[zxcvbn4038]

No people do this all the time - a few years ago I read an article where the secret sauce was writing everything in lisp (good luck hiring for that). Goldman Sachs does a lot of work in erlang but mostly to limit turnover on the dev side - try getting a job if all you have on your resume is years of working with a language nobody else uses, you can do it but it’s going to take a lot more effort on your part. I came across a place in Austin once where they did all their work in a toy language the manager wrote in college (greatest job security move ever). Java was supposed to be the solution to every problem, so you could migrate seamlessly between the single platforms in use at most companies. I remember lots of articles were switching to Java is what made the volume go to eleven for company X. More recently I see a lot of articles are Golang is how company X is keeping ahead if their peers. I’m sure I’m a few more years there will be something else.

[doix]

> Goldman Sachs does a lot of work in erlang but mostly to limit turnover on the dev side - try getting a job if all you have on your resume is years of working with a language nobody else uses, you can do it but it’s going to take a lot more effort on your part.

My take on that is slightly different. Choosing a fairly esoteric language as a company reduces the amount of effort it takes to review applicants. Right now, if you post a job for python, you'll get thousands of applicants. You'll then need to filter them and a vast majority won't be able to code the most basic things.

Post a job advert for erlang, you'll get significantly less applicants because there are fewer erlang programmers. Also, no one learns erlang to “get a job in tech”, they learn erlang because they like it as language. In my experience, this means that on average erlang programmers will be better on average to python programmers.

I'm going to assume that if someone from Goldman Sachs leaves, they will try to find another erlang job, because that's what they enjoy programming in.

[pathtracer]

> Post a job advert for erlang, you'll get significantly less applicants because there are fewer erlang programmers.

In general I would agree with you, but does that work everywhere? I could see how that works in some tech focused locations like Silicon Valley. But if I would try to hire Erlang developers around here I would not find a single one. Unless of course I would hire remotely and try to compete with SV company salaries.

[monsieurbanana]

> and try to compete with SV company salaries

That assumes that everyone that is worth hiring is already in SV or somewhere else with a similar salary.

[Chris2048]

> post a job for python, you'll get thousands of applicants

I'm glad to see that Python is in that category. When I first abandoned Java in it's favor, I was given funny looks about why I'd stick with such an niche language..

[dkarp]

> Right now, if you post a job for python, you'll get thousands of applicants

Have you done this? I wish we received thousands of applications for each python role we post

[dmd]

Absolutely, yes. Hundreds of submissions, and 80%+ of them literally could not solve fizzbuzz.