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Coders Who Don't Job Interview: Zed Shaw
- heyrhett 15y agoOther creative professions have this phenomenon too. In film, there are actors who audition for parts, and actors who have roles pitched to them. Everyone knows that being famous for your work requires a combination of talent, luck, and hard work, but everyone can't be Zed Shaw. There isn't room. It would be like telling actors "Just do what Jim Carrey did."
- kiba 15y agoYou don't have to be famous or uber skilled to not have to be interviewed. I got my first job a month ago simply by being knowing someone on IRC.
- heyrhett 15y agoSure, and people get parts in movies because they know the producer. But, the article is about Zed shaw, and I think the comparison to famous actors applies. I think it's a good point though, that maybe just because you aren't guaranteed to be famous, Zed Shaw probably has some highly effective habits that all developers can learn from. And you don't have to be famous for his advice to be helpful.
- tjpick 15y ago> highly effective habits that all developers can learn from http://programming-motherfucker.com/ http://programming-motherfucker.com/
- notJim 15y agoEvery now and then, I start to feel lazy or like I'm wanting to avoid some necessary but tedious task. Then I think to myself "programming, motherfucker" and get that shit done.
- AltIvan 15y agoHi, this is completly offtopic but i couldn't find another way to contact you: In another thread you complain about the "Unknown or Expired Link" error you sometimes get in HN; i want to tell you that i created a Google Chrome extention that fixs this problem (and also adds some other functionality). You can check it out here: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bldhjkmbdomhijjjnmckgchocnfhkpnd https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bldhjkmbdomhijjjnm... Mmm... if you are not a Chrome user... well... you should become one! :)
- diolpah 15y agoI've hired a number of people directly from IRC without a formal interview process. It's a fantastic place to find smart people. But it's important to point out that by virtue of sharing knowledge and posting pastebin urls of your code over a period of time, you are already interviewing, in a sense.
- nostrademons 15y agoI think it depends a lot on the relative standing between you and the company. There are a large number of startups and small businesses where I could get a job simply by saying "Hey, I'm interested", walking in, and having a 15-minute chat with the founder. I would probably not want to work for most of them, though, because it's quite boring being the smartest guy in the room. However, the number of people who could get hired at Google or Facebook without an interview is probably in the dozens to low hundreds, worldwide. And many of them probably aren't interested, because they've got their F-you money, or they have a nice tenured research position somewhere where they can do whatever they want.
- swah 15y ago> having a 15-minute chat with the founder How isn't that an interview?
- nostrademons 15y agoDepends whether he offers you the job at the beginning of the chat or the end. The former has happened to me before...
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- allwein 15y agoGenerally there's two points to an interview. 1) Is this person knowledgeable and capable of performing the job I need them to do? 2) Is this person a cultural/personable fit for my team? I think the point of this article is that when you're a "famous" developer with known traits, number 1 is dispensed with. The 15 minute chat is just to determine number 2. I myself have gotten several jobs after just a recommendation from a friend and a quick drink with the manager.
- SimHacker 15y agoHow about smoking a joint with your future manager and development team in a hotel room at a conference?
- revorad 15y agoEveryone can't be Zed Shaw or Jim Carey, not because there isn't room, but because it's bloody hard.
- Tanner 15y agoI disagree. People become Zed Shaw or Jim Carey based on merit but if everyone is equally meritorious then nobody is. Being good at something is subjective but being better than most people is measurable.
- sedev 15y agoOf course we can't all be Picasso (the role was filled by some guy who was hanging out in Paris at the right time), but that is no reason not to try. Trying to raise the collective professional standard is a Good Thing. I think more people should try to emulate Zed Shaw in terms of coding competence (there are already enough people trying to emulate him in terms of 'surly fellow who gets away with being a tremendous asshole on account of being a tremendous asshole who's usually right').
- noonespecial 15y agoThey much too often skip the who's usually right part but nail the first half.
- sedev 15y agoYeah - the first half comes easier. Too easy - I do it myself far too often.
- pavel_lishin 15y agoRelevant post by John Scalzi: http://whatever.scalzi.com/2011/06/15/how-to-have-a-writing-career-like-mine/ http://whatever.scalzi.com/2011/06/15/how-to-have-a-writing-... The tldr is: "How to Have a Writing Career Like Mine: You Can't"
- pavel_lishin 15y agoCan we make this not happen after double-clicking text? http://i.imgur.com/YL9Xd.png http://i.imgur.com/YL9Xd.png
- heyrhett 15y agoHow informative and useful that you now know the word "didn't" was in a Billy Joel song! I've always thought that people who chose to use hypertext this way were seriously missing the point.
- pavel_lishin 15y agoIt's not hypertext. It's what happens if you double-click some text and wait approximately two seconds.
- Jach 15y agohttps://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/noscript/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/noscript/
- zcid 15y agoNoScript is one of my two mandatory extensions. I don't understand how anyone can stand the web w/o it.
- pavel_lishin 15y agoIt helps if the majority of sites you visit don't pull bullshit antics.
- po 15y agoAnd for safari I use: http://homepage.mac.com/drewthaler/jsblacklist/ http://homepage.mac.com/drewthaler/jsblacklist/
- barce 15y agoYa, I'm bringing it up with the Apture folks.
