[jmduke]

I think the thing that frustrates me the most about it is: they’ll probably get a thousand applicants. A bunch of 25 year-old kids with a ton of talent and stars in their eyes are going to try to get this crap job for crap pay so they can work somewhere “cool” and feel like a part of something big. The Penny Arcade “machine” (their term) will roll on, making its millions of dollars while somehow retaining the “little guy” image that hasn’t been accurate for at least five years, and probably more. That’s one of Khoo’s many gifts — he has figured out exactly how to sell this company, even if the image they’re peddling is a load of horseshit.

This confuses me, because its as if the author tries to force his valuation of the opportunity onto all prospective applicants. He recognizes that a position at Penny Arcade has a level of cachet, but doesn't recognize that that level of cachet is transitive: if someone "can work somewhere “cool” and feel like a part of something big", then good for them. It's up to each person whether or not to decide if those benefits outweigh the costs of eschewing different employment.

Also, lots and lots of ad hominem. I'm not super familiar with Penny Arcade -- having never attended PAX and having not read the comic in a few years -- but a lot of this post seems to be conjecture which hinges on Robert Khoo being a villain.

(I would never apply for this job, because I value salary and work-life balance too much. But I recognize there are people who don't, which is why early-stage startups can thrive.)

[chipotle_coyote]

I don't think the author describes Khoo as a villain, just as someone who is very "money-motivated" despite explicitly saying otherwise. Yes, it's subjective to say "the cachet of working at Penny Arcade doesn't outweigh the negatives of this job, and the fact that the posting tells you up front that it's a shit job doesn't change that," but the author certainly makes a good case as to why he believes that. Is it conjecture to say that Khoo wants to pay under market rate for one job that should really be done by more than one person at market rate? Well, if you believe the job listing that Khoo wrote, not really. That's pretty much how he described the job, and that's a perfectly reasonable inference from it.

Also, I don't see an actual ad hominem attack in here. Buecheler is blunt, but it seems to me he's very explicitly attacking Khoo's actions and policies here. He may be arguing that those actions make Khoo kind of a jerk, but that's not ad hominem. (Buecheler clearly argues Khoo is a terrific businessman, in fact; he just argues that he's using his powers for evil.)

You can certainly argue that "You should know it's a shit job, here's how it's a shit job, but hey it's for Penny Arcade! Woo!" is a fine enough job posting because it's up front about its intrinsic shittiness. But I don't think it's unreasonable for someone to respond with, "Yes, but not only is a shit job still a shit job, this particular one is a shit job at a company that certainly has the resources to make it not a shit job and is choosing to make it so because they're a high-profile, loved-by-nerds company and can get away with it." That response appears to be fundamentally correct.

[coldtea]

>This confuses me, because its as if the author tries to force his valuation of the opportunity onto all prospective applicants.

Perhaps it's rather as the author believes in an objective reality, where there is one true valuation of a thing, and he's not so much trying to "force his valuation onto all prospective applicants" as trying to "communicate the real valuation to all prospective applicants".

>He recognizes that a position at Penny Arcade has a level of cachet, but doesn't recognize that that level of cachet is transitive: if someone "can work somewhere “cool” and feel like a part of something big", then good for them.

Perhaps he recognizes that what some people perceive as "cachet" is actually BS and can be bad for them, regardless of what they believe, in the same way that a teenager wanna-be rockstar that thinks heroin is cool and an early death is "romantic" needs to be told otherwise...

[jmduke]

Perhaps it's rather as the author believes in an objective reality, where there is one true valuation of a thing, and he's not so much trying to "force his valuation onto all prospective applicants" as trying to "communicate the real valuation to all prospective applications".

I strongly disagree with this, though. I'm young, but I'm confident people can have different experiences at the same position -- I have friends who would happily take a salary hit to work at startups or smaller businesses. They value the opportunities and cultures of those jobs to be worth more than the additional $X,000. That doesn't mean they disagree with a "one true valuation" -- it means their valuation has different factors and weights.

