I feel like sometimes big tech companies give technical interviews when they're not actually hiring, that it's a sort of formality. Can't really confirm it, but thinking this way makes me feel better about not passing to the next stage.
Correct. In many of these companies, part of your evaluation is how many interviews did you give. This means: the game is to do as many as these interviews, typically once a week, such that you are not penalized for doing too few interviews.
I was once penalized for giving too few interviews but there weren't enough candidates at that time! While I cared about giving every candidate a good chance for success, I can say confidently that not many did care. They only cared about getting credit for doing the interview.