- unbracketed 15y agoI’d also say that going back to school is a good way to update your life and change your profession. I’m a firm believer in getting government student loans and using them to go to school. They’re cheap, low interest, and the US government is usually very nice about letting you pay them back. I’m not so sure about other places around the world though. Another take on the student loan system: http://consumerist.com/2010/09/student-loans-gateway-drug-to-debt-slavery.html http://consumerist.com/2010/09/student-loans-gateway-drug-to...
- nightski 15y agoNotice how he says government loans. That I agree with. The private loan system is another beast altogether, one I am dealing with personally. Fortunately with our profession it is not hard to pay off loans.
- zedshaw 15y agoYes, government loans. I wouldn't have been able to go to school if it weren't for the government loans I could get. I was poor, and school was damn expensive no matter where I went. Without the government handing me dirt cheap loans and letting me pay them off practically indefinitely I'd be much worse off. Now, banks and private loan companies can go to hell.
- arctangent 15y ago"I think I also tend to pick off the lower level work because most of my original ideas are usually too weird for a professional setting." I'd like to see some clarification on this. A lot of the work I do (inside a large organisation) seems to involve inventive approaches to problems. Maybe not like writing new web servers, but certainly the kind of non-routine stuff that keeps a hacker happy. I don't (often) do this just for fun - there's simply not enough time to solve problems the boring way. "Professionally though, inspiration is for amateurs and I just do my work." I'd also like to see some clarification on this. Is Zed saying that it's wrong to take a novel approach to one's work? Or that maybe it's better to just do things the way you're told and save the creative juices for personal endeavours? I might just be mis-reading this completely. Any help much appreciated...
- zedshaw 15y agoI try really hard to get things done at work, sometimes that means doing shit work so someone else can have a good time coding something interesting. That's all there is to it. That doesn't mean I don't try to do the shit work in an efficient novel way, it just means what I'm willing to work on isn't necessarily glamorous. As for the second comment, I'm just saying that if you have to wait around for inspiration before you can do anything then you're just an amateur. I may not be as into what I do without inspiration, but in my day job I can just do what I need without waiting around for a muse to strike me with Thor's hammer. I find people who walk around screaming that they "MUST BE PASSIONATE!" are either deluded, stupid, or just prima donnas who can't sit down and do the damn job. Personally I'd take someone objective and little critical over some passionate Yes-Man. Now, that's at work, where usually I'm just slinging code for someone else to make money off of and my interest is really only in doing my job well, not in what I'm doing.
- dmoney 15y agoIt seems like success as a programmer (or at least Internet fame) requires doing a lot of side projects. Do you ever find that doing the shit work at work saps your interest for side projects? Like if you have to look at another line of code you'll scream?
- zedshaw 15y agoI'll add one more thing. People ask me about getting work now that I'm "famous", and I usually just tell them this: Before I was famous I'd have to scrounge around for shitty jobs. Now they just come to me. Truth is, I still interview, I still do the stupid coding quizzes, I still send my resume, not because I have to, but because I want to be taken seriously and treated fairly with the understanding that I got hired because I know what I'm doing. Not because of my "fame". After that, the jobs are pretty uninspiring these days and while the work environment may be pleasant, I rarely find any place that's interested in taking a big risk with my ideas.
- mgkimsal 15y ago"Before I was famous I'd have to scrounge around for shitty jobs. Now they just come to me." Do you mean shitty jobs just come to you? Or better stuff? Couldn't tell if you were trying to be funny there or not.
- sceadu 15y agoLook at the rest of the post.
- enry_straker 15y agoHad to laugh cause i had a similar reaction. It's more a reflection of how i view his words rather than the words themselves. Zed was being serious and was talking about how he wants his recruiters to take him seriously, I suspect that i am spending way too much time on reddit, and should learn to take things at their face value.
- sigzero 15y agoI think he meant the former.
- speckledjim 15y agoAre you seriously using the words "fame" and "famous" without sarcasm there? Perhaps "well known within certain programming communities" would be more apt.
- shazow 15y agoDoes nobody care about personality and team fit? You can be great on paper and by reputation, but turns out Zed and I don't jive. Edit: Interviewing can reveal these things, for both the applicant and the hiring company.
- jacques_chester 15y agoI'm not sure why you're being downvoted. I admire Zed. His angry rants make me laugh. His ability to pump out decent code is brobdingnagian. He's usually right. But of course, part of what makes his rants so funny is that even the minimum niceties are dispensed with. I'm not sure if that means Zed can be inserted into a team of ordinary folk without wasteful drama from people with hurt feelings. I understand Zed's work mostly takes the form of freelancing. That's probably the best fit.
- zedshaw 15y agoNo, I don't freelance, I actually work as an employee at companies. I absolutely hate freelancing.
- jacques_chester 15y agoWell don't I feel like a drongo. :)
- johnx123-up 15y agoOT: I'm not sure, if HN is programmed in a way that "Zed Shaw" will always appear on front page.
- zedshaw 15y agoThey do, and people who think I'm just a dick, rather than see the truth (which is that I'm a dick to people who treat me and other people like dicks), aren't the kinds of people I want to work with.
- georgieporgie 15y ago
- varikin 15y agoOne thing I think should be added is that to participate in the community. It can be working on projects—your own or other open source projects, being active on IRC and mailing lists, or going to local user groups. I like to believe I got my current job by starting a Python user group. It helped me network and find where the jobs in the area where.
- moondowner 15y ago> "I first heard of him from a video Leah Culver linked to on a talk that Zed gave, “The ACL is dead.”" I knew I wasn't the only one.