[danudey]

I took a pay cut of $20k/yr to work at my current job. I'm glad I did. I made a shitload of money before, and even if I'm sometimes discontent with my current position due to the occasional fit of stress, it's much healthier of an environment for me to be in.

Actually, looking at the job post for PA:

- 'Code in multiple front-end and back-end languages' - well, I can do that. In fact, I do a lot of backend work at my job, and am forced to do front-end work for it as well because we don't have web devs on staff.

- "Maintain servers and other hardware including load balancing and database admin" - Yep, I do that. It's part of my core tasks.

- "Do general office IT" - Don't need to do much of this, because we're almost entirely a Mac shop.

- "Manage your own projects" - I suck at this, but It's part of the job.

- "Be on call 27/7 though we hope not to bug you too much in the middle of the night" - Yep. I once got a phone call at 3 AM and had to get up and refactor some code because it wasn't displaying data properly. Not even business critical, that's just how it goes.

I could make more elsewhere, and have on several occasions. I could make twice as much consulting, for example. The perks, however, are great. I get to set my own hours outside of our core hours, I work with really smart people, we have neat company events, and all in all it's a great place to work.

So for everyone who thinks that I'm being 'exploited' the way these PA guys are: I really, really like my job. I have a great team and a great boss, and I'm happier here than I've been in my entire working career, but if someone broke it down to just these bullet points, it might sound shitty.

Personally, I think it would be a great opportunity to work at Penny Arcade. They're a huge company in some ways, and they have a lot of visibility. It's also a fun office environment (ping-pong tournaments? prank wars? video games?) if you're the right fit. I'd apply if I were willing to move to the US (and if I were, Seattle would be a good pick).

It's not all about money. If you're getting paid enough to live comfortably at home, the next most important thing is to live comfortably at work.

[ceol]

We have no idea what your office is like or how much they make. We do have an idea how much PA makes, and it's enough to hire at least two people to handle these tasks.

[danudey]

Assuming there's enough work across all four that needs doing.

Keep in mind, all of these tasks are already being done by somebody. It's possible that the majority of the tasks will be additional projects (e.g. set up an office fileserver to optimize the art workflow, automate common tasks, fix minor bugs in the CMS, etc).

My point is: there's a ton of things we don't know about this job either; for example, their 'we're not going to pay you lots' could mean $100k instead of $120k, which would be fine by me for living in Seattle, but the way people are complaining about it makes it sound like it's $35k/yr and you have to buy your own office equipment.

[ShirtlessRod]

>> "Do general office IT" - Don't need to do much of this, because we're almost entirely a Mac shop.

Oh, lord. No pesky routers, phones, cabling, or other infrastructure-level things, then? Machines never upgraded? Hardware never fails?

[gaius]

Quite. Imagine you are a hiring manager (or perhaps you don't have to imagine). Would you make a candidate a higher offer seeing Penny Arcade on their CV? Then what is the cachet exactly?

[jblow]

I do run a software company, and I would much rather hire someone with Penny Arcade on their resume than, say, Oracle or something.

[Zimahl]

I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not.

Either way, I would think that having Penny Arcade on a resume would be an interesting story but other than that I can't imagine their infrastructure being anything that would help a career. Penny Arcade is probably only slightly above a real estate office for complexity.

[taeric]

Me thinks you have not seen the scope of their audience. This would be akin to having no respect for the Humble Bundle developers because it is just a tiny shop. I mean, only a few games every few weeks. :)

[Zimahl]

The scope of their audience is somewhat irrelevant. I'm not criticizing their comic here - other than a somewhat simple blog(ish) design, they just need to handle a lot of users to their semi-static site which is a solved problem. Maybe deal with a ton of users on their forum - once again a solved problem. Otherwise, like I said, most of it is office IT stuff for a handful of people working in an office.

I'm not sure how that is any more impressive than many other businesses that aren't known in the geek world.Their other endeavors (Child's Play, PAX) are more business and logistics and light on the IT. From what I've read most of that stuff is outsourced anyways so that PA can focus on the content and not the tedium.

