War for tech talent in NYC • Hacker News Board

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#41

Post by huertanix » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 9:30 PM UTC

tocomment wrote: post #11

You'd think they'd want to hire someone in philli who's willing to work two days a week onsite and the rest from home but no. It's like I have the plague whenever I mention it.

I think that there's a certain dynamic with people that work in person that doesn't happen as much remotely; In person someone could walk into a random conversation after overhearing an idea, start adding their own twist to it, and eventually someone starts scribbling on a whiteboard and a new iteration of your product is born. I just don't see that happening as easily over groupware.

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#42

Post by huertanix » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 9:34 PM UTC

sbisker wrote: post #35

joe-mccann wrote: post #23

Austin, SF/SV and NYC are all in the same boat: Tech talent demand is unbelievably high. If you have a LinkedIn profile with reasonable skills (hell, put "HTML5" in your profile and watch what happens) you probably are already aware of this.

What does it mean when companies are trolling around looking for "HTML5"? Is that just the new buzzword? Or are that many companies actually interested in building things with Canvas these days? (I hope it's not because they think you need some sort of special HTML5 experience to learn how to embed video.)

For the most part, I've noticed it means "do things Flash does, but on an iPhone/iPad." So yeah, canvas.

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#43

Post by johnrob » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 9:59 PM UTC

ig1 wrote: post #33

goodgoblin wrote: post #17

I would love to know what the average startup is paying now in NYC v.s. what the average Wall Street Firm would pay for the same programmer.

They can't compete. They'll never be able to compete on the money front. If you're a senior C++ lead dev working in the front office of an Investment Bank you can make 250k-500k/year. If you join a startup as an early employee and get 1% equity , assuming a 10% chance of exit after three years, the company would need to have a $1 billion dollar exit for the risk-reward equation to break-even. There are a lot of ex-fi…

Your risk reward equation doesn't account for preferences. There are a lot of folks out there that would be turned off by a 0% chance of a big exit, which is what 250-500K/year is. Every startup offers a tiny chance of fame and fortune that a normal salaried position lacks.

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#44

Post by shafqat » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 10:10 PM UTC

jasonlbaptiste wrote: post #4

Who here is an NYC startup and who here is hiring?

NewsCred is hiring - we're looking for information retrieval engineers. So any experience (or even interest) in search, IR, solr, lucene, machine learning etc would be great. If not, willingness to learn.

We'd love on site, but would consider the remote option if the fit is great, and the remote location is near NYC.

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#45

Post by shafqat » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 10:11 PM UTC

gaustin wrote: post #31

jasonlbaptiste wrote: post #4

Who here is an NYC startup and who here is hiring?

I'd like to add a further question, if it's not frowned upon. Are there any that might be interested in folks who would start remotely (but willing to come out for bits of onsite time) and then relocate to NYC in a few months?

Yes - what kind of tech are you interested in? Email me (email in profile)!

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#46

Post by ig1 » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 10:15 PM UTC

johnrob wrote: post #43

ig1 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can't compete. They'll never be able to compete on the money front. If you're a senior C++ lead dev working in the front office of an Investment Bank you can make 250k-500k/year. If you join a startup as an early employee and get 1% equity , assuming a 10% chance of exit after three years, the company would need to have a $1 billion dollar exit for the risk-reward equation to break-even. There are a lot of ex-fi…

Your risk reward equation doesn't account for preferences. There are a lot of folks out there that would be turned off by a 0% chance of a big exit, which is what 250-500K/year is. Every startup offers a tiny chance of fame and fortune that a normal salaried position lacks.

Even if you want a chance of a big exit, it makes more financial sense to just put 20% of your salary into angel investments every year.

Sure there are other factors at play such as lifestyle, corporate culture, etc. But when it comes down to hard money startups can't compete with investment banks.

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#47

Post by dotnetrock » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 11:12 PM UTC

shafqat wrote: post #44

jasonlbaptiste wrote: post #4

Who here is an NYC startup and who here is hiring?

NewsCred is hiring - we're looking for information retrieval engineers. So any experience (or even interest) in search, IR, solr, lucene, machine learning etc would be great. If not, willingness to learn. We'd love on site, but would consider the remote option if the fit is great, and the remote location is near NYC.

How do you guys make money since there is no pricing or any info on what the service will cost.

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#48

Post by geebee » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 11:15 PM UTC

asnyder wrote: post #39

geebee wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This quote struck me as a bit outdated as well. Not because it mentions Java and PHP, but because it seems to imply that those are the big two skill sets. The "what does your startup use?" polls that show up on HN every know and then suggest Python and Ruby are in heavy use (though PHP and Java do still get a decent showing)

Believe it or not the self-selecting group represented on Hacker News is absolutely not representative of the developer majority. Furthermore, it's very unsettling that even on hacker news there's this prevalent anti-PHP attitude. With the release of PHP 5.3, and the current maturity of the numerous frameworks there's never been a better time to use PHP.

I have no trouble believing this. I should probably have said "even on hacker news polls, Java and PHP get a substantial showing..."

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#49

Post by burningion » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 11:32 PM UTC

ig1 wrote: post #33

goodgoblin wrote: post #17

I would love to know what the average startup is paying now in NYC v.s. what the average Wall Street Firm would pay for the same programmer.

They can't compete. They'll never be able to compete on the money front. If you're a senior C++ lead dev working in the front office of an Investment Bank you can make 250k-500k/year. If you join a startup as an early employee and get 1% equity , assuming a 10% chance of exit after three years, the company would need to have a $1 billion dollar exit for the risk-reward equation to break-even. There are a lot of ex-fi…

Just out of curiosity, where can I get more info on risk-reward equations?

Re: War for tech talent in NYC

#50

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Dec 28, 2010, 11:39 PM UTC

ig1 wrote: post #46

johnrob wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your risk reward equation doesn't account for preferences. There are a lot of folks out there that would be turned off by a 0% chance of a big exit, which is what 250-500K/year is. Every startup offers a tiny chance of fame and fortune that a normal salaried position lacks.

Even if you want a chance of a big exit, it makes more financial sense to just put 20% of your salary into angel investments every year. Sure there are other factors at play such as lifestyle, corporate culture, etc. But when it comes down to hard money startups can't compete with investment banks.

[deleted]