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Comment by ChrisMarshallNY | Hacker News Reader

> Interviewer can easily download your app(s) and have plenty of material to ask you about during the interview.

In my experience, this never happened.

I strongly suspect that was because they had already decided they weren’t going to hire me (I was 55, when I was interviewing), and didn’t want to waste the time.

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I can't argue with your experience but will simply add that I did download apps from the two candidates I interviewed that did have apps on the AppStore.

I had one chap refuse to check my portfolio, because "I probably faked it."

Here's my GH ID: https://github.com/ChrisMarshallNY

You can easily see that I faked over a decade of checkin history, dozens of repos, in multiple organizations, over 20 shipped apps, lots of blog posts, tutorials, class modules, etc.

Sounds like your interviewer just a a grudge against you or something.

Or against something in his profile. People have ridiculous preconceptions of the world.

Gray hair has resulted in a lot of grudges. I've even had a couple of folks just come out and say it.

I know that my generation (and the one before) have caused many issues, but I'm not your typical "OK boomer."

I’m sorry. Not only is that unethical, it is illegal. These companies need to stop discriminating on age.

> it is illegal

But it is not enforced. Tech companies don't bother to hide it at all. They run job ads that all but say "Bros only."

When money is being made, the authorities tend to look the other way. That has been going on in the finance industry for decades (and don't get me started on crypto).

Depends on what country you're in. It's illegal here in Australia, but almost universally practised regardless. The law is not in reality available to most people, nor is it by and large adhered to by business except where absolutely necessary (ie. predictably enforced). Every large company I've worked for has broken the law with impunity.

There good cause for "the law" in daily reality (as opposed to "The Law" as an abstract good) not to be held in any esteem by ordinary folk.

>I had one chap refuse to check my portfolio, because "I probably faked it."

I don't know the context of how that came up, but I'd probably let the recruiter know of their unprofessional behavior if that happened to me.

That is a "gray area." There's another thread, going on, about "illegal questions," and most applicants won't confront their tormenters, because it's an easy way to get blackballed (labeled a "troublemaker").

In my case, since I had been experiencing veiled insults and condescension from almost every interviewer (and being "ghosted" by recruiters, when they find out my age), I just said "Bugger this for a lark," and decided to retire early.

I doubt anyone misses me, but I am pretty sure that I could have helped at least one of the companies from going titsup.

refusal to take a good look at GitHub, a shipped product, or portfolio is a red flag that indicates bad org health, and to avoid.

I downloaded apps by the person we most recently hired. Why wouldn’t you?

I would have killed for a portfolio like mine. I never had that chance, when I was a hiring manager. My portfolio was designed for people like I was, when I was a manager.

However, I gave the opportunity to a few, and they ignored it. In at least one case, their ignoring it was a fairly blatant move to get me to give up. It worked.

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