8 ms·

That does indeed look very nice. I've heard some not-so-great things about actually being an Apple employee, though. Can anyone comment?

chrischen 17y ago
Getting yelled at (and terrified) by Steve Jobs? At least that's what I saw in Pirates of Silicon Valley.
- borism 17y ago
  yeah, the glorious days... now I guess it's more like getting yelled at and terrified by your average middle manager.
chrisrhee 17y ago
I contracted on-site in Cupertino for a year. They have 35,000 employees, so if you're looking to join a tiny start-up where everyone is 23 years old and best friends, you're not going to find that at Apple. Actually, I used the large crowds of employees to my advantage and basically "snuck" into the offices every day for the last few months I worked there when my security badge stopped working (long/uninteresting story.) I've never worked for a big corporation, but working for Apple is probably like working for any other company with that size of a workforce. Some people love their job, some people are bored and a lot of it depends on which group/department you're in. I was a little turned off by the cubicle/office farms in some of the buildings, which are probably setup like that due to security. I saw Steve Jobs a few times at the cafeteria. But he did not yell at me. Or anyone else.
- gjm11 17y ago
  and basically "snuck" into the offices every day for the last few months: In the unlikely event that you haven't already read http://www.pacifict.com/Story/ http://www.pacifict.com/Story/, you should. As should anyone else who doesn't immediately know what story that is from what I just said. It's simultaneously inspiring and horrifying. (More of the former.)
  - TY 17y ago
    This is a fantastic story, it deserves its own HN thread! I doubt that this would be possible in today's Apple though... If FSJ commented on this, he would probably mention dispatching Moshe in a time travel machine :-)
  - davidalln 17y ago
    Fantastic story, and it pointed out that there is a beyond excellent graphing calculator on my computer! No more Wolfram Alpha for x= equations!
  - edw519 17y ago
    One of the reasons I come to hn so much is for motivation when things get tough (which is often). I don't think I've ever read anything here that motivated me more. This is already on my bulletin board. So the next time I opt for the "easy way out", I can look at this and remind myself not to be such a wimp. Just a few of the gems inside: The three of us spent the next six hours editing fifty thousand lines of code...It would have taken weeks for any one of us working alone. Since that left no managers in the loop, we had no meetings and could be extremely productive. "This doesn't suck" (high praise in Apple lingo). This feedback loop created an ever-increasing spiral of productivity. It is a cliche in our business that the first 90 percent of the work is easy, the second 90 percent wears you down, and the last 90 percent - the attention to detail - makes a good product. The secret to programming is having smart friends. I gave a twenty-minute demonstration, eliciting "oohs" and "ahhs." programmers are the least qualified people to design software for novices. ...we were in full crunch mode, working sixteen hours a day, seven days a week...If this story were a movie, you would now see the clock hand spinning and the calendar pages blowing away in the wind. ...it was a macho computer guy thing - we had never shipped a million copies of software before I answered to no one, and no one had to do anything I asked...We were hackers, creating something for the sheer joy of making it work.
    - Create 17y ago
      The Graphing Calculator Story.mp4 54:26 - 3 years ago goog:// I find the story to be just the opposite: such behaviour of The Corporation is not motivating at all, in the productive sense. It is rather motivating to do something completely different from productive coding/work.
costan 17y ago
Great people and work environment, low pay and perks, not immigrant friendly. And they've been doing the iOffers for a long time now. I was an intern in 2006, and they looked just like that back then.
- plinkplonk 17y ago
  "not immigrant friendly" Coould you expand on this? Is it something like "they don't do H1 visas" or "there are occasional incidents of borderline racism" (I heard something to this effect in a conversation recently) or something else?
  - costan 17y ago
    Hm, I just saw this question, sorry. I should definitely clarify. I witnessed NO racism or xenophobia at Apple. I was treated very well throughout my internship. To the best of my knowledge (2006), Apple does H1 visas, but they don't sponsor green card applications. When your H1-B expires, they'll have you work elsewhere until you're eligible for an H1-B again. This is based on a small sample (rumors).

