Our manager was a brusque, no-nonsense sort of dude. But he clearly had anger problems. On the team were 2 senior engineers, me, and a junior e…

Maybe I’m just too jaded, but this is how I assume all big tech companies operate. The people that win get the results, even if it means being a massive piece of shit and treating your employees like garbage.

In fact, I would wager that not a single VP or higher at any major tech co isn’t a self-serving, backstabbing asshole. You simply don’t get into those types of positions on merit alone. You need to play the game.

That type of environment, where it’s almost impossible to do good work because you constantly need to be watching your own back is so unappealing to me that I can’t fathom why anyone with self worth would work at a FAANG. Perhaps it’s because they don’t know yet, but Blind exists, and it’s more horror stories than not.

Not having to deal with office politics and deranged managers is worth a hell of a pay cut imo.

Re: My Experience at Apple

#435

Post by triceratops »

worker767424 wrote: post #356
oblio wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been bashing Apple about BatteryGate a few times. You know, where they hid information from their customers in a way that benefitted their sales. They were sued and they settled. Which is basically admitting guilt, as these lawsuits are never lost by corporations (they either drag them out forever or if there too afraid of what losing implies, they settle). Each time I'm downvoted. The Apple Shiny Aluminum Corpo…

Batterygate looks bad, but the technical reason of the battery not being able to supply enough current for the CPU to run at full speed without crashing makes sense, so I think it's mostly a case of communicating the change poorly.

> I think it's mostly a case of communicating the change poorly.

Deliberately. The technical reasons are irrelevant. If Apple had slowed down the phones and shown a notification that said "Phone running in reduced mode. Replace your battery to restore full performance." they would be acting ethically. Hiding it was unethical and they deserved their fine and more.

Re: My Experience at Apple

#436

Post by saagarjha »

heimatau wrote: post #421
saagarjha wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The picture the author included has enough information for an outsider to piece together their organization. The fact that it includes a meeting time and room would be enough for Apple to figure out who it was, just by looking at who booked it. Unfortunately, they probably are already in a position where Apple knows exactly who they are, and perhaps their colleagues do too.

> The picture the author included has enough information... I'll refrain from the sarcasm. Although...it's very appealing. Is exApple-anon (OG comment that I responded to protect the obvious attack vector) the same as limono (HN submission)? Do you have evidence of this? I hope you certainly don't believe that they are the same person in a 100,000 person organization. This would be terribly assumptive. I don't believ…

I’m sorry, I’m not following your comment. I had interpreted the one I had originally responded to as “please don’t dox this person” to which I was responding “the pictures in the article are enough to dox the person already”. I am not quite sure how ‘limono or ‘exApple-anon come into this; FWIW I would doubt that they are or that ‘limono is even the person that wrote the article on Medium.

Re: My Experience at Apple

#437

Post by heavenlyblue »

dingaling wrote: post #345
m0llusk wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That isn't really true. Steve Jobs was no nonsense, but was most often merely direct rather than rude. One thing which Steve Jobs did do was go to great length to assemble highly qualified teams for missions that were clearly stated and understood and which all involved agreed were worthwhile even if there might be quibbles over details. The Apple that rescued itself from near death with colorful and fun designs and…

Direct is basically a euphemism for rude, in that it indicates lack of empathy. It might not intentionally be so, but usually shows that the speaker puts other priorities ahead of the emotional state of the recipient.

I have found that people who harbour opinions like these usually just aren’t very good at realising how bad they are at what they are doing in the first place. So they need the niceness to keep the false assumption that they are not that bad.

Sometimes the emotional state of the recipient is just a function of how grown up they are.

Re: My Experience at Apple

#439

Post by m463 »

exApple-anon wrote: post #9

Posting anonymously for obvious reasons. Unlike others, I actually find this story fairly believable. When I first joined Apple, straight out of college - a good program, top three in the country - I was abused similarly. I joined a team that was on a project behind schedule. Our manager was a brusque, no-nonsense sort of dude. But he clearly had anger problems. On the team were 2 senior engineers, me, and a junior e…

I have a friend who went through this two times. (Second time was "shame on me").

One problem was that he worked with a lot of H1-B coworkers. So management would push, and they feared for their ability to stay in the country, and when he got there, people would just just suck it up. His first day, calls at 1am 2am 3am. He left.

So a year later they cajoled and talked him into another job. He was given assurances and when he got there, basically the same culture slapped him in the face again. sigh.

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