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Comment by davidw | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, I had a similar reaction to that line. I might consider working weekends if I get something out of it other than "swimming in the deep end", like, say, extra money, or the prospect of extra money in the future in the case of a startup where one puts in that kind of time in the hope of future rewards. That is made possible by having a significant equity stake in the company.

I mean, if you look at it from something of a Homo Economicus point of view, consider the pay rate a good developer gets, and that that money for the weekend is essentially getting donated to Apple Inc, a massively profitable corporation.

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Making this material attractive to people who would just as soon work as quants is probably not Apple's goal here. If you don't react favorably, you probably aren't what they want. (I'm not saying this is necessarily a bad thing, just that if money is really all you can think of in a job, some companies are more OK with that and others prefer passion, and it's good that people suited for one kind don't end up at the other.)

I'm good at what I do because I'm passionate about it, and I want to be justly compensated for my time.

The rest of what they write isn't bad: everyone likes to feel like they're working on something that matters.

Doesn't it somehow rub you the wrong way to pay employees in "passion" versus money? In my head, money is equivalent to respect.

If the majority of the earnings from your work goes to someone else and you still have to do work really hard ("because we're changing the world! everyone has to pitch in! weeeeee!!"), you are ipso facto in a position of weakness and are not earning the respect of your superiors.

There is something that seems very wrong about this.

> just that if money is really all you can think of in a job, some companies are more OK with that and others prefer passion, and it's good that people suited for one kind don't end up at the other.

You seem to imply it's either passion or compensation which looks like a false dichotomy to me. Lots of people have passion for their work but still they're smart enough to avoid companies who treat the passion like a weakness to exploit so that they can pay lower wages.

I agree. And it seems a bit hypocritical to be coming from a company that expects higher prices for their products because of the work they have put into it. Why should the employees not expect the same for their time?

Because some people realize that money is just a tool. They may prefer to get paid to work on something they are passionate about than get paid more for something they aren't.

Put another way, if you are going to end up working over a weekend, would you rather do it because you love your work, or because you get paid time-and-a-half?

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