throwaway1zz

At some point in the future, if it becomes clear that the company is on path for an ipo I could pay for it then.

I will hold off until then.

They have raised a significant amount but have been stingy in the stock options grant.

Thanks for the insight you are dead right about the managements view.

1. I should have been clear, I am not taking a pay cut in the base but the overall pay(base + rsus)

2. I am glad they were upfront and honest about it. The manager said 50:50 split.

4. Yeah I agree with this.

There's 1 year cliff for vesting but apparently one can excercise at the current strike price on day one and that's pretty common among other startups with folks who want to avoid the AMT

Primary concern is declining insurance coverage, unless 23 and me allows for a anonymous no name test?

I agree with some parts of your answer but I have always wondered do u really evaluate the capabilities solely on an ability to solve these mind bending problems, there are lot of folks who might not know how to get an exact solution for a crazy hard dp problem but are very good devs and vice versa is also true a good cs interview might not necessarily translate to a great dev in a real world scenario.