8 ms·

Ask HN: Why are there never any job postings for non web positions?

66 points by nsnick 12y ago

Why are there never any job postings for non web or mobile jobs on Hacker News? Even in software engineering, there are a lot of other fields.

minimaxir 12y ago
The job postings are only for YC companies, of which there are not-as-many non-web/mobile companies.
- bengali3 12y ago
  FYI see these monthly posts as well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822808 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822808 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822817 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822817 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822810 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822810
serve_yay 12y ago
"Why does everyone listen to Taylor Swift? There are lots more musicians than just her."
- willlma 12y ago
  Yeah, why is that?
  - ocfx 12y ago
    Ugh just shake it off.
- interdrift 12y ago
  Because Taylor Swift is hot right now..
vinceguidry 12y ago
Web development is hot right now. Really really hot. In Atlanta, code school grads with little experience are getting snapped up as soon as they graduate. I'm having to look to Eastern European remote talent because salary expectations in the US are unreal. Literally every company needs a web presence, and it's quickly getting to the point where the usual crappy UX just isn't cutting it. It also happens to be as hard or harder than most other types of software engineering. You have to stay on top of trends, keep building your skills. You don't deal with algorithms much, but your OOP needs to be on point if you hope to build something maintainable for the web. Most of the potential talent has a subtle disdain for web work, everyone wants to be a game dev or do stuff that's math-heavy or algorithmic. So giant shortage of good web programmers.
- gwbas1c 12y ago
  "because salary expectations in the US are unreal" I once got a lowball (cough) offer that was so bad, I wouldn't have been able to pay my (unusually low) rent, buy gas for my (paid off) high-milage car, and make my (unusually low) monthly student loan. Health care was not included. My experience is that employers with that attitude aren't worth working for. These employers don't respect my career, nor do they have a realistic understanding of how to make a profit.
- drtse4 12y ago
  > It also happens to be as hard or harder than most other types of software engineering. You have to stay on top of trends, keep building your skills. Wait, what?? :)
- Tossrock 12y ago
  "It also happens to be as hard or harder than most other types of software engineering." I would disagree with this point, as evidenced by the fact that people coming out of code schools are still getting hired. To do software engineering in other fields (financial, embedded systems, game dev, operating systems, enterprise LOB, cloud platform, crypto, big data/distributed systems, etc) takes a lot more experience and training. A competent programmer can crank out a rails based Mom & Pop small business site in less than a day. You can't really crank out Big Table, or Unreal Engine. However, the market size for small business web sites vastly exceeds that for Big Table.
  - vinceguidry 12y ago
    It's a steep cliff. Everyone says the barrier to entry is low, and it is, but there's a ginormous difference between Mom & Pop site and something suitable for even a small business. E-commerce is sorta simple, but the constant need for third-party integrations will bury you if you don't work hard to keep everything simple. And the demand for those integrations just keeps coming. There's also a much larger number of technologies you have to work with. With financial, embedded, game dev, OS, crypto, big data, you have a finite number of languages / tools to learn, once you learn them, you spend the rest of your career perfecting them. With web dev, you have to not only perfect your tools, but constantly integrate new tools and languages and paradigms into your workflow. It's a lot harder than it looks to do well. And just because code school grads are getting hired doesn't mean they're making useful contributions from day one. Guaranteed it'll be some time before they're really worth their salary.
