> AmaGooBookSoft hires, to a first approximation, only pedigreed developers with their AKC papers in hand. I think that is a very outdated view of those compan

> AmaGooBookSoft hires, to a first approximation, only pedigreed developers with their AKC papers in hand. I think that is a very outdated view of those companies. IME at least, you've described Google's hiring process pretty accurately but are fairly incorrect about the rest. In particular, Amazon is hiring like crazy [1]. Even back when I graduated, Amazon was known for being a place that was easy to get into if you were willing to stomach the sometimes-insane workload (which still pales in comparison to some startup sweatshop horror stories). Again, I didn't graduate from a program with much name recognition and AmaGooAppleFaceSoft still snatched up 45% of my graduating class. > (actually: pretty much just GooBook) I'm not sure why you're only including those two. Amazon share prices have quintupled over the last 5 years. If you were compensated with RSUs you've done very well for yourself. I know several MS software engineers who were (very recently) paid roughly $150K + $100K in equity each of their first four years (admittedly after attaining their Master's, though I'm not sure how much it helped). 1: https://www.amazon.jobs/en/search?offset=0&result_limit=10&sort=relevant&category=software-development https://www.amazon.jobs/en/search?offset=0&result_limit=10&s...