

Hacker News London meetup, Thursday 16th May - dmitri1981
http://www.meetup.com/HNLondon/events/117523952/

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jschuur
Is it my imagination, or has the number of sign-ups dropped dramatically since
introducing the £6 fee?

I don't think the amount being asked for is unreasonable, considering the
speakers, the beer and pizza, and I agree with why it was introduced, but is
the new system still filing up the venue in the end? Before the sign-up fee, a
week before a meetup, it wouldn't be uncommon to see most/all of the 4-500
slots already filled up.

Sanderson is hilarious though. A great addition! Something to look forward to,
since sometimes some of the talks can get a little... less interesting.

~~~
dmitri1981
The first two events of the year were probably some of the busiest ones we
had, judging by the number of people in the hall. Last event was only
announced a week in advance which led to lower numbers. The dropout rate for
free events is fairly high so I'd say you get the same attendance at a 500
person free event and 300 a person paid event.

Having said that the attendance does seem to be declining. I suspect one
factor is that there are so many great events happening in London these days
and busy folks only have so much time to spare.

If anyone has suggestions on where the event may be falling short and could do
with some improvement, I'd love to hear it.

~~~
jschuur
I don't know if it's related to the larger trend, but I do find myself
frustrated when the speaker lineup is finalized late. No doubt, there's
logistical reasons for this, but for me, the quality of the talks is often
very hit and miss, even when I do know who is attending. The Hacker News brand
alone isn't enough to draw me and I'm not much of a mingler, so I rely on the
speaker lineup to see if I'll go.

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HNthrowaway314
I had a great time at the previous meetup -- interesting conversations,
accompanied by food and drink. What's not to like?

Now one of my primary reasons for attending was to check out possible job
openings, and as expected, there were a few I was interested in.

I had what I thought were useful conversations with the people that had
advertised said jobs, and came away with a couple of email addresses.

Unfortunately, despite repeated emails, I didn't hear back even once. Not even
with a "thanks, but no thanks" sort of response. This strikes me as quite
unprofessional, especially from a community that supposedly looks down on this
sort of behaviour.[1] Given that I also experienced this for most of the
approaches I made to organisations at previous Silicon Milkroundabout events,
I have to conclude one of either two things about the "hacker community":

1) My abilities/skills are really quite ordinary at best, and not a good fit
for pretty much any technocrat organisation. See also
<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5664839>

2) Most people are simply paying lip-service to transparency and "the right
way to do things".

FWIW, in my job search efforts, Big Companies have been far more transparent
and forthcoming with their communication than absolutely any startup I've
applied to. And that is depressing as hell.

/end self-flagellation.

[1] It's quite possible that I just got unlucky and stumbled onto precisely
the few orgs that do, in fact, follow these practices amidst the remaining
shining paragons of virtue.

~~~
TheAnimus
The worst time I ever had dealing with a candidate was one that had been
referred by a friend to our medium sized organisation. Normally that firm
either hired people via a recommendation from someone who worked in that field
(ie "they are perfect for what you need") or via an agency. Never "they might
be what you're looking for".

What was hard for me, was simply trying to say no. It took me about 1.5 hours
of research and help from some of the more experienced people around me, I
felt like I was writing a dear John letter. I wanted to explain why it wasn't
just a no, that it was due to the fact we needed someone who had more
experience in the kind of thing we were doing, as sadly we didn't have time to
train within (our normal method at that place).

When going the conventional route, I can simply email something along the
lines of "failed all questions, got nothing correct simple SQL, couldn't write
a for loop." even tell the agency not to waste my time, or large HR firm that
we need to have better screening.

If they are a small startup, it might be as simple as you didn't gel with
them. A friend of mine puts the success of his team down to the fact they all
meet up in person, every friday at 11am, at their favourite bar, if people are
really stressed with each other about work they drink and play table football
until they are friends again. He commented how he couldn't work with a mutual
friend because they don't drink and refuse to go to pubs. Obviously you can't
say that to the person.

So if you've got someone who is busy or who hasn't got very good reasons for
saying no to you, then they might simply ignore you. Don't let it get you
down, try to understand its not an easy situation for them either and try to
be much more detached about applying for roles, it is as they say, just
business.

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jchesters
Looks like a great lineup of speakers! Great job, Dmitri!

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dangrover
Aw, I am visiting London this week from the US, but booked my train for the
15th. Oh well!

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asadhaider
Lineup looks awesome, wish I could go but can't take the time off work.

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ZeroMinx
Looking forward to it!