[jblow]

Not sarcasm at all.

[niuzeta]

I'd love to have it explained if it wasn't a sarcasm.

I'm not trying to challenge you, but as an employee I'd always thought that a tech company that supports the infrastructure would look better on resume than one that depends on it. I'd like to hear why.

[solarmist]

Nope, but that's not the cachet it would add too.

Their cachet is pure geek cred.

[coldtea]

"Their cachet is pure geek cred"

If by "geek cred" you mean "the scorn of savvy geeks who can see through cheap employer tactics to get suckers to work for less that they are worth"

[jtuente]

>Perhaps it's rather as the author believes in an objective reality, where there is one true valuation of a thing

This just annoys me to no end. Even in an objective reality, valuations are subjective; e.g. I value having a high-end computer at my home and a rink-a-dink laptop on the road, whereas some of my friends will never own a desktop again because they find no value in it. To be cliche, different strokes for different folks. There is no real valuation of anything, but simply a choice between alternatives which offer some or all of the things that someone chooses to value.

What you're describing is utilitarianism.

[taeric]

This rhetorical style reads terribly.

Since not everyone is objectivist, the first is sort of contradictory.

The second point is lost on comparing the job to illicit drugs. This is more like comparing it to an intern where you may not get as high of a salary as you could possibly demand, but you will get to work with people you likely view as celebrities. Would be closer to a roadie position with a very established band. Probably not the most lucrative position ever, but is it really comparable to heroin?

[Dylan16807]

>Since not everyone is objectivist, the first is sort of contradictory.

That seems like circular logic to me. It assumes that being subjective blocks objective arguments, based on the subjective opinion of some people.

>The second point is lost on comparing the job to illicit drugs.

It's just an example of a tempting but harmful habit.

[taeric]

The contradiction was "the author believes in an objective reality" but might not be trying to "force his valuation" on others. My point is that not only is this forcing a valuation, it is assuming an objective view on things in order to do so.

And there is a huge difference between heroin and "just an example of a tempting but harmful habit." I mean, sure I can see what you are getting at. But I go back to saying it is a terrible rhetorical style. Any point there is lost by it just being off in scope.

[rhizome]

It assumes that being subjective blocks objective arguments

Take this as you will, but I would (subjectively, natch) contend that the only objective argument is that objectivity doesn't exist. There is always selectivity in play when making an argument, both by what is included to support the argument and by what is not. So, subjectivity itself blocks objective arguments. I'm willing to be proven wrong, though.

[xixi77]

One true valuation of anything is only possible in a world populated by precisely identical people. I call that a fantasy, not "objective reality".

[munificent]

Perhaps it's rather as the author believes in an objective reality, where there is one true valuation of a thing

Wait, are you proposing that this is actually the case? That all things have one true real value? That if the entire world likes pistachios but I don't, my perceived low value of pistachio is somehow objectively wrong and needs correction?

People value things differently. Whether its because of individual preference, or just different circumstances, the fundamental proposition of commerce is that people want different stuff.

If I have a banana tree and you have a goat, one banana is worth less to me than a cup of goat milk. Meanwhile, a cup of goat milk is worth less to you than a banana. We exchange and now we're both better off. This is the whole reason commerce works: because it's a non-zero game.

people perceive as "cachet" is actually BS and can be bad for them

I'm just flummoxed here that someone can just flatly declare that another's perceptions of their own preferences are bullshit. "No, dude, you really hate chocolate. Trust me. Yeah, that feeling of satisfaction you have right now. Not real. Don't smile like that. It's a fake smile! You hate it!"

How does that make sense?

[Lagged2Death]

Also, lots and lots of ad hominem.

Ad hominem is when you say, in effect, "You butter your toast on the wrong side, so I'm going to discount anything you say, you wrong-side-butterer, you."

It's not ad hominem to point out that a a specific claim ("I don't even really like toast," while sitting on a throne and dais made entirely of toast) is calculatedly disingenuous.