drtse4 12y ago
If you are referring to the monthly jobs threads i was wondering the same thing, i would have expected more people searching for mobile developer (especially freelancers), but i guess mobile apps are not yet the new "website".
- rday 12y ago
  Over the past 6 months I've had multiple clients drop their mobile requirement to focus on web. I think it has mainly to do with scope creep and cost. All those extra features that you can cram on a web page need that much more effort on mobile. People, for some reason, seem to be understanding that mobile costs a LOT of money, so they wait until later. But they expect to be able to build the web side really cheap, so they stick with that and argue price. Just my little anecdote....
mwfunk 12y ago
I always assumed it was because HN is somewhat specific to YC and SV startups, and pretty much everything that YC and other VCs are investing in right now is mobile and/or web stuff. There are plenty of other tech jobs, just not necessarily in the startups that YC focuses on.
polvi 12y ago
All YC companies build technology, however many (most?) are building technology for markets that traditionally have not used technology in a modern way. These are things like cleaning (HomeJoy), flower delivery (Bloomthat), t-shirts (Teespring), etc etc. Theses technology enabled businesses are the ones that primarily use web/mobile, and thus all the jobs.
logfromblammo 12y ago
Journalists and novelists are both writers, but they do not compete in the same niche. The former will need to do several hundred writing jobs per year, while the latter may only need two. Thus, 99.5% of writing jobs may be for journalist stories. Any novelist looking for commissioned work will not want to sift through 200 posts to find even one relevant listing. So people posting such jobs would probably get better results on a site that explicitly excludes the noise. In short, there are more "lightweight" postings because the people who solicit them and do them need to secure new work more often. If you can make 20 websites in the same time that you could build one enterprise application, you will probably see that job advertisements are 95% for websites and 5% for business software.
yellowapple 12y ago
Because this site has been overrun by (and/or revolves around) Silicon Valley entrepreneurs who don't give a damn about something unless it's in the form of a single-page noSQL web-scale big-data in-the-cloud CrappucinoScript imperatively dysfunctional HTTP2 Wangular.js monstrosity written by "hipster rockstar ninja devs" wielding Macbooks and plaid shirts and pocket calculators and half the inventory of ThinkGeek in a mockery of actual programming? ;) More seriously, it's because web developers are in high demand, so there are going to be more postings for them; having a proper web presence is absolutely vital to modern businesses nowadays, and that requires developers to establish that presence. Hacker News is also run by YCombinator, which specializes in funding startups - a market which tends to lean very heavily on web development, since many of those startups are based on web apps - and therefore will already have an inflated quantity of web development jobs by that virtue alone.
jtbigwoo 12y ago
It's partly selection bias. The content here probably doesn't have as much appeal for the middle managers who do a lot of the hiring at big companies.
gizzlon 12y ago
As others have said, web development is hot right now. In my experience, it's hard to find people willing to build customized back-end stuff. It's probably too expensive, and companies just buy whatever ready-made solutions that kind-of cover their needs. (think ERP, CRM's etc) The demand for web-devs might be artificially high right now, as most normal people have not yet discovered that they do not really need a programmer to build their website. I think Squarespace / Wix / WP etc, maybe with a custom design, should cover most websites. I've been doing back-end web programming as a freelancer for a few months, but it's really hard to find good clients, so I'm moving to something else.
mathattack 12y ago
The warning sign of 1999 was Marketing majors becoming web developers. Are we there again?
citibank 12y ago
