

Men wanted for hazardous journey: AdGrok (YC S10) is hiring. - antongm
http://adgrok.com/men-wanted-for-hazardous-journey

======
davidw
BTW, thanks for not using that "no comments" "YC company hiring" thing. It's
really annoying not to let people discuss or ask questions about the
opportunity in question.

~~~
eli
But then again, most of the comments here don't have a whole lot to do with
the job.

~~~
davidw
Yeah, they're not really making the best use of the opportunity:-/

~~~
Semiapies
If you found this such a great opportunity, wouldn't you be happy you had less
competition for it?

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ericd
I think the people getting caught up with the sensitivity of what is a pretty
beautifully relevant reference wouldn't be a very good personality fit for
working at AdGrok anyway. So it's a doubly good title - it's a great metaphor
for a startup, and it performs the same filtering function that the original
ad did. Brilliant.

~~~
axod
I think the people getting caught up with the sensitivity... wouldn't be a
great fit for being allowed on the internet.

I guess we can all see now why most job postings have comments disabled.

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ido
Maybe consider mentioning where you are? It took some googling to find out
that SOMA is apparently somewhere in San Fransisco.

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siculars
"This isn’t some BS social media thing that injects dancing pigs into your
Facebook newsfeed."

Lol. Great help wanted ad. They should all be like this.

~~~
tomjen3
Yeah, this is definitely one of the better help wanted ads, but it is a
blatant rip-of.

Or Scott has joined y combinator, which would be even more awesome

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Fjslfj
I don't understand why they feel morally superior to people creating games.
Have we devolved to the point where search engine marketing is considered so
prestigious an occupation that its practitioners feel they are able to make
jokes about others?

~~~
robryan
One big difference is a direct revenue model, making something that creates
direct value for clients is vastly different to making something cool and
trying to figure out a revenue model later. Not to say that either type can
both be a success and failure, just in this case it's much easier to monetize
the customers you have.

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siddhant
"Why join the navy, when you can come be a pirate like us?" - probably one of
the best lines I've heard in a while.

~~~
iampims
That’s a variant of a quote by Steve jobs
<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs>

~~~
Semiapies
So is there anything both original _and_ clever in this?

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reason
If you have a problem with the title of this job post, then chances are you're
not fit for the company, or most young startups for that matter.

~~~
Semiapies
So, you're saying that the fact they rephrased the headline means that they
aren't fit?

Or is it that they might be more reasonable than defenders of the headline
engaging in silly chest-pounding about "sensitive" people?

~~~
reason
Not much to say really; I've got work to get to. I'm sure there are plenty of
others in this thread who are more than willing to discuss the supposed
intentions behind this implicitly sexist job posting that has seemed to
generate so much nonsensical noise to where the posters themselves changed it,
giving the children the pacifier they so desperately wanted.

Edit: children, and men, and women.

~~~
Semiapies
You're too busy to say anything, so instead 70 words to try to tout your
supposed superiority over the people you disagree with.

------
lian
Dude, my literacy is pretty up there, and I didn't recognize the quote. I
don't know that it would really tarnish its historical relevance to write "Men
(or women) wanted for hazardous journey: AdGrok (YC S10) is hiring".

If their Steve Jobs quote is eligible for paraphrasing in order to seem
original, I don't know why an old newspaper clipping isn't in order to seem
like an equal-opportunity employer.

~~~
hop
Its a historical quote from Ernest Shackleton when he was recruiting the crew
for infamous 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition with ads in London
newspapers that read:

 _MEN WANTED: For hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of
complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and
recognition in case of success. Sir Ernest Shackleton._

I very highly recommend the book - [http://www.amazon.com/Endurance-
Shackletons-Incredible-Alfre...](http://www.amazon.com/Endurance-Shackletons-
Incredible-Alfred-Lansing/dp/078670621X)

~~~
lian
Yes, clearly we've all realized this by now.

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JabavuAdams
I used to think that programmers were smart because we could talk to machines.

The shallowness of a lot of the posts on this emotional and contentious topic
reinforce what I've learned since: on average programmers are not that smart,
which is why they need to talk to simple machines.

Basically, try to discuss something that ends in "ism", and otherwise
reasonable people go all ape-shit.

~~~
Semiapies
Well, yes - programmers are human.

The terrible thing to me is that this discussion is _better_ than I'd see in
non-programmer circles.

------
commanda
It's really unfortunate that this poorly-chosen title overshadows an otherwise
very attractive job posting. Sexism is still sexism, whether or not it's from
1914. -female and feminist programmer here.