The argument isn't "This guy's a hypocrite and therefore he's wrong about absolutely everything," which would arguably be ad hominem. The argument is "This guy doesn't even believe what he's telling you right now, maybe you shouldn't believe it either."

[rayiner]

The fact of the matter is that this sort of "cool but shitty" job is quite common in other industries (music, movies, advertising, politics, sports). At least in tech, these sorts of jobs don't involve giving sexual favors, so be thankful for that much.

[kalleboo]

There's an even closer analogy on hand, which is especially poignant with Penny Arcade - video games. Lots of kids enter the game industry and get chewed up and overworked and tolerate it because they love games.

[taurath]

I knew I had to leave when I was asking why X benefit was so bad and HR's response was "well we work on video games" as if that helped the situation.

[jgon]

Well he kind of is acting like a villain. I mean if we were to strip out all the names associated with this topic the one line summary could be "Business/Sales guy wants to hire a tech person to work really hard for little money while he gets rich". I mean its a tale as old as the tech industry but are we seriously going to apologize for him? Do we have absolutely zero solidarity with regard to this issue?

[dpcheng2003]

I think the author skates between praise and criticism as they are different sides of the same coin--Robert is a great businessman.

I find this type of knee-jerk response to the job posting disappointing. When did we become so sensitive or insecure or helpless that we need to shame this person or this job posting?

It's been said multiple times over in this comments thread that Robert is actually being uniquely transparent, that the candidates who apply have lots of other options and no one is being forced to take this job given those two factors. If this was a Craiglist ad for some deviant act, would we jump on our horse and say, "How dare this person ask someone to do [deviant act]?" No, we'd probably just ignore it because we're adults and we get to make our own decisions. That [deviant act] is not for us.

You can say Robert should follow best practices and be more competitive in his offer, and to some extent, this post does that. But to use colorful and aggressive language, presuming that the founders of Penny Arcade are cashing in "trade show checks" is not productive. Robert isn't breaking any employment laws. The best you can do to show your disapproval as a great developer is to not apply.

[rantanplan]

There are so many logic flaws in your comment that I will just respond to the ones that stand out(to me anyway).

"Robert isn't breaking any employment laws".

I didn't know we should only voice our disagreement when someone does something illegal. Actually, on second thought, I think doing that would be somewhat redundant because, well you know, the law has already taken care of that.

"The best you can do to show your disapproval as a great developer is to not apply"

What a misguided and cynical opinion! No. What we can do, is to expose unethical and exploitative tactics, in order to protect the younger, and by extension, the more naive candidates.

[dpcheng2003]

Everyone has the right to voice their disagreement. It is, after all, a free country. I voiced my opinion, you're voicing yours. I am confused where my logic "fails" here.

The point I am making is that there is a community that is taking an outsized response to his very honest and open job posting about the type of person he wants on his team. As many people mentioned here, this isn't very different from other postings in other desired fields, like game design, acting, etc. or in many startups.

I will agree I am cynical but I am hardly misguided. I doubt anyone reading that job posting will think they are joining a highly lucrative, salary-competitive role. They are doing it because they love PA.

What if we wrote the "real" job descriptions of other desired positions like being an engineer at Apple, for example? Apple is notoriously known for working their employees. Where's the outrage?

You and the author of this post has every right to say the job posting is not competitive or in your opinion, unethical or exploitive. Where I find disagreement is the manner in which he argues his points. There's no need to use language that can be misconstrued as aggressive to makes his points, but he does anyway.

[rantanplan]

Fair enough. Maybe I am not impressed by the "honesty" depicted in the job posting. Being honest won't redeem you from being exploitative towards other people.

I agree that you should attack arguments and not people. Maybe the author of the article got a bit over excited.

[saraid216]

> a lot of this post seems to be conjecture which hinges on Robert Khoo being a villain

I didn't get this sense from the post. He disagrees with what Khoo is doing. That kinda necessarily means he'll be talking about Khoo negatively.