I wanna work at Instagram • Hacker News Board

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#91

Post by pkamb » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:07 PM UTC

Tycho wrote: post #75

fara wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the lack of a working maximize button good UX?

I'd say the maximize button is in itself a bad design idea. Hit the green button on the browser window and it will expand to the width (or height) whereby scroll bars are no longer necessary. This 'maximizes' your screen real estate, rather than blowing it all on one window/app like a Windows maximize button. Also, while it's not a bad idea to keep page widths in the 750-1050ish range, No True Mac User would object t…

Doesn't work so well with a tabbed browser, where each tab is going to have a different optimized 'maximize' size. It's decent for folder windows and etc. though.

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#92

Post by noonespecial » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:10 PM UTC

madh wrote: post #79

Anyone else see gibberish? (Chrome 11/XP) This can't be good. http://awesomescreenshot.com/0e59u240c

Its a font thing. The style sheet calls for a load of YanoneKaffeesatz-Light.otf and a few others from the server. If that goes wrong for some reason, there's no alternate so you get gibberish.

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#93

Post by Mystalic » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:10 PM UTC

crasshopper wrote: post #85

Mystalic wrote: post #30

Anything that makes you stand above the crowd of job seekers and get noticed is (almost) always a smart move. Do you think Instagram is thinking "no, this girl is clearly an idiot?" No, they're clearly going to notice her and give her consideration that she wouldn't otherwise get. They're probably thinking "nice initiative" even if they've seen this type of application before. I think a few of you are being too cynic…

And my question would be, why did it get to the top of Hacker News? I tried making a website like this and failed to get much notice.

You can't predict every variable. Sometimes one vote helps bring it to the front page and it picks up steam. I suspect the Instagram brand gave this website extra attention.

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#94

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:12 PM UTC

Mystalic wrote: post #30

Anything that makes you stand above the crowd of job seekers and get noticed is (almost) always a smart move. Do you think Instagram is thinking "no, this girl is clearly an idiot?" No, they're clearly going to notice her and give her consideration that she wouldn't otherwise get. They're probably thinking "nice initiative" even if they've seen this type of application before. I think a few of you are being too cynic…

[deleted]

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#95

Post by dchest » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:13 PM UTC

kenjackson wrote: post #82

dchest wrote: post #40

Don't want to sound rude, but the lens ("I made this") has pretty bad type work. Kerning is off, the curve is not right ( http://i.imgur.com/tpDqv.png ). The drop shadow is also strange. Overall, there's not enough attention to detail.

Curious, can you point me to your sites design?

Why do you want to look at my site? Will this somehow make my points invalid? :-) Oh, this guy can't design, so no, kerning is right.

I'm not a designer, and although I design everything for my products myself, I don't pretend that my design work is good; hell, I know that I lack attention to detail, and I'll be the first person to criticize my work.

If you insist, here you go: http://www.codingrobots.com/ (the most recent thing I drew was this, I think: http://www.codingrobots.com/images/cathodique_128.png [this reminded me that this product is dead, and I need to release this icon into the public domain], and I can point out why it's not good, and why it's the best I can do at this moment).

BTW, I'm not looking for a job.

Edit: while the spotlight is on my, I'd like to say that design is a very fricking hard work. Every time I try to draw an icon or position elements on a web page, it's like going to hell -- it takes forever and causes pains. Programming is easier ;-)

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#96

Post by reason » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:13 PM UTC

crasshopper wrote: post #85

Mystalic wrote: post #30

Anything that makes you stand above the crowd of job seekers and get noticed is (almost) always a smart move. Do you think Instagram is thinking "no, this girl is clearly an idiot?" No, they're clearly going to notice her and give her consideration that she wouldn't otherwise get. They're probably thinking "nice initiative" even if they've seen this type of application before. I think a few of you are being too cynic…

And my question would be, why did it get to the top of Hacker News? I tried making a website like this and failed to get much notice.

Because as many here would probably not like to accept, HNers are just as prone to social engineering as the guy on Facebook who signs up for the app that can supposedly revert his Facebook page back to the old design.

HN can be gamed quite easily, for this and other reasons.

Since you're near the top of this thread, which itself is sitting at the top of the HN front page, why not link to your site here? I wouldn't mind.

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#97

Post by r00fus » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:15 PM UTC

kmfrk wrote: post #60

Kudos to her for putting herself out there, but she's misunderstood what the point of this kind of application is. When you make a grab for a job like this, you underscore the fact that employers don't always know that there is something that can be improved - and that someone should be hired to do it. I vaguely recall someone writing an application for 37signals, where he made some redesigns for the site that he tho…

Her article/resume is her "show" not "tell". The medium is the message... that's UX.

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#98

Post by vijayr » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:16 PM UTC

jamesjyu wrote: post #22

Someone should make an app to let anyone make this kind of clean targeted resume.

then everyone will start creating such resumes, and it'll not be unique/different anymore (which'll make it difficult to stand out)

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#99

Post by Titanous » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:17 PM UTC

Mystalic wrote: post #30

Anything that makes you stand above the crowd of job seekers and get noticed is (almost) always a smart move. Do you think Instagram is thinking "no, this girl is clearly an idiot?" No, they're clearly going to notice her and give her consideration that she wouldn't otherwise get. They're probably thinking "nice initiative" even if they've seen this type of application before. I think a few of you are being too cynic…

We hired someone recently at Shopify who made a site like this using our platform. It should at least get her an in-person interview.

Re: I wanna work at Instagram

#100

Post by Splines » Wed, Mar 23, 2011, 8:18 PM UTC

dchest wrote: post #40

Don't want to sound rude, but the lens ("I made this") has pretty bad type work. Kerning is off, the curve is not right ( http://i.imgur.com/tpDqv.png ). The drop shadow is also strange. Overall, there's not enough attention to detail.

I was also confused by it. I was wondering if she worked for Leica at some point (i.e., she designed a camera lens?). Only by reading your critique can I guess that she drew it. It looks pretty good, although the kerning problems with the text is a little distracting.