chrischen 17y ago

Getting yelled at (and terrified) by Steve Jobs? At least that's what I saw in Pirates of Silicon Valley.

borism 17y ago
yeah, the glorious days... now I guess it's more like getting yelled at and terrified by your average middle manager.

chrisrhee 17y ago

I contracted on-site in Cupertino for a year. They have 35,000 employees, so if you're looking to join a tiny start-up where everyone is 23 years old and best friends, you're not going to find that at Apple. Actually, I used the large crowds of employees to my advantage and basically "snuck" into the offices every day for the last few months I worked there when my security badge stopped working (long/uninteresting story.) I've never worked for a big corporation, but working for Apple is probably like working for any other company with that size of a workforce. Some people love their job, some people are bored and a lot of it depends on which group/department you're in. I was a little turned off by the cubicle/office farms in some of the buildings, which are probably setup like that due to security. I saw Steve Jobs a few times at the cafeteria. But he did not yell at me. Or anyone else.

gjm11 17y ago
and basically "snuck" into the offices every day for the last few months: In the unlikely event that you haven't already read http://www.pacifict.com/Story/ http://www.pacifict.com/Story/, you should. As should anyone else who doesn't immediately know what story that is from what I just said. It's simultaneously inspiring and horrifying. (More of the former.)
- TY 17y ago
  This is a fantastic story, it deserves its own HN thread! I doubt that this would be possible in today's Apple though... If FSJ commented on this, he would probably mention dispatching Moshe in a time travel machine :-)
- davidalln 17y ago
  Fantastic story, and it pointed out that there is a beyond excellent graphing calculator on my computer! No more Wolfram Alpha for x= equations!
- edw519 17y ago
  One of the reasons I come to hn so much is for motivation when things get tough (which is often). I don't think I've ever read anything here that motivated me more. This is already on my bulletin board. So the next time I opt for the "easy way out", I can look at this and remind myself not to be such a wimp. Just a few of the gems inside: The three of us spent the next six hours editing fifty thousand lines of code...It would have taken weeks for any one of us working alone. Since that left no managers in the loop, we had no meetings and could be extremely productive. "This doesn't suck" (high praise in Apple lingo). This feedback loop created an ever-increasing spiral of productivity. It is a cliche in our business that the first 90 percent of the work is easy, the second 90 percent wears you down, and the last 90 percent - the attention to detail - makes a good product. The secret to programming is having smart friends. I gave a twenty-minute demonstration, eliciting "oohs" and "ahhs." programmers are the least qualified people to design software for novices. ...we were in full crunch mode, working sixteen hours a day, seven days a week...If this story were a movie, you would now see the clock hand spinning and the calendar pages blowing away in the wind. ...it was a macho computer guy thing - we had never shipped a million copies of software before I answered to no one, and no one had to do anything I asked...We were hackers, creating something for the sheer joy of making it work.
  - Create 17y ago
    The Graphing Calculator Story.mp4 54:26 - 3 years ago goog:// I find the story to be just the opposite: such behaviour of The Corporation is not motivating at all, in the productive sense. It is rather motivating to do something completely different from productive coding/work.

costan 17y ago

Great people and work environment, low pay and perks, not immigrant friendly. And they've been doing the iOffers for a long time now. I was an intern in 2006, and they looked just like that back then.

plinkplonk 17y ago
"not immigrant friendly" Coould you expand on this? Is it something like "they don't do H1 visas" or "there are occasional incidents of borderline racism" (I heard something to this effect in a conversation recently) or something else?
- costan 17y ago
  Hm, I just saw this question, sorry. I should definitely clarify. I witnessed NO racism or xenophobia at Apple. I was treated very well throughout my internship. To the best of my knowledge (2006), Apple does H1 visas, but they don't sponsor green card applications. When your H1-B expires, they'll have you work elsewhere until you're eligible for an H1-B again. This is based on a small sample (rumors).