Citi Bank United Kingdom 14th Of January 2015 3 Hanover Square, London W1S 1HD, United Kingdom Tél. :+(44)7024029803 Fax : +(44)7024053618 http://www.citibank.co.uk/ http://www.citibank.co.uk/ You Are Hereby Notified That Your Inheritance/Contract Payment Of £12,500 000 (Twelve Million Five Hundred Thousand Great British Pounds) Has Been Approved To Be Made To You Through Central Bank ATM Visa Master Card. Due to Fraud and E-mails from different Agencies without making the delivery to the rightful owners of the ATM Card We have decided to make the distribution to every individuals that was nominated as a Beneficiary by The Government Body of United Nation as a redeemable way of making life better due to the Economy Recession. and we shall send you the Certificate of deosit for you to go through it as well You are to make available a details of Western Union or Money Gram of £3,300 for Shipment and Insurance Handling of your ATM Parcel DHL Courier Services and UPS Services. The Security Fees of £3,300 must be paid to be safe during the transaction and from unwarranted Bills from our client. After the Security Payment is paid Your ATM Card will be made available to you through your information you posted to us within 8 days because as soon as we received your information The Bank will inscribe your information on your ATM Card and send you your Operating Codes Via Alert on your Phone for Privacy and the card will be dispatch to you immediately. A certificate shall be issued to you to present to your Local Bank as a form of Identities and Recognitions as the bearer of the Funds. For your information you are advised to call me to know your Funds Manager before you start making any payment call us through the Phone Number below. You Are Advised To Re-Confirm To Us The Below Information Or Call Me Immediately For More Details: +(44)7024029803 You can E-mail here: (orabank24@gmail.com) 1. Full Name: 2. Phone & Fax Number: 3. Address Were the ATM Card will be posted to (P.O Box Not Acceptable) 4. Bank Coordinate: 5. Sex/Age: 6. Status & Occupation: 7. Country: Best Regards Brian McAreavey, CEO- Citibank Plc. Phone Number: +(44)7024029803 +(44)7024053618
citibank 12y ago
Citi Bank United Kingdom 14th Of January 2015 3 Hanover Square, London W1S 1HD, United Kingdom Tél. :+(44)7024029803 Fax : +(44)7024053618 http://www.citibank.co.uk/ http://www.citibank.co.uk/ You Are Hereby Notified That Your Inheritance/Contract Payment Of £12,500 000 (Twelve Million Five Hundred Thousand Great British Pounds) Has Been Approved To Be Made To You Through Central Bank ATM Visa Master Card. Due to Fraud and E-mails from different Agencies without making the delivery to the rightful owners of the ATM Card We have decided to make the distribution to every individuals that was nominated as a Beneficiary by The Government Body of United Nation as a redeemable way of making life better due to the Economy Recession. and we shall send you the Certificate of deosit for you to go through it as well You are to make available a details of Western Union or Money Gram of £3,300 for Shipment and Insurance Handling of your ATM Parcel DHL Courier Services and UPS Services. The Security Fees of £3,300 must be paid to be safe during the transaction and from unwarranted Bills from our client. After the Security Payment is paid Your ATM Card will be made available to you through your information you posted to us within 8 days because as soon as we received your information The Bank will inscribe your information on your ATM Card and send you your Operating Codes Via Alert on your Phone for Privacy and the card will be dispatch to you immediately. A certificate shall be issued to you to present to your Local Bank as a form of Identities and Recognitions as the bearer of the Funds. For your information you are advised to call me to know your Funds Manager before you start making any payment call us through the Phone Number below. You Are Advised To Re-Confirm To Us The Below Information Or Call Me Immediately For More Details: +(44)7024029803 You can E-mail here: (orabank24@gmail.com) 1. Full Name: 2. Phone & Fax Number: 3. Address Were the ATM Card will be posted to (P.O Box Not Acceptable) 4. Bank Coordinate: 5. Sex/Age: 6. Status & Occupation: 7. Country: Best Regards Brian McAreavey, CEO- Citibank Plc. Phone Number: +(44)7024029803 +(44)7024053618

