I dont even get rejection, there is just no reply from the other side. Where am I in this meme?
this post was submitted on 09 Mar 2026
291 points (99.3% liked)
Programmer Humor
41294 readers
382 users here now
Post funny things about programming here! (Or just rant about your favourite programming language.)
Rules:
- Posts must be relevant to programming, programmers, or computer science.
- No NSFW content.
- Jokes must be in good taste. No hate speech, bigotry, etc.
founded 6 years ago
MODERATORS
More like this most of the time
IDK how common this is, but there are stories of companies that make you work on real production code in the interview. Basically suckering you into free work before they give the position to the boss's cousin or something.
I had a startup give me a take home to implement a graphql api on top of some sample data they gave me. Recruiter said they were in the middle of a migration and I made some assumptions
that's when you randomly mix up the sample data but still turn in the results
y'know, if you want to
I've heard about this kind of shit, but never seen it myself.
UK company Brewdog were up to that shit allegedly. Probably easy enough to Google.
When I was applying for sound design and music job for video games, like 15 years ago, they regularly made me design 50+ sound effects and compose like 6 tracks just to never get back to me. One time, they even made me program a whole ass interactive car engine sound plugin.
And you don't want to hear about academic and arts call. "Please send us a 12 pages document with description, technical implementation data, a detailed realisation timeline, and 16 references of previous projects. Don't forget to pay the registration feeb and submit the document in 3 different language, so we can decide what project will get the 2000$ grant out the 127 we received. If you're lucky enough so that we read your project, you even might receive a generic rejection letter from us."
Exact same field, exact same personal experience, except it was a dragon instead of a car. Didn't even get to put it on my demo reel because it was their IP, they said.
Fixed it
No feedback email either. Possibly just ghosted.
if you want feedback, don't bother doing any of the coding challenges/tests and they'll send you a "we're disappointed" email. lol
I have interviewed people for a long long time, and unless they were egregiously bad (obviously cheating, or failed every part of the technical) I have always written them a paragraph of feedback.
Every single candidate. It’s not hard, takes 5 minutes
you're a unicorn! lol
Sometimes hiring managers aren't allowed to provide any feedback because it can create legal liability.
But usually they just don't want to.
How does it create liability to say “I’d like to have more advanced Python skills, specifically the using object oriented code to structure a solution to the problem”
I feel like society has gone insane. Don’t do anything, it might upset someone, or you could step on someone’s emotional support ant, and we’ll get sued!
yeah most companies don't even bother with the courtesy email anymore