Mediocre talent in Silicon Valley

And even being in top 10% does not directly translate into being able to create an extraordinary product.

There are hundreds of thousands talented people that did not buy into hype or are not too ambitious to even attempt the amazingly tiring interviews at these companies.

His premise is essentially that, by circular reasoning, all the good engineers are at big companies, and, since Google and Facebook are paying too much, you are better off poaching from a "downmarket" brand, like Microsoft and Amazon, instead of actually being invested in your hiring process. Or, heaven forbid, fostering development of your existing employees.

> Once everything becomes “epic,” nothing less will do, so hype ends up everywhere.

When everybody's special, nobody's special. In Silicon Valley, "epic" and synonyms have been so overused that they now encompass even the truly mediocre. Merely being there is considered evidence of success, being elsewhere is treated as evidence of failure. Whatever this article's particular failings might be, at least it helps to highlight the hubris that drives the endless hype.

I hope this comment thread gets all those comments from the other thread where engineers should get paid $1m+ a year.

Hahaha.

> Instead, here in Seattle, I work with amazing people -- who came from Amazon, Boeing, Microsoft and other area startups.

Hold the phone, did the author just call Microsoft, Amazon, and fucking Boeing startups?? The Valley really did get to him, didn't it.