66 points by nsnick 12y ago

Why are there never any job postings for non web or mobile jobs on Hacker News? Even in software engineering, there are a lot of other fields.

minimaxir 12y ago

The job postings are only for YC companies, of which there are not-as-many non-web/mobile companies.

bengali3 12y ago
FYI see these monthly posts as well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822808 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822808 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822817 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822817 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822810 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8822810

serve_yay 12y ago

"Why does everyone listen to Taylor Swift? There are lots more musicians than just her."

willlma 12y ago
Yeah, why is that?
- ocfx 12y ago
  Ugh just shake it off.
interdrift 12y ago
Because Taylor Swift is hot right now..

vinceguidry 12y ago

Web development is hot right now. Really really hot. In Atlanta, code school grads with little experience are getting snapped up as soon as they graduate. I'm having to look to Eastern European remote talent because salary expectations in the US are unreal. Literally every company needs a web presence, and it's quickly getting to the point where the usual crappy UX just isn't cutting it. It also happens to be as hard or harder than most other types of software engineering. You have to stay on top of trends, keep building your skills. You don't deal with algorithms much, but your OOP needs to be on point if you hope to build something maintainable for the web. Most of the potential talent has a subtle disdain for web work, everyone wants to be a game dev or do stuff that's math-heavy or algorithmic. So giant shortage of good web programmers.

gwbas1c 12y ago
"because salary expectations in the US are unreal" I once got a lowball (cough) offer that was so bad, I wouldn't have been able to pay my (unusually low) rent, buy gas for my (paid off) high-milage car, and make my (unusually low) monthly student loan. Health care was not included. My experience is that employers with that attitude aren't worth working for. These employers don't respect my career, nor do they have a realistic understanding of how to make a profit.
drtse4 12y ago
> It also happens to be as hard or harder than most other types of software engineering. You have to stay on top of trends, keep building your skills. Wait, what?? :)
Tossrock 12y ago
"It also happens to be as hard or harder than most other types of software engineering." I would disagree with this point, as evidenced by the fact that people coming out of code schools are still getting hired. To do software engineering in other fields (financial, embedded systems, game dev, operating systems, enterprise LOB, cloud platform, crypto, big data/distributed systems, etc) takes a lot more experience and training. A competent programmer can crank out a rails based Mom & Pop small business site in less than a day. You can't really crank out Big Table, or Unreal Engine. However, the market size for small business web sites vastly exceeds that for Big Table.
- vinceguidry 12y ago
  It's a steep cliff. Everyone says the barrier to entry is low, and it is, but there's a ginormous difference between Mom & Pop site and something suitable for even a small business. E-commerce is sorta simple, but the constant need for third-party integrations will bury you if you don't work hard to keep everything simple. And the demand for those integrations just keeps coming. There's also a much larger number of technologies you have to work with. With financial, embedded, game dev, OS, crypto, big data, you have a finite number of languages / tools to learn, once you learn them, you spend the rest of your career perfecting them. With web dev, you have to not only perfect your tools, but constantly integrate new tools and languages and paradigms into your workflow. It's a lot harder than it looks to do well. And just because code school grads are getting hired doesn't mean they're making useful contributions from day one. Guaranteed it'll be some time before they're really worth their salary.

drtse4 12y ago

If you are referring to the monthly jobs threads i was wondering the same thing, i would have expected more people searching for mobile developer (especially freelancers), but i guess mobile apps are not yet the new "website".

rday 12y ago
Over the past 6 months I've had multiple clients drop their mobile requirement to focus on web. I think it has mainly to do with scope creep and cost. All those extra features that you can cram on a web page need that much more effort on mobile. People, for some reason, seem to be understanding that mobile costs a LOT of money, so they wait until later. But they expect to be able to build the web side really cheap, so they stick with that and argue price. Just my little anecdote....

mwfunk 12y ago

I always assumed it was because HN is somewhat specific to YC and SV startups, and pretty much everything that YC and other VCs are investing in right now is mobile and/or web stuff. There are plenty of other tech jobs, just not necessarily in the startups that YC focuses on.

polvi 12y ago

All YC companies build technology, however many (most?) are building technology for markets that traditionally have not used technology in a modern way. These are things like cleaning (HomeJoy), flower delivery (Bloomthat), t-shirts (Teespring), etc etc. Theses technology enabled businesses are the ones that primarily use web/mobile, and thus all the jobs.

logfromblammo 12y ago

Journalists and novelists are both writers, but they do not compete in the same niche. The former will need to do several hundred writing jobs per year, while the latter may only need two. Thus, 99.5% of writing jobs may be for journalist stories. Any novelist looking for commissioned work will not want to sift through 200 posts to find even one relevant listing. So people posting such jobs would probably get better results on a site that explicitly excludes the noise. In short, there are more "lightweight" postings because the people who solicit them and do them need to secure new work more often. If you can make 20 websites in the same time that you could build one enterprise application, you will probably see that job advertisements are 95% for websites and 5% for business software.

