I get that the point of the article is to point out the flaws of technical interviews, but I see a lot of people griping and quite frankly circle jerking about

I get that the point of the article is to point out the flaws of technical interviews, but I see a lot of people griping and quite frankly circle jerking about how bad recruiters are. I am definitely "mid career" at this point and a manager and I consider my "recruiter bench" to be a huge asset, both for when I am hiring, and also looking. The thing is, yes absolutely 80% of them are garbage- they are mere regex's and will likely be out of the industry in a few years. The other 20%, that really know their shit, and have deep connections in the industry are gold though. What you need to do is find those guys and build relationships with them over time, so when you have an open head, or decide its time, you already have a half dozen people you can call that you have a long relationship that you trust to help get you a job. These guys can also just give you good intelligence- what is hot right now, what is not, who is paying well, which companies despite their darling status at the moment can't seem to keep an engineer in their seats more than a year. To get that kind of info though, you have to build a relationship. If I see someone that writes a well informed, grammatically correct email to me, I will look them up on LinkedIn. If they have been around awhile, have some shared connections with me, maybe shared some posts that are interesting, I will usually give them a call back and say "hey I am not interested, but lets keep in touch- here are some things that might interest me in a new role, you are welcome to bounce stuff that fits this off me any time." They will inevitably continue to call you over time- and that's when you can start asking them stuff- who is good/bad, etc. Even offer to get drinks (they will almost always pay)- that's when you can get the really good gossip. If you keep that bench warm, you will likely find that the quality of potential positions thrown your way improves dramatically, as well as the quality of potential candidates. At least that's been my experience.