Online reputation can certainly get you a job; why should it not lose you one? If you participate in an open source project, you are likely to get a boost in a

Online reputation can certainly get you a job; why should it not lose you one? If you participate in an open source project, you are likely to get a boost in an interview with a knowledgeable company. It certainly does with me when I've hired someone. Now, if someone at the company goes and looks at your code in that open source project, and says "Yikes! That's some pretty awful code!", then you've got a problem. People have been getting jobs and losing opportunities due to reputation forever. This is just an extension to existing processes; nothing really new.