yellowapple 12y ago

Because this site has been overrun by (and/or revolves around) Silicon Valley entrepreneurs who don't give a damn about something unless it's in the form of a single-page noSQL web-scale big-data in-the-cloud CrappucinoScript imperatively dysfunctional HTTP2 Wangular.js monstrosity written by "hipster rockstar ninja devs" wielding Macbooks and plaid shirts and pocket calculators and half the inventory of ThinkGeek in a mockery of actual programming? ;) More seriously, it's because web developers are in high demand, so there are going to be more postings for them; having a proper web presence is absolutely vital to modern businesses nowadays, and that requires developers to establish that presence. Hacker News is also run by YCombinator, which specializes in funding startups - a market which tends to lean very heavily on web development, since many of those startups are based on web apps - and therefore will already have an inflated quantity of web development jobs by that virtue alone.

jtbigwoo 12y ago

It's partly selection bias. The content here probably doesn't have as much appeal for the middle managers who do a lot of the hiring at big companies.

gizzlon 12y ago

As others have said, web development is hot right now. In my experience, it's hard to find people willing to build customized back-end stuff. It's probably too expensive, and companies just buy whatever ready-made solutions that kind-of cover their needs. (think ERP, CRM's etc) The demand for web-devs might be artificially high right now, as most normal people have not yet discovered that they do not really need a programmer to build their website. I think Squarespace / Wix / WP etc, maybe with a custom design, should cover most websites. I've been doing back-end web programming as a freelancer for a few months, but it's really hard to find good clients, so I'm moving to something else.

mathattack 12y ago

The warning sign of 1999 was Marketing majors becoming web developers. Are we there again?

citibank 12y ago

Citi Bank United Kingdom 14th Of January 2015 3 Hanover Square, London W1S 1HD, United Kingdom Tél. :+(44)7024029803 Fax : +(44)7024053618 http://www.citibank.co.uk/ http://www.citibank.co.uk/ You Are Hereby Notified That Your Inheritance/Contract Payment Of £12,500 000 (Twelve Million Five Hundred Thousand Great British Pounds) Has Been Approved To Be Made To You Through Central Bank ATM Visa Master Card. Due to Fraud and E-mails from different Agencies without making the delivery to the rightful owners of the ATM Card We have decided to make the distribution to every individuals that was nominated as a Beneficiary by The Government Body of United Nation as a redeemable way of making life better due to the Economy Recession. and we shall send you the Certificate of deosit for you to go through it as well You are to make available a details of Western Union or Money Gram of £3,300 for Shipment and Insurance Handling of your ATM Parcel DHL Courier Services and UPS Services. The Security Fees of £3,300 must be paid to be safe during the transaction and from unwarranted Bills from our client. After the Security Payment is paid Your ATM Card will be made available to you through your information you posted to us within 8 days because as soon as we received your information The Bank will inscribe your information on your ATM Card and send you your Operating Codes Via Alert on your Phone for Privacy and the card will be dispatch to you immediately. A certificate shall be issued to you to present to your Local Bank as a form of Identities and Recognitions as the bearer of the Funds. For your information you are advised to call me to know your Funds Manager before you start making any payment call us through the Phone Number below. You Are Advised To Re-Confirm To Us The Below Information Or Call Me Immediately For More Details: +(44)7024029803 You can E-mail here: (orabank24@gmail.com) 1. Full Name: 2. Phone & Fax Number: 3. Address Were the ATM Card will be posted to (P.O Box Not Acceptable) 4. Bank Coordinate: 5. Sex/Age: 6. Status & Occupation: 7. Country: Best Regards Brian McAreavey, CEO- Citibank Plc. Phone Number: +(44)7024029803 +(44)7024053618

citibank 12y ago