Comments on C for Coding: Joel Inc., Stackoverflow Careers and Jumping Shark...

It's impressive to see how many programmers don't ...

2010-02-24T00:36:07.267+08:00

It's impressive to see how many programmers don't even know about stackoverflow. The very fact that you are actively trying to engage in a community of peers and try to learn something (that's why I like browsing SO) puts you in front of a lot of developers. That's really what I think makes SO attractive for employers.

But you are right nonetheless.

There is an increasing amount of "plz sent teh codez" questions. But seriously, even if those people filed their CV on careers I am pretty sure no employer would want to make them an offer. The signal to noise ratio is getting worse.

The number one problem with anything connected wit...

2010-01-01T04:36:13.050+08:00

The number one problem with anything connected with Joel Spolsky is that Fogbugz is a so-so product. It's definitely not a top contender in its product category.

Because of the Joel mystique, our company included Fogbugz in a recent evaluation process. It didn't even make it into the top five contenders.

So with all of Joel's years of commentary on elite programming, it's a little telling that his own product doesn't live up to his rhetoric.

This colors everything else he's connected with, IMHO. Sorry, but "the emperor has no clothes on", is all I have to say on the matter.

In my very personal opinion, the founders created ...

2009-12-22T12:46:55.016+08:00

In my very personal opinion, the founders created the careers branch to create wealth, to create money. Thats all, the only reason. So, well, look at it from this perspective and it all makes sense.

A humans sense should not be to find a (better/healthier/better-paid) job.

If you HAVE TO find a job, then concentrate on why you think you have to do so.

WHEN I READ ABOUT JOB

2009-12-19T12:49:03.274+08:00

WHEN I READ ABOUT JOB

I didn't read the whole of this post, it is just t...

2009-12-12T12:19:03.388+08:00

I didn't read the whole of this post, it is just too long.

When I read about joel's job board, I created my own, which can be used by any blogger, not just those at the top.

Ok, so I have a cold and have spent far too much t...

2009-12-12T04:36:44.612+08:00

Ok, so I have a cold and have spent far too much time reading about the Stackoverflow Careers flapdoodle; I have to comment.

Speaking as someone who has spent the better part of the last 20 years playing the contracting game, I have just one piece of advice for job-seekers: Do not pay someone money to find you a job. It is a scam. Don't believe me? What happens if you don't get a job? They still have your money, right? In the SO Careers case, it seems to be an unintentional scam if you can in fact get your money back. Or perhaps it is the same sort of scam as mail-in rebates---the fraction of people who don't take advantage is large enough to make it a fair revenue source. In any case, it is a bad idea and you do not need to do it. If you really want to advertise your SO greatness, put a link to your profile on your web page or resume.

Well, I actually have two pieces of advice: Looking for a rockstar/superstar/whatever-star/wonderful-fun-exciting job? Don't bother; they are made, not found. Take a look at the history of those people who have those jobs.

Here's a prediction for you: as MikeWoodhouse pointed out above, SO access is much cheaper than normal recruiter's fees. Unless there are some stringent principal-only requirements for SO access, it will be full of the recruiter/contracting/head-hunting employers that fill Dice, Monster, and the other employment sites. Nothing wrong with that, really, but don't expect wonders.

Speaking of head-hunters, there are a couple of problems with the SO Careers idea. First, the idea that it is, or should be, limited to "serious" job-hunters. It has been more-or-less axiomatic for quite a while in recruiting circles that the people to look for are 1/ already employed and 2/ only casually looking for jobs. Those "superstars" that are actively looking are only a small fraction of the good people out there and they are also only a small fraction of those actively looking.

Second, if you are a superstar, you likely have a mail folder full of recruitment offers. Why would you want to pay to get more?

Joel has always been selling us something. "Joel ...

2009-12-12T00:13:55.152+08:00

Joel has always been selling us something. "Joel on Software" exists to convince you that only the best of the best work at Fog Creek and simultaneously provides the challenge "Are you good enough?"

Google did exactly the same by putting really hard math problems on billboards.

Great post -- very well written. I enjoyed reading...

2009-12-11T23:53:24.202+08:00

Great post -- very well written. I enjoyed reading it.

Also, thanks for the link...

