Source (Bluesky)
Honestly if this kills coding interviews then it will be the best thing LLMs will have accomplished.
this post was submitted on 12 Jun 2025
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Fuck AI
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interview round 8/36
(hr) "yeah, invert this uhhhh... binary tree?"
(frontend with 10 years experience) "when will i need to invert a binary tree at my job as a front end developer?"
(hr) "i, uh... sorry, you're not a good fit here, bye bye"
The idea of someone bluescreening whenever they're asked about themselves is absolutely hilarious.
As an aspie, I've been there, no AI required. I reached the point where I mentally prepared 'boilerplate' answers to questions like that. It gives me something to say, while my brain gets back up to speed, and pointed in the right direction.
"What do you do outside of work, in your free time?"
"Not work."
"I drink 4-6 beers, jerk off, take a shower and then go to bed."
Yeah, no Lemmy user would ever be like that in real life ..... .... .. ....
What does 6HIH mean and why did you encode it in Morse?
Its an ARG
Maybe 6HIH is a code
It's a secret! I'll post the answer next month .. .... ... ...
54242433
I will now spend 37 hours analyzing all your messages and posts to figure out what the numbers mean
I can't imagine working with these people. I would fire them instantly. Plenty of us aren't idiots sucked into lazy ai hype. Its literally laziness, nothing else.
Sounds like you are one of the people who actually do useful things. https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-era-of-the-business-idiot/
This is so great.
I can't stand willfully dumb people!
Having recently been an interviewer for a programming position, we saw a ton of people cheating using LLMs. It was pretty obvious. What were they thinking, that they could fool us, get the job, and …. then fail because they don’t know how to do what they’re hired to do? It was an insulting waste of everyone’s time.
To be fair, most real time coding interviews are complete bullshit anyway. If you want to see code samples ask for a portfolio, or give longer term coding homework. "Do three leetcode puzzles in 45 minutes or less" is about as useful as asking a candidate to shit in front of you.
I agree. Though those take-home assignments are easily faked too. We do a sort of pair-programming interview where we present a real task/feature we did in the past, and talk it through while they use a scaffolding we provide in CoderPad. It’s far from a flawless method; people sometimes get nervous and shut down, but most people don’t. I treat it as something we can do together (though they’re writing the code) and root for them to solve it. If I need to, I try to nudge them in the right direction to see how they react to that.
The thing is, I'd rather spend the time discussing the code and algorithms and design choices with someone who has had time to actually think through a problem. The reality is that I don't care if you generate boilerplate code with the AI as long as you can explain it. I am mostly hiring for DSP roles so there's plenty of theory to talk about above and beyond the code to ferret out the phonies.
My beef with live coding interviews is that you end up with the exact opposite experience. You get a nervous, scatterbrained engineer who is locked into panic code generation mode and there's just no time to have a deeper discussion.
That is the takeaway when you look at some of those Peter Principle'd sorts that don't get fired because the owner knows them.
The applicants recognize that competent work doesn't guarantee a job half as much as being a yes-man to an insecure executive. They believe they just have to get in the door.
It takes a few paychecks before you fire them. And during that time they're interviewing other places.
You don't need a steady job if you have three simultaneous rotating ones.
That seems like so much more work than just learning shit and working for real.
I'm guessing they planned to continue using AI at work
Waiting for the first tech company that reinstates in person interviews and hiring locally. Would probably work in silicon valley.
So what I hear is that if I manage to get through AI driven screening process, I’ll be the top candidate. If.
Recruiter: 'What are your hobbies?'
My brain: 'Don't say fucking your mom, don't do it. DON'T. YOU. DARE. SAY. FUCKING. YOUR. MOM!!'
Recruiter: 'You're using chat gpt aren't you?'
Me: 'yep, that's definitely it. Absolutely...'
What do the things I do in my personal time have to do with being selected for a job? Fuck these people, I'm sure the process before reaching these interviews is highly automated (with or without llms). If companies are going to use all kinds of ai bullshit (on top of the usual non-ai bullshit) workers ai-bullshiting back is only fair.
It's one of the many questions meant to ensure you're capable of basic human interaction and aware of basic social conventions. You aren't rambling about your BDSM sex dungeon or how much you love setting Teslas on fire in a mock work setting, you have the tact to choose something work appropriate.
It's also because you might be spending 40 fucking hours a week with the person interviewing you, and it can be nice for them to have some small chat topics going in. No workplace is 100% "keep your head down and just work". Human connection is extraneous to the job at hand, but it sure can make those 40 hours far less of a death march every week.
And now it serves yet another minor purpose: it's another flag that might point to the interviewer using ChatGPT to bullshit things.
It's concerning to me that so many people can't come up with even a few useful reasons for a bullshit interview question like that.
"chatgpt give me a list of hobbies that can be mentioned in a job interview."
The issue is that the companies themselves heavily employ "AI" tools to find a candidate that is as standard and run off the mill as possible. Then the interviewer asks more questions that are mostly standardized and have a standard set of acceptable and a standard set of unacceptable answers.
The entire process is designed to be robotic and it favors people who automatize as much of it as possible.
Companies do want employees who are already robots. And like Capek's original definition.
Look at how companies automate the work schedules based on efficiency above all else and it's no surprise they want us to be replaced all together since even the drugs and propaganda doesn't stop humans from being human.
It favors those who can give up all other aspects to be the best worker, to be a robot covered in skin. And we wonder why people feel so detached and don't want kids. They programmed us poorly as humans.
[Copy paste from my other answer] It was a rhetorical question, sorry that wasn't clear. I know that knowing details about my private life can be useful for an employer to estimate how exploitable I'm going to be. What it meant is more or less 'Not their fucking business', asking personal questions in an interview is a big red flag for me, how about 'are you thinking on getting pregnant any time soon?'? I'm sure most companies would like to have that information too..
And now it serves yet another minor purpose: it's another flag that might point to the interviewer using ChatGPT to bullshit things.
No, it only does for the unprepared: 'Hey, chat gpt, give me a list of hobbies that would make a good impression in a job interview', or just bullshit through it: 'I volunteer, I play some [team sport], I like hiking, hitting the gym, reading, playing the guitar even though I'm not very good..'.
Warhammer 40k can show attention to detail and strategy. Working on cars can demonstrate methodical work ethic and problem solving. Self hosting can show an enthusiasm for tech.
It literally doesn't matter what you answer, just shows that you have a life outside of work and might be an enjoyable coworker.
It was a rhetorical question, sorry that wasn't clear. I know that knowing details about my private life can be useful for an employer to estimate how exploitable I'm going to be. What it meant is more or less 'Not their fucking business', asking personal questions in an interview is a big red flag for me, how about 'are you thinking on getting pregnant any time soon?'? I'm sure most companies would like to have that information too..
There certainly are different calibers of personal life questions that can be asked, but I'm pretty sure in the example above it is about freezing without an answer entirely. "I'm sorry, but I don't feel comfortable answering questions not related to the position" would probably pass their litmus just as well as listing some hobbies.