3 ms·

"Maybe I'm just a cynic, but it's hard for me not to feel skeptical." Sorry to disappoint, but nobody is being trolled here.

niggler 14y ago
You are trolling, and here's why: 1) Your writing style is eerily similar to that of a person based in India (and yes, I've seen enough people claiming to be americans but actually from India to know the difference) For example "helping to define product and rapidly build it" is not a natural phrase to use. 2) I highly doubt anyone here needs to see something like "API's" under skills. It's not like people here aren't aware of many of the APIs that you know. 3) If you really spent 7 years working and have experience in "Ecommerce, Saas, Social API's, Analytics, Finance, Health IT" you either jumped many times between jobs or you worked for a contracting company 4) A person with your level of experience, especially in areas like javascript and HTML5, should be able to throw together a sample or a portfolio. Do you have such a sample?
- saryant 14y ago
  Other than the single phrase you pointed out, nothing else in his post jumps out to me as being similar to the typical Indian style of English writing. Until very recently I used to work for one of the big outsourcing firms so I've exchanged more than my share of emails with offshore devs. This one just doesn't strike me the same as those emails. I'll give you (2) and (3) but he may also just be overreaching. Analytics could equal throwing Google Analytics on a page. Ecommerce, a PayPal integration. And who hasn't grabbed some data from the Twitter API when testing out a new framework or library? I'll agree that that's a very broad range, maybe. Overall, however, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that he's not an overseas dev trolling for leads.
  - niggler 14y ago
    on point 1: "API's" <-- this could be sampling bias, but I've never seen an american write it like this (though, to be honest, I've never seen a resume include the abstract assertion that the person is familiar with APIs) "Social API's" <-- If this person used the Twitter API then he or she would say it. "Experienced in domains" <-- This phrase didn't strike you as odd? "I am on the hunt for Developer-related position." <-- That could be eastern european, but struck me as Indian. on overreaching: ostensibly this person realized that the community has many technically competent people. Overreaching makes sense when talking to a recruiter. When you are talking with other technical people, just get to the point! No need to say "Health IT" or "Finance" without going into what exactly you did. Finance is particularly bad, because there are many ... for lack of a better term, mindless roles in the major investment banks. But the fourth point really bothers me. If I wanted to be hired as a web dev, I would have a sample up. Something that would show I know what I'm doing. It's not that hard, and the prevalence of free micro hosting like AWS or github pages or nodejitsu renders the economic argument moot. Hell, even a simple twitter bootstrap site would say that he or she knows that it exists.
- eshvk 14y ago
  What if he is...gasp... A person from in India who moved to the U.S. and is now looking for a job after doing all the stuff that he says he did. Is it that big a fucking deal or is that tin foil hat of yours permanently stuck?
  - niggler 14y ago
    7 years working (assuming US) + some positive number of years in school is enough time to slough the indian style english quirks. You would be surprised how many people born in india that have moved to the US actually speak american english (even if there is an accent). I've yet to see any evidence that this person is not an overseas developer fishing for contract work. And yes, I've dealt with enough people that claim to be based in the US but turn out to be in India that I take everything with a grain of salt. And if you haven't, you probably haven't tried to find an employee or contractor.
- up_and_up 14y ago
  Sorry niggles, but you are smoking something. Born in Minneapolis MN. Polish/German American Boy. You need a long form birth certificate or something? Yes, I have plenty of samples. Trying to remain anon here. Shoot me an email.
  - niggler 14y ago
    Just for the record, my point wasn't about people born in India. I was pointing out that, in my experience hiring employees and contractors, many remote developers (especially in India) masquerade as US citizens who want to work remotely (and the truth is revealed only when I offer to fly them to NYC for a meeting)
mikle 14y ago
First of all I hope you do get a job out of the leads here, you indeed sound like a normal real person. Niggler below did a good job of specifying some of my concerns of why I am skeptical, but I hope the biggest point I got across is that in my opinion HN isn't the place for this. It feels like you are in the middle of a party and you stood up and yelled "I need a job" - you might be serious and smart, but I'll still feel skeptical about you because you can't fit your message to the audience. The thing is - the audience here mostly did offer advice and leads, so I might not really know what it wants, so I'm just speaking for me :)