Entertaining, but pointless.

2009-12-11T19:43:34.652+08:00

Entertaining, but pointless.

I'm watching the career of Careers with curiosity....

2009-12-11T17:52:00.157+08:00

I'm watching the career of Careers with curiosity. I've paid my 3 years' subscription - I figure I can just about scrape together $0.80 a month, even after the Chancellor announced that I will be required to contribute more to the Greater Good next year.

Do I plan to change job in that period? Probably not. Do I expect signing up with SO Careers to alter that outlook? Honestly, no. As you point out above, domain knowledge is often important - a large part of my relatively comfortable income derives from my scarily long service in the finance sector. (Although I have to admit to having forgotten what a contango is.) I would be surprised if a suitably interesting and remunerative position turned up through SO. I don't consider it impossible though, just unlikely. I figure the risk-reward probably works out.

Is it really only $5K for year-round access for an employer? As a London-based developer (from time to time involved in recruitment) I wouldn't be surprised to pay 25-33% of starting salary to an agent for a successful hire. And for that I have to talk to agents, which is a real, if unquantifiable cost in itself. Should we be recruiting in the coming year, I'd be tempted to take at least a week's worth to see what a trawl might throw up.

Joel is an arrogant tool, and Atwood routinely mak...

2009-12-11T09:54:00.175+08:00

Joel is an arrogant tool, and Atwood routinely makes errors of fact in 'Coding Horror'.

Don't get me wrong -- they both appear to be competent developers, but they suffer the dual curse of bloggers in spades. That is they both believe at the same time 1) that their personal experience is universal; and, 2) their understanding of said experience is unique.

What makes Joel's arrogance so offensive is the utter mediocrity of his product. If his company produced something amazing, or even an audacious failure he'd have more cred. A bug tracker? You're looking for the best and brightest summer interns to work on a bug tracker? I'd like to see the resumes he gets vs. Jane Street Capital.

I have to ask where the notion comes from that I'm...

2009-12-11T07:27:41.774+08:00

I have to ask where the notion comes from that I'm calling Careers "evil"? The only time I used the word "evil" was in relation to nitrogen so I'm curious where that comes from.

I need to stress that I have absolutely no issue with Jeff, Joel or anyone making money. I'm not questioning that end, just how you go about it and whether what you're doing can work.

I'll also say that I think SO is fantastic. Just compare it to the "evil hyphen site".

Very nice post indeed, and good to read something ...

2009-12-11T06:30:46.151+08:00

Very nice post indeed, and good to read something that is not dumbed down/shortened to the common denominator (now who's being elitist).

I've wanted to believe that answering questions would make me awesome and a great developer people would want to hire, and I am all for teaching and things since it teaches you the most as well.

But really, if I have to decide between explaining non-niche things on stackoverflow (required for a high karma) and working (possbily on my hobby projects) or spending time reading up on things I don't know yet... the choice is not that hard.

Amazed at how negative some comments on here. You ...

2009-12-11T04:55:22.744+08:00

Amazed at how negative some comments on here. You might be right, you might be wrong but it's an interesting post.

In passing I'd just say I find it funny the way Joel has acquired followers by telling programmers what they want they hear - "you need comfy chairs and big screens, you get treated badly by most employers". Ha !

Bobby, you have some great suggestions. Your final...

2009-12-11T04:54:14.135+08:00

Bobby, you have some great suggestions. Your final critique is a bit weak, though. This is a blog, not the WSJ nor the NYT.

William, would you consider interviewing Joel? I would hope that Joel wouldn't be bent out of shape over your article and be willing to respond to your comments/questions.

"If two candidates with equal resumes are trying f...

2009-12-11T04:44:31.016+08:00

"If two candidates with equal resumes are trying for a Django python job the one with the 3000 upvotes for the python tag should win everytime."

Any notion that upvotes mean fitness for a particular job is pure bullshit. Check the top voted answer here: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/101268/hidden-features-of-python. Whoa, you can chain comparison operators in python! Ka-ching, 184 upvotes. The most upvoted answers are usually uninsightful and obvious. Anyone using numerical value of rep for anything serious is plain stupid.

You make a number of good points on this post, but...

