First: you're missing all the users with less than 1000 reputation that have paid for CVs. There are actually about 1500 paid CVs in the system.
Is there critical mass? I would say, in major tech/development areas, or for national-footprint employers who relocated candidates, absolutely yes. A company like Google, Microsoft, Pixar will certainly find plenty of good candidates on Stack Overflow.
In smaller cities without big tech industries, and for people who don't want to relocate, mostly the answer is "not yet" although I expect to get there. The little startup in Tulsa that needs an embedded systems programmer but doesn't want to relocate someone... won't find them. The guy in Oklahoma City who won't move elsewhere isn't finding good tech jobs because there aren't any in Oklahoma City, not because we don't have critical mass.
As for the revenue, earning money was never the point of charging job seekers. We charge job seekers a minimal amount because it eliminates a huge number of unserious, unqualified, and other candidates who really don't stand a chance. If it's free, job seekers have an incentive to post their resume everywhere "just in case" which employers hate, because they have to filter through lots and lot of junk. We're actively looking for better ways to do this kind of pre-filtering. I'd like to lower the cost as much as possible without opening the floodgates, and I imagine we'll find creative ways to let high-rep stackoverflow users get a CV without paying very much. Nothing is set in stone.
You might want to check that the practice of charging job seekers is even legal. A lot of english-speaking countries prohibit recruitment services charging job seekers to prevent exploitation of vulnerable people.
To quote from British Law:
"Except in such cases or classes of case as the Secretary of State may prescribe, a person carrying on an employment agency or an employment business shall not demand or directly or indirectly receive from any person any fee for finding him employment or for seeking to find him employment."
Actually, if you really make that little money out of it, the publicity stunt of giving it all to charity might be more profitable in the long term than keeping it to yourself.
Translated: Hey Joel, I'll always suspect your motives regardless of what you do even if it's a binary choice so you can't win. What does whether or not Joel is doing this for the money have anything to do with whether or not StackOverflow Careers is a good or bad thing?
The problem sane people have, is that the profit motive is backwards.
The stated purpose is to help geeks get jobs. However, SOC makes more money from geeks not finding jobs.
How else can one respond to that than with doubt? Are we supposed to take their word for it, that they're going to do the best they possibly can in building and operating this service, so that they can make less money?
Exactly, some nice false dichotomies going on here. Also: what's the sin in making money while also helping programmers get better jobs, regardless of whether or not that money is the primary goal or a side effect?
Stack Overflow rep is already used to determine when a user can do things like edit questions or moderate - why not use that to determine who might be a "serious" candidate? Just like you have metrics that must be met to moderate questions, why not add one that lets you add your CV for free? Maybe there are breakpoints where it gets cheaper so the only ones paying full price are people with little to no rep at all.
I really like the idea of the site learning who to trust over time - while I wouldn't say it's fully accurate it's working towards the idea at least. This is just another area where you can implement that idea.
I don't quite follow how charging money eliminates "…unqualified, and other candidates who really don't stand a chance" from the selection pool.
What does charging a fee have to do with qualification, and what other factor makes them not stand a chance (and which is also mitigated by charging a fee)?
Sure, which accounts for the "not serious" candidates but does not, IMO, explain the claim that it will filter "unqualified" candidates or those who "don't stand a chance."
They will self-select out because it will not be worth the marginal cost. If the marginal cost is 0, then it is worth the effort for the perceived long-shot chance. You are right in that this will not eliminate the truly deluded.
Is there critical mass? I would say, in major tech/development areas, or for national-footprint employers who relocated candidates, absolutely yes. A company like Google, Microsoft, Pixar will certainly find plenty of good candidates on Stack Overflow.
In smaller cities without big tech industries, and for people who don't want to relocate, mostly the answer is "not yet" although I expect to get there. The little startup in Tulsa that needs an embedded systems programmer but doesn't want to relocate someone... won't find them. The guy in Oklahoma City who won't move elsewhere isn't finding good tech jobs because there aren't any in Oklahoma City, not because we don't have critical mass.
As for the revenue, earning money was never the point of charging job seekers. We charge job seekers a minimal amount because it eliminates a huge number of unserious, unqualified, and other candidates who really don't stand a chance. If it's free, job seekers have an incentive to post their resume everywhere "just in case" which employers hate, because they have to filter through lots and lot of junk. We're actively looking for better ways to do this kind of pre-filtering. I'd like to lower the cost as much as possible without opening the floodgates, and I imagine we'll find creative ways to let high-rep stackoverflow users get a CV without paying very much. Nothing is set in stone.