[michaelcampbell]

> It's not, though. Many people have no clue how to interview well, and way too many tech interviewers are obsessed with whether or not the candidate got the "right" answer.

On the other hand, many interviewers are just normal people who have no idea how to gauge "how the candidate thinks", but like to think they are. I saw this a lot in the heyday of Google's brainteaser type questions. (And middle managers seem to revel in it.)

So the right answer is as good a proxy as they can hope for. It still sucks, but there you go.