2009-12-11T04:31:16.306+08:00

You make a number of good points on this post, but I think that calling careers.stackoverflow.com evil is a bit too much. At the end of the day either it will succeed or it will fail.

If it succeeds, then it will prove your post wrong. If it fails, then so what? It seems like SO is an economic success in its own right, and a failing careers site won't stop that.

Jeff & Joel haven't kept it a secret that SO and the related sites are primarily a business venture intended to make money. Why are you upset that they're trying to milk it for what they can with something that may or may not work?

You can critique the hell out of anyone if you rea...

2009-12-11T04:27:57.958+08:00

You can critique the hell out of anyone if you really try hard. Joel and the products he's been involved with quite simply rock!

Finally someone adressing this ! And I don't thin...

2009-12-11T03:29:15.685+08:00

Finally someone adressing this !

And I don't think you put enough emphazis on the total lack of connection between StackOverflow's Popularity score and good programmers.

Popularity vs Real skills: http://itlater.com/?p=8

William, I think I'm beginning to realize somethi...

2009-12-11T02:55:01.613+08:00

William,

I think I'm beginning to realize something:

Being a good programmer is hard. Being a Great Programmer is virtually impossible. Writing good prose is hard. Writing something useful, new, imaginative, innovative, insightful -- basically worth reading -- is harder than being a Great Programmer.

If you want to write something half-decent about StackOverflow Careers and Joel. You should call Joel or email him, ask him questions, get his answers, ask him some more questions -- tough ones that cut to the root of things. Then write an article.

That would be interesting! I would love to read something written by someone who actually spoke to Joel and asked him the tough questions that we all want to ask. Ask Joel about Wasabi, FogBugz, the future of his blog. Ask him what he thinks about the balance between being the CEO of a for profit company and being the voice behind Joel on Software. (Spend some time thinking of some better questions.)

Imagine if the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times wrote articles like yours? Bah!

" 'The great software developers, indeed, the best...

2009-12-11T02:41:06.927+08:00

" 'The great software developers, indeed, the best people in every field, are quite simply never on the market.'
So the target market seems to be those developers who think they’re great developers but actually aren’t. If they were they wouldn’t be looking."

To be fair, I suspect the difference here is how you define "in the market". In the usual system, you have to be actively looking for a job to be "in the market", under which definition the only time great programmers are "in the market" is when they either got fired or are near to quitting their job. The point of SO-Careers seems to be redefining "in the market" to mean "open to the idea of taking a better job", a standard under which more "great programmers" fall.

That said, interesting article, if a bit meandering.

I like you made your "this won't work" point at th...

2009-12-11T02:00:51.715+08:00

I like you made your "this won't work" point at the end of the article by basically up numbers that make your point correct.

Also you ignore the fact that by getting answer upvotes on stackoverflow.com other programmers are vetting you.

If two candidates with equal resumes are trying for a Django python job the one with the 3000 upvotes for the python tag should win everytime.

@anonymous: gotta give credit to stackoverflow, yo...

2009-12-11T01:01:45.719+08:00

@anonymous: gotta give credit to stackoverflow, you don't have to register ;)

I think employers that put too much into the rep #...

2009-12-11T01:00:55.426+08:00

I think employers that put too much into the rep # aren't going to get what they bargained for. I personally, have around 6.5k, and when SO launched was on page #2, but works gotten quite busy since SO launched and I haven't had very much time to use SO, so my reputation has stagnated. Am I a good programmer? yes. am I one of the elites on SO? no.

And didn't they say in the podcast that you would get your money back if you couldn't find anyone? that might have been for the jobs.stackoverflow.com though, can't remember.

Definitely agree with Don and with the author of t...

2009-12-11T01:00:07.506+08:00

Definitely agree with Don and with the author of the article. Am i the only one that will never register to stackoverflow?
Why should i do that? To answer to questions that a google search could solve, read for the 100th time that parsing HTML with regexp is a bad idea (;)), earning badges and giving Joel a community that he could milk for a new source of income?
No thanks, the internet has plenty of other forums and communities...
And regarding his blog/internet-presence, while it surely has an "historical significance", in 2009 it has nearly no remaining technical/informational value left for someone that has already read the classics (soft-eng books, peopleware-like books,etc...).