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Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

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141–150 of 346 posts

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#141

Good. The best minds of a generation have wasted their talents figuring out how to best maximize media addiction and serve ads for Facebook and Google. Let’s hope a new generation engages in more socially productive endeavors.

Let’s hope that they’re paid more than sub-market rates and 0.05% equity.

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But I think most startups would save money and time by keeping it simple until they really need more. Having done this several times I can definitively say given my experience it's best to start in the cloud with a cloud native architecture. I can run a fully containerized application in ECS or EKS for a few hundred bucks a month. Why would I incur all the costs and limitations of a VPS or even worse a server I hav…

I'm often perplexed when I hear people complain about cloud costs. I can't tell if people just have really different workloads than I've experienced or if they just haven't considered cost when they pick their compute, databases, etc. If you use object storage, some serverless database, and some serverless compute a small company (by which I'm thinking "normally very low volume with occasional, very important, often…

The stuff you’re saving time on, managing hosts, just isn’t that much compared to dealing with aws/terraform/etc. I’m at a few orders of magnitude more spend than that, and in absolute dollars is very much noticeable how much more expensive aws is. But as a percentage of costs it’s so little next to wages, as is your example, that cost is really the wrong thing to get hung up on. Most engineers I’ve worked with don’t get that, they see a value they can objectively minimize, without realizing that even dropping it to zero his little business effect.

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#143
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you took a job like that, were you really one of the best minds of your generation?

Who are you to judge? Maybe they needed to support sick kids or parents. Arrogant and ignorant statement.

Great point. It was a question not a statement but I like your perspective a lot. Thank you.

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last summer and also before that, when I applied, I would get ~90% response rate and would have at least a call from recruiter/HM. Last week I sent a bunch of applications and crickets... this is something that I've never experienced in +10 years being in the industry. I'm not in dire need for a job but I can imagine how much,much stressful is to be unemployed now vs even 3-5 years ago.

I was laid off in December and this has been by far the hardest search of the now four times (yes, really) I’ve been laid off in my career. The few times I’ve received anything resembling feedback in this cycle has been along the lines of “we have a large number of highly qualified candidates for this role” and with a lot of LinkedIn postings citing 200+ applicants, I believe it.

Never apply through LinkedIn. It is so low-friction that the vast majority of applicants are nowhere near qualified, and hiring managers quickly learn to ignore anything that came in from LinkedIn.

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#146
post #104
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you took a job like that, were you really one of the best minds of your generation?

I mean, by almost any measure, some of the most brilliant programmers of the past 20 years have worked in ads at Google and Facebook, yes.

Were they the ones laid off this year?

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#147

Good. The best minds of a generation have wasted their talents figuring out how to best maximize media addiction and serve ads for Facebook and Google. Let’s hope a new generation engages in more socially productive endeavors.

Let’s hope that they’re paid more than sub-market rates and 0.05% equity.

They can start their own startups if they don't like the terms.

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#148
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Checked mine too and the difference is stark. However just setting Linkedin to "looking for a job" was enough to get a lot of attention in early February. I didn't want to wait for layoffs on my company, so, in advance, I got a much better paid job in about 2-3 weeks. Listings always suck, btw. Recruiters is where it's at.

I wonder what recruiting looks like as a career right now in comparison. I’m sure many will have to switch fields.

I see experienced ones remaining calm, where rank-and-file is a bit desperate: too many calls, sending me nonsense jobs, badmouthing companies, pushing it too hard to accept offers. Unsurprisingly, there was a boom during COVID, and a lot of those new people started around that time.

I see a correlation with development positions. There is just too many candidates for junior positions, but if you're a company trying to hire senior, principal or leadership your chance of success without a recruiter is very slim.

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#149
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you took a job like that, were you really one of the best minds of your generation?

It goes both ways. If you win the lottery starting a company at the right time, are you really the best mind of the generation or just lucky?

Somebody in a garage today is working on a business that will be worth billions within 5 years, and we'll all kick ourselves with "why didn't we think of that!"

Re: Tech layoffs are feeding a new startup surge

#150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like you had an interesting observation but it’s not clear to me. Can you state it more plainly? What kind of organization? I have also noticed FBers have a certain kind of personality. Vaguely utopian but removed from reality with a heavy emphasis on hedonism.

Sorry for sounding cryptic, it is hard to pin down exactly, but I somehow see Zuckerberg himself kind of like that; maybe someone who likes technical problems, but sees human relations in a kind of formulaic way, and oblivious to ethical consequences of technical work, not interested in the classics or humanities.

> oblivious to ethical consequences of technical work

He was told about the consequences pretty much from day 1. I don't think anyone at Facebook (especially not Zuckerberg) gets to be oblivious.

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