------
ryanwaggoner
Sexist!

Just kidding...people are too sensitive.

<http://www.antarctic-circle.org/advert.htm>

~~~
crux_
Well, call me too sensitive then: it is sexist.

If they need to explicitly mention that "women are welcome" in a footnote,
that pretty much confirms that their choice of headline is saying that women
are somewhat less than welcome.

I don't see why being too sensitive is seen as somehow worse in the
startup/developer community than being too insensitive.

You'd think it would be smarter to err in the other direction...

~~~
ryanwaggoner
Their choice of headline is a reference to a historical document from almost a
century ago. Would it be better if we: a) rewrite history, or b) never
reference it?

~~~
crux_
They chose the headline; I did not -- and it seems pretty clear from more than
just the headline that the AdGrok folks value anti-PC posturing quite highly.

If it were me choosing the headline, and I had a desire to reference
Shackleton's journey, what's wrong with "Wanted for hazardous journey: [...]"?

~~~
ryanwaggoner
First, point to anything else in that blog post that indicates any kind of
"anti-PC posturing". Specifically anything that reveals any kind of gender
bias. I'm guessing that you can't without revealing some gender biases of your
own, but try me.

Second, there's a difference between "anti-PC" and anti-equality.

For example, I can say "fuck political correctness" because I think running
around mincing your words in a (pointless and futile) attempt to avoid
offending anyone is cowardly, but that doesn't mean that I hate minorities or
am against equality. It just means that I think "political correctness" is
stupid. If you're offended by my opinions, that's _really_ not my problem;
it's yours.

~~~
crux_
> # Tell jokes that would make sailors blush

Not specific gender bias, but we can both agree it's likely.

> For example, I can say "fuck political correctness"

Sure you can, just like every other startup/developer type has said ten
thousand times -- hell, you aren't even the first in this thread.

Isn't there room for a more nuanced view?

------
carols10cents
Let's say, for the sake of devil's advocacy, the historical quote was "Women
wanted for hazardous journey". If the ad had used that as its headline, would
you males feel encouraged to apply?

~~~
stonemetal
It depends, in this alternate history has women been used as a common word to
mean person of either sex? If it has, like man has in this history, then I
would not be discouraged.

------
gallerytungsten
I have used AdGrok to some degree, and while I have no interest in applying
for the job, I can express my confidence in their can-do attitude and sense of
humor. To the Pole!

------
varaon
Nice, but you'd be much better off with "Good men and women wanted for
hazardous journey."

There may be statistically fewer women in tech, but you'll never hear from
them with a title like that!

~~~
antongm
The headliner is an apocryphal quote from Ernest Shackleton, leader of a
doomed but famous Antarctic expedition in 1914.

Nothing about the current state of tech was implied, nor about our desired
employee pool. Obviously we welcome one and all.

~~~
limedaring
Don't think it's obvious, if you just look at the headline. Is the integrity
of the quote more important than looking non-biased against women programmers?

~~~
mike_h
I usually come out pretty strongly against programmer-culture misogyny,
however subtle, but here we're talking about a pretty famous quotation and I
would answer to your question, "yes". There's a difference between sexism and
historically-weighted badassness.

One could argue there's a literacy-filter being applied here more than a
gender-filter.

------
arkitaip
I can't think of a better ad to attract the people needed for a startup. Kudos
for keeping it real, honest and to the point. Wish you the very best.

------
dfnord
US citizens only?

~~~
antongm
We'd consider anybody. We have one non-US citizen founder right now.

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fossuser
This looks like an awesome offer, too bad I still have a year and a half of
school left. Interested in an intern? :-)

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earl
Interesting -- cool job post.

What I would really like to see, although of course you may not want to
disclose this, is what sort of projects this person would work on in the first
couple of months.

For everybody else, I spent 2 years working on SEM and I think AdGrok is a
great product, fwiw. See eg Clickable or KeyMetric as competitors; Clickable
is self serve SEM on GYM, at least when I interviewed there. This is a much
better interface and helps solve the biggest problem for small business sem,
which isn't technical but is convincing people of value and helping
nontechnical people use SEM without burning through too much money on account
managers.

Too bad I hate writing web apps, because this looks like an awesome
opportunity.

Are you planning on setting up call fowarding ala clickable / yodle /
reachlocal? Overlaying that information would be awesome, though it's a huge
pita...

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lhnn
I support this headline. I'm sure these men would hire a female capable of
providing the talent they require, and of fitting in with the culture of their
workplace. I long to escape to such a place that doesn't cater to people
looking for a reason to be offended, when no offense is warranted or intended.