niggler 14y ago

You are trolling, and here's why: 1) Your writing style is eerily similar to that of a person based in India (and yes, I've seen enough people claiming to be americans but actually from India to know the difference) For example "helping to define product and rapidly build it" is not a natural phrase to use. 2) I highly doubt anyone here needs to see something like "API's" under skills. It's not like people here aren't aware of many of the APIs that you know. 3) If you really spent 7 years working and have experience in "Ecommerce, Saas, Social API's, Analytics, Finance, Health IT" you either jumped many times between jobs or you worked for a contracting company 4) A person with your level of experience, especially in areas like javascript and HTML5, should be able to throw together a sample or a portfolio. Do you have such a sample?

saryant 14y ago
Other than the single phrase you pointed out, nothing else in his post jumps out to me as being similar to the typical Indian style of English writing. Until very recently I used to work for one of the big outsourcing firms so I've exchanged more than my share of emails with offshore devs. This one just doesn't strike me the same as those emails. I'll give you (2) and (3) but he may also just be overreaching. Analytics could equal throwing Google Analytics on a page. Ecommerce, a PayPal integration. And who hasn't grabbed some data from the Twitter API when testing out a new framework or library? I'll agree that that's a very broad range, maybe. Overall, however, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that he's not an overseas dev trolling for leads.
- niggler 14y ago
  on point 1: "API's" <-- this could be sampling bias, but I've never seen an american write it like this (though, to be honest, I've never seen a resume include the abstract assertion that the person is familiar with APIs) "Social API's" <-- If this person used the Twitter API then he or she would say it. "Experienced in domains" <-- This phrase didn't strike you as odd? "I am on the hunt for Developer-related position." <-- That could be eastern european, but struck me as Indian. on overreaching: ostensibly this person realized that the community has many technically competent people. Overreaching makes sense when talking to a recruiter. When you are talking with other technical people, just get to the point! No need to say "Health IT" or "Finance" without going into what exactly you did. Finance is particularly bad, because there are many ... for lack of a better term, mindless roles in the major investment banks. But the fourth point really bothers me. If I wanted to be hired as a web dev, I would have a sample up. Something that would show I know what I'm doing. It's not that hard, and the prevalence of free micro hosting like AWS or github pages or nodejitsu renders the economic argument moot. Hell, even a simple twitter bootstrap site would say that he or she knows that it exists.
eshvk 14y ago
What if he is...gasp... A person from in India who moved to the U.S. and is now looking for a job after doing all the stuff that he says he did. Is it that big a fucking deal or is that tin foil hat of yours permanently stuck?
- niggler 14y ago
  7 years working (assuming US) + some positive number of years in school is enough time to slough the indian style english quirks. You would be surprised how many people born in india that have moved to the US actually speak american english (even if there is an accent). I've yet to see any evidence that this person is not an overseas developer fishing for contract work. And yes, I've dealt with enough people that claim to be based in the US but turn out to be in India that I take everything with a grain of salt. And if you haven't, you probably haven't tried to find an employee or contractor.
up_and_up 14y ago
Sorry niggles, but you are smoking something. Born in Minneapolis MN. Polish/German American Boy. You need a long form birth certificate or something? Yes, I have plenty of samples. Trying to remain anon here. Shoot me an email.
- niggler 14y ago
  Just for the record, my point wasn't about people born in India. I was pointing out that, in my experience hiring employees and contractors, many remote developers (especially in India) masquerade as US citizens who want to work remotely (and the truth is revealed only when I offer to fly them to NYC for a meeting)

mikle 14y ago

First of all I hope you do get a job out of the leads here, you indeed sound like a normal real person. Niggler below did a good job of specifying some of my concerns of why I am skeptical, but I hope the biggest point I got across is that in my opinion HN isn't the place for this. It feels like you are in the middle of a party and you stood up and yelled "I need a job" - you might be serious and smart, but I'll still feel skeptical about you because you can't fit your message to the audience. The thing is - the audience here mostly did offer advice and leads, so I might not really know what it wants, so I'm just speaking for me :)