10 ms·
Total derail but: > I'm a Principal Engineer at a FAAMNG company. Does anyone other than a MS employee put an M in FAANG?
by jldugger 5y ago
Total derail but:
> I'm a Principal Engineer at a FAAMNG company.
Does anyone other than a MS employee put an M in FAANG?
- slumpt_ 5y agoDefinitely not. This is literally the first time I’ve even seen FAAMNG.
- rl3 5y agoSame. Sup, faam.
- Aulig 5y agoFirst time I've seen it too, but I find it more fitting actually. I see Microsoft as a lot more of a tech giant than Netflix, but maybe Im judging by the wrong criteria.
- quickthrowman 5y agoYou aren’t, MSFT is much more appropriate than Netflix, a company that releases 2nd rate copies of shows from better networks.
- mewpmewp2 5y agoI think as of late FAAMG is more popular or appropriate than FAANG, but I mean, who knows. According to Wikipedia at least https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Tech https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Tech Edit: Not popular maybe, but appropriate still.
- z3t4 5y agoCan we put an R in there too? Does Redit count!? Did you know that modern farming is very high tech?
- psyc 5y agoI always thought it was more appropriate for most purposes. But on HN, perhaps the most common purpose is discussing ludicrous total comp. And, at least when I left in 2010, Microsoft most certainly did not offer that. I heard that they raised pay across the board shortly after I left, but considering where they started, I’d be shocked if it put them on par with FAANG. Anybody know?
- IggleSniggle 5y agoI don’t really know, but I’m under the impression that Amazon comp is pretty comparable to Microsoft these days.
- jabedude 5y agoI think AMZN stock value increases pushes Amazon comp well past Microsoft
- whimsicalism 5y agoBoth MS and AMZN have increased comparable amounts in value.
- meetups323 5y agolevels.fyi has MSFT at ~75% of GAAF salaries for equal positions (N is apparently exclusively Seniors getting a cool half mil in pure salary and nothing else? Not sure how accurate that is...) That being said, it's hard to compare directly. I know many M folks, and some F, G, A and A folks. The M folks probably work at most 75% of the hours of the others. I for one would much rather work a standard 9-5 and make a lot than work 996 (not that extreme, but kinda) and make downright absurd amounts...
- whimsicalism 5y agoAmazon seems pretty comparable to MS, not sure where you are looking.
- 5y ago
- ggambetta 5y agoGretchen, stop trying to make FAAMNG happen! It's not gonna happen!
- Kluny 5y agoLmao, had the same thought. Also, did you get a lot of those participation trophies when you were a kid? I read a take on those recently, along the lines of, "if the adults always praise everyone, then their praise is meaningless and can't be trusted". Ie, a recipe for impostor syndrome in later life. I certainly experience that. Anytime I participate in an activity that I'm naturally talented at, I figure it's just not that difficult and I've done nothing special.
- saalweachter 5y agoParticipation trophies weren't a big thing for GenX or Millennials, according to Google's N-gram Viewer, showing up instead for Boomers and Zoomers (and the Silent Generation). https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=participation+trophy&year_start=1800&year_end=2019&corpus=26&smoothing=3&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cparticipation%20trophy%3B%2Cc0#t1%3B%2Cparticipation%20trophy%3B%2Cc0 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=participation+...
- Kluny 5y agoDid OP mention their age? I assumed, without any other info to go with, that they're about the same age as me - 30's and millennial. And my cohort got participation medals for every goddam thing you could think of. Looking at the 6th place ribbon winner of the third grade spoon race right here. Not to pick nits or anything!
- readdit 5y agoSeems like MS has imposter syndrome.
- zR0x 5y agoThem HN commenting standards…
- Uehreka 5y agoPeople probably should. If the acronym includes Netflix, it definitely needs to include MS, they’re way bigger.
- bbarnett 5y agoMicrosoft wasn't historically an "internet company". They were an OS only, non-internet company, compared to the rest. When the acronym was created, it was still that way. Even now, they make most of their butter from OS installs, although yes, they have branched out a lot.
- icedchai 5y agoThey were, though now I feel Microsoft is actually a more diversified tech company than the FAANGs. Consumer software and hardware, enterprise software, cloud / Internet, gaming, open source (github, etc.)
- sorry_outta_gas 5y agoMicorosft has alwyas been the hyper diversified tech company, they could lose an entire segments of their market and still truck along
- menzoic 5y agoThe acroynm is based purely on stock performance during the time it was created. You could make the same argument for Apple but Apple was on the list from day 1.
- reureu 5y agoIf we're actually gonna do this, can we at least rearrange and make it "MAFANG"?
- thefourthchime 5y agoAgreed. We don’t need another MAGA
- rhacker 5y agoOUTED!
- yissp 5y agoI've seen people on 4chan /g/ include the M, but it being 4chan, they rearrange the acronym into something offensive that I shan't repeat.
- jdkfglkjh34 5y agoCan we get a hint?
- genewitch 5y agoIt's the one higher up this comment thread.
- nostrademons 5y agoI still think that the acronym should be "FN MAGA". Microsoft, Apple, Google, and Amazon are the big-4 companies, with notably larger market caps than Facebook and Netflix, and those 4 are more broad platforms/conglomerates while Facebook and Netflix are closely associated with a single app or small set of apps.
