It's not supposed to be fair. Interview questions are designed to differentiate candidates as quickly and broadly as possible. This is one where the notional go

It's not supposed to be fair. Interview questions are designed to differentiate candidates as quickly and broadly as possible. This is one where the notional goal of completing the project is different than the true goal of seeing how the candidate performs when given an impossible scenario. The author of this article fucked up when he tried to pass off 5 days of work as an example of what he could accomplish in 5 hours. I am glad he was able to find inspiration from it, but for the success of his startup I hope he also is able to understand other, better ways he could have approached the interview task.