

How TheLadders.com scam works - ecaron
http://corcodilos.com/blog/3219/theladders-how-the-scam-works-2

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holdenc
The Ladder's preys on the illusion that there are such things as "$100K+
jobs," when in fact there are truly just "$100K+ employees." Someone either
does or doesn't have what it takes to add enough value to warrant that salary.
People who can bring more than 100K in added value to a company probably don't
need to use a site like the Ladders to get a job.

~~~
JoachimSchipper
I agree, but it's still _hard_ to add $100K as a McDonald's server - clearly,
some jobs make it easier to add that much value than others.

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nradov
The whole concept of charging job seekers for access to listings is just
ridiculous. Anyone who falls for a scam like that deserves to lose their money
and time. As a hiring manager I would never advertise on a site that charges
candidates.

~~~
synnik
Any job seeker who is worth 100K+ won't pay the subscription fee anyway...
their listings show the location and often the company name, even to non-
paying users. It doesn't take much effort to figure out how to go find the
actual posting directly from the actual company.

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daimyoyo
It's my impression that people who command a 6-figure salary generally don't
need help finding work. Reading this reminds me of the "work from home"
infomercials they show at night. "For an nominal fee, we'll help you make
$5-$10K/month!" And it seems like those infomercials, the only people making
money are the ones who own the company.

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karamazov
TheLadders was present at the NYC@Boston startup event a few weeks ago, which
supposedly had to turn away some companies interested in being there. I'm
surprised the people running the event would let a company like this recruit.

~~~
brown9-2
They seem to employ a several dozen developers in NYC:
<http://www.cenedella.com/job-search/photos-of-us/>

I wouldn't think a giant job and resume board needed this many people to run.

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yan
A Lisp/functional programming meetup group I sometimes attend is hosted by The
Ladders. Their offices are actually really nice and look like it'd be a great
place to work for a developer. It's awesome of them to let us use their space
and equipment; I know nothing of their business practices, however.

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jrockway
On the other side of the coin, just add "computer programmer" to your resume,
send it off to the investment banks, and enjoy your "$100K+ job". It's not a
scam when both parties consent.

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unreal37
Job listings rarely include salary information. I don't see anything wrong
with them guessing that certain jobs are above $100K.

So if the job title is "VP, Technology", it seems logical to include it in
their site. The example in the way-too-long article is "Marketing Manager".
Managers can make over $100K.

I don't see why he's so worked up by this. Except maybe they compete with him.

~~~
brown9-2
You wouldn't see a problem with them copying a job listing from your site,
that originally had no salary info on it, and them slapping a guessed salary
on the copy of the listing they show to their users? The users aren't told the
salary they are looking at in the listing is a guess.

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vacanti
The author of the blog post is a head-hunter. Since the Ladders is disrupting
head-hunters, he's not exactly an impartial participant in this conversation.

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aresant
I've heard that the actual business model behind theladders is that they sell
access to companies to see / search the database.

Here's one of their internal sales presentations (to corporations):

<http://www.slideshare.net/uptheladders/theladders>

Due to the monthly subscription fee they've gotten candidates that self-select
out of the junk that you find on HotJobs, CareerBuilders, Monster, etc.

~~~
cliftonmckinney
Most job sites do this, including LinkedIn, Dice, Monster, etc., and they
charge a lot for it. $1,000/month to start in the case of Dice and about half
that for a limited search on LinkedIn. Makes sense from a recruiting
standpoint in one sense--if the candidates are truly $100K+ material--but my
suspicion in this case is that candidates are more likely folks who want to
make $100K+, think there may be an easy way to do it, and are willing to pay
for it.

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sabat
That is the longest assassination piece I've ever seen. The gist of it is
probably true -- that the Ladders copies postings from other sites and does
not verify whether all its jobs pay >$100K, despite advertising to the
contrary. But that whole point could've been made, verbosely, in two
paragraphs. This post is literally 8,000 words.

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yellow
Agreed. Once it started getting redundant, I glanced over and realized my
scroll bar handle was quite small and still at the top...

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ecaron
I've still got my fingers crossed that one of this summer's YC startups is a
tl;dr generator:)

 _I do see the irony in mentioning that on a post I submitted, but it could
use the love of an editor._

~~~
po
If you turn it on in the OS X services preferences you can do
Safari-->Services-->Summary

Here's what I got:

 _This seems to be the heart of TheLadders’ method of doing business:
TheLadders itself is the source of inappropriate job applicants that waste a
company’s time and money. Without consent of the employer, TheLadders takes
its job descriptions, tags them with inaccurate salary ranges, and induces its
subscribers to apply for those jobs._

Not bad.

~~~
damncabbage
That's pretty good.

... I think I'll start running it on my email drafts before sending them out.

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Hisoka
I'm not suprised TheLadders scrapes results from other sites. Otherwise their
database would be almost empty. Hardly can you find an employer willing to
disclose salary and say this job is paying 100K and more.