- IggleSniggle 5y agoFacebook has grown into a lot of the things. It probably deserves to be grouped with the others. I honestly thing FAANG became the acronym because these companies were making big waves simultaneously at one point, and the acronym is attractive. There’s never been any good reason not to include Microsoft except that for a long time it was considered old and stodgy. Netflix doesn’t make sense in terms of market cap, and it also doesn’t make sense in 2021 when it’s more a media company than a technology company. Don’t get me wrong, they totally nailed it on a ton of tech fronts, and deserve their technical accolades…it just looks strange next to the others. Oh, thinking about Netflix, I just figured it out. It’s about SWE salaries, and not really related to much else. …although if that’s it, then Amazon doesn’t really deserve it’s spot any more than Microsoft.
- saalweachter 5y agoNetflix is fairly comparable to Disney in terms of business model and market cap. Which isn't bad -- I assume Disney also has a number of highly-paid SWEs -- but for me the difference between FAAMG and Netflix is that (as far as I can tell) Netflix doesn't employee a giant pile of SWEs doing blue sky research / doomed projects only tangentially related to the core business.
- IggleSniggle 5y agoGreat comparison, Disney v Netflix. It’s actually remarkable to me how close to Disney that Netflix is, considering the considerable IP that Disney now owns and how otherwise comparable they are.
- erikpukinskis 5y ago
- vmception 5y agoI enjoyed FAANGMULA and TARANTULAS fun meme There are also a handful of sub $100bn marketcap publicly traded tech companies that pay on par of FAANGs and may have more enticing vesting schedules too. Greater upside as well.
- kuresov 5y agoWould love to hear about some of those companies
- iratewizard 5y agoSalesforce has done well for me up until the last two weeks. Oracle isn't dead yet. Adobe, Nvidia and Qualcomm are also all doing well at a 30 foot view. None of those have made as much money for me as Cleveland-cliffs, though.
- vmception 5y agoPinterest, Lyft, Uber to name a few
- saalweachter 5y agoI usually use FAAMG instead of FAANG because I don't understand what Netflix is doing in there.
- cvhashim 5y agoHas to do with blue chip tech stocks apparently
- adventured 5y agoWhen Jim Cramer coined it (originally as FANG) and began pumping it on his show regularly, it was just a batch of large, sector dominant tech stocks he thought should be bought at that time (with the letter ordering being convenient for memory). That's all it was. There is no greater definition, and it's bizarre to see people argue over that aspect routinely on HN, given it was nothing more than a stock pumping promotion by a slightly vacuous tv bobblehead.
- mwfunk 5y agoYeah it's literally just a short list of companies that people see as being the big kahunas of the tech industry. In the '80s it would've been Intel, Microsoft, IBM, and maybe even companies like Lotus or WordPerfect. In the '90s it would've been more like, Intel, Microsoft, AOL, Sun, maybe Oracle, maybe still IBM? Hell maybe even Ebay. Lots of those companies are still around but the ones that are tend to be more mature, less volatile, and less influential on the rest of the industry now, and get correspondingly less press. But yeah, that's all FAANG is and I'm amazed anyone thinks it's anything more standardized or meaningful or precisely defined. It's shorthand for the biggest and most influential companies in the tech industry at the moment, at least from the perspective of people on the outside looking in. If someone wants to the throw an M into FAANG I totally get it.
- kook_throwaway 5y agoUsing all the bandwidth on the interwebs.
- 5y ago
- verst 5y agoPlenty of discussions and comments from the people who originally coined the term FANG / FAANG why they would want to update the term today. Never heard of FAAMNG though. FAGMA or FAAM have been suggested as updated terms in light of the metrics / characteristics that initially led to the term FA(A)NG being coined. These terms were certainly not originally intended to describe high salaries for engineers ;)
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- swiley 5y agoI've seen "FAGMAN" in a couple places. It really reflects the general sentiment towards those companies as well.
- genewitch 5y agoWhen I'm on E2EE I only use that acronym. And I've worked for one of the companies and had IP stolen by two others. Maybe that's why...
- swiley 5y agoRemember: E2EE on phones is not secret.
- bowmessage 5y agoand it suddenly is if it's on PCs?
- rsynnott 5y agoWell, aren’t you just the edgiest.
- Beldin 5y agoI've seen that as FANGMAN - adding NVidia to the mix. I never considered it before, but the image of a man with fangs that slowly sucks the life out of you also might fit, depending on your PoV.
- swiley 5y agoIMO Qualcomm can be far worse than NVidia but I don't know where you would put a "Q."
- foldr 5y agoIt also reflects the casual homophobia of the relevant communities. (It’s one thing to laugh at the silly acronym, but another to use it as a way of deprecating the companies in question.)
- jdkfglkjh34 5y agoGP listed six companies instead of identifying their employer. If they do work at Microsoft, it's cruel of you to out them. If they don't work at Microsoft, it makes sense that they'd want to list more companies rather than fewer.
- fnord77 5y agowhat is MS?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- dekhn 5y agoyes, it's FAAMG not FAANG. Used to work at G and I always correct people this way.
- rfrey 5y agoI'm going to archive this subthread for the next time someone asks me what "bikeshedding" is.
- jldugger 5y agoI don't really care, other than to hint to the author that they're giving away more info than is being shared. Did not expect a million replies =)
- tester756 5y agoI do because I wouldn't put video streaming service among tech behemoths that create operating systems, compilers, programming languages, databases, put shitton into ML research and many, many other I'm not saying that video streaming is easy, but I believe any of those could do it easily from technical standpoint. Google, Facebook and Amazon already do, idk about Apple and MS.
- sheikheddy 5y agoAppleTV+? Microsoft Stream?
- deanCommie 5y agoLOL. Without revealing any further, I'm not at M ;)
- farazzz 5y agoYeah, I assumed they were Microsoft because I’ve never heard FAAMNG before