
Triplebyte Now in Seattle and Los Angeles - Harj
https://triplebyte.com/blog/triplebyte-now-in-seattle-and-los-angeles
======
Harj
In addition to already seeing an increasing number of engineers from both
Seattle and Los Angeles applying to Triplebyte, two other trends drove our
decision to open up in these two locations.

First we've seen a continual drop in the number of Seattle based engineers who
are willing to relocate to the Bay Area. It's dropped by over half since the
start of the year and it's the first sustained drop we've seen since starting
Triplebyte in 2015.

Second, we've seen an increasing number of Bay Area engineers interested in
moving to Los Angeles even as the average software engineer salaries in the
Bay Area continue to grow.

As someone who moved halfway across the world and left family/friends to move
to the Bay Area, it makes me sad to see how it's becoming increasingly
difficult for people to move here. I believe this is the biggest threat to
Silicon Valley's dominance as the center of the technology industry.

~~~
yesimahuman
Why sad? I think it's great. It's awesome that folks can stay where their
families are, where they _want_ to live, and participate in this awesome
industry. It's going to bring so much more wealth to other parts of the world.
We should celebrate that.

Congrats on expanding, looking forward to when you come to the midwest!

~~~
kcorbitt
It's sad because the cost of living is eliminating choice. It's great if you
want to stay wherever you are and have a fulfilling life there. But it's still
sad if someone else wants to move to the Bay Area and can't because prices
have gotten out of control.

~~~
yesimahuman
I agree with you there. Ideally folks can afford to live where they want,
including the bay area.

------
michaco33
ARGH! Now it all makes a bit more sense. Triplebyte is a YC alumni, and that's
why they're allowed to spam HN.

I got downvoted in the comments of another spam post of theirs because I made
a snarky remark. I think they have mod access here -- they can delete your
comment, make it invisible, etc. I think they're deleting comments in this
very thread right here.

I'm just tired of seeing your ads everywhere, Triplebyte. You're right, I am
an engineer. You have found me. But, I have a job that I plan on staying at
for years. May I please, please be excused from the endless barrage of
triplebyte "stories"? (not "spam", guys, OK? that word is not to be used
anymore in 2018)

~~~
dang
No YC company has mod access to HN.

------
VonGuard
Ya'll sure spend a lot on Reddit ads, even my wife sees them, and she's not
your target audience. Is this effective? honestly curious.

~~~
xenihn
Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that sharing an internet
connection with someone means that you will see ads influenced by each other's
network traffic, assuming you're going through the same router.

~~~
billyggruff
There are many 'identifiers', but commonly, at least, a long-living cookie
that ties your browser session to ads, tracking, etc.

More granular targeting, especially for portable devices that will change WAN
IP.

~~~
xenihn
Right, it's not the only identifier, but it's one of them, and you will
"pollute" each other's targeted ads to an extent. I'm assuming some sort of
adtech stuff is happening at the carrier/provider level as well, independent
of your browser or individual browsing device.

~~~
billyggruff
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17081684](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17081684)

------
ronilan
_> We're offering new companies in both Seattle and LA a special $15,000 fee
on your first hire._

That is an insane amount of money in the world of education and skill
training.

For an industry that prides itself on being “efficient” and “productive”, it
is kind of amazing to see how institutionalized the gatekeeper business has
become.

~~~
pchristensen
That's a very big discount compared to a typical engineering placement fee,
and it isn't even the biggest cost to an employer hiring an engineer and
training them to get up to speed.

------
driverdan
Why does location matter? Triplebyte's process is location independent. Is
this an SEO play?

~~~
RickS
The triplebyte application is remote (or was when I did it in ~2015), but the
jobs they match you with are not. As the author confirms elsewhere in this
thread, they need a critical mass of employers and candidates before the
process is effective for both parties.

Re the SEO play idea and jumping straight to the assumption of deception, I've
found it useful in life to switch my mental model away from "I don't
understand, what's wrong with you?" towards "I don't understand, what's wrong
with me?"

~~~
dunpeal
What aspect of the process requires a non-remote component?

I'm unfamiliar with TripleByte, but it seems like they're matching online
candidates with jobs, and that looks something that should be doable online.
Other companies in this space are fully online and are recruiting for
employers everywhere.

~~~
RickS
> What aspect of the process requires a non-remote component?

For "job placement" in the abstract, nothing. I'm sure they could do the whole
thing over skype were all parties so inclined.

In practice, this seems not to be what their company and customers are
interested in. They do in-person onsites, for in-person roles. They're chasing
a successful business with an operational scope that pleases their customers,
not a locational-egalitarian remote utopia, so I don't fault them for only
supporting a subset of work types. They do what works for them, and don't owe
the market total coverage.

------
jorblumesea
Anyone else feel Triplebyte is one huge candidate data collection scheme? It
really feels like this is a "you're the product, not the consumer" situation.
I can see a scenario where a big 4 company would pay for this data and match
it to a direct hire application to weed out candidates beforehand.

------
tzs
I have a question about Triplebyte.

Suppose I'm not looking for a job, but take your quiz for fun (which your site
says is OK). I'd probably take the quiz in some area I'm not good in, such as
front end web [1], because that might provide some guidance as to what I
should be looking at if I want to get better in that field.

There is, of course, a good chance I'll do terrible on that (but have a lot of
fun).

Then let's say that months or a year or so later, I've had a chance to
actually get good in that area, and I'm looking for a job. Will that botched
for fun quiz in that area sink me if I try to use Triplebyte seriously in that
job hunt?

[1] I've only had to do simple web stuff--simple PHP generated pages with
simple framework free JavaScript now and them.

~~~
ccvannorman
You can retake any quiz after 4 months. My understanding is they only
propagate you to hiring companies on a pass/fail basis and they use your most
recent score

------
berbec
I passed my triple byte exam with "very high scores" (I'm sure that's BS), but
I don't know any of the languages they were testing me on. What should I teach
myself before I schedule the interview? Rust? Go? Php? A framework instead?

~~~
zeven7
It doesn't matter what language or frameworks you use. Just use what you're
familiar with. The goal is to show competency.

------
billyggruff
Best of luck with your wifi deployments.

In all seriousness, I had an interesting dealing with triplebyte regarding an
internal job posting.

Took an assesment, was sent a message of acceptance, followed shortly by a
rejection.

Felt 'weird'.

~~~
51lver
As someone who was also rejected even though I solved their challenges, I've
got a feeling they are measuring the wrong stuff. The rejection said that I
"didn't show the growth they are looking for". Maybe a fresh 2018 CS grad
could do it? I don't know, I started out with qbasic on a 386...

~~~
billyggruff
Maybe they can correlate age with question+heuristics?

------
tudelo
Does anyone have experience with Vettery? Seems to be a somewhat similar
service and they will absolutely not stop contacting me.

~~~
Benjammer
Last job search a little over two years ago, I put a profile up on both
Vettery and Hired. I had a MUCH better experience on Vettery. The Vettery rep
assigned to me reached out and communicated probably 3-4x as much as the Hired
one, who basically just sent form emails for "your profile is live," "you have
a new contact to respond to," etc... while I talked to the Vettery person on
the phone to go over my resume and talk about what I was looking for, and she
gave me feedback and suggestions before my profile was even "live."

------
paul7986
What salaries does TripleByte offer for Sr. Devs in these high cost of living
cities?

$200k and above?

~~~
ummonk
Triplebyte isn't doing the hiring there afaik. It is referring you to
companies that hire there, who will offer their standard salaries for those
cities.

