just playing devil's advocate here, but why is slapping together an API with some javascript worthy of a job offer? what's so exciting about YT instant? from hurley's twitter message, it sounds like he asked this kid to drop out of stanford to join youtube, which sounds a little crazy. maybe I just have no imagination.
The kid's innovative and imaginative, can clearly build and design product quickly, and has a Facebook and Stanford pedigree. That sounds like a winner to me.
Things are not measured by how difficult or simple it was to create. It is measured by the result it produces.
He also validated for them that users want YouTube Instance without the company doing any work or taking any risks. For this reason alone, he deserves more than a job offer.
I agree and thank you for speaking what was on my mind as well. Anyone with moderate javascript skills could have a site like this up and running within 2 hours. I'm not even a fan of google instant though, oh well, to each his own.
People often say "I could do that" when seeing a Jackson Pollock painting. The key is they didn't, Pollock did. Hindsight is 20/20 and skills in executing are a dime a dozen. I'd be willing to be the vast majority of HN users could have coded up Youtube Instant. The differentiator is Feross actually did it.
Maybe anyone could, but it was Feross who did so. As well, I'm sure he still went through the YouTube interview process. YouTube Instant was just his foot in the door.
>but why is slapping together an API with some javascript worthy of a job offer?
I was equally leery for the same reason. I've made tons of apps that bound events and pulled/updated data from cache layers I had setup.
Apparently I didn't have the good sense to be a shameless self-promoter.
This is frankly exemplary of the one thing I don't like about HN, even though I dearly love the community here.
The emphasis on typical business values, rather than on true productivity and hard work agonizes my conscience on a regular basis.
It makes me nauseous to think he got such publicity and a job offer for that.
I hate to be sour about it, but damn.
S'like hiring a B-school kid because he completed a rudimentary business plan, rendered it into PDF, and put it online and it happened to go viral for some absurd reason.
People who are on the sidelines are always claiming they could do it better, or otherwise downplaying other's attempts to make something cool. Apparently you haven't been able to make any apps that caught anyone's attention, and it sounds like you're jealous that something you perceive as equal to your efforts did.
Honestly, I'd never intentionally hire anyone with your attitude.
I've used set theory to hack up a search engine for a collab project in an evening.
I've made an app that gets around the lack of transactions in MySQL MyISAM and allows auditing of arbitrary django ORM models with logs.
I wrote a micro-compiler last night using llvm and my own lexer, parser, and tokenizer.
I simply don't write things that are necessarily "accessible" to the general public, and I don't go out of my way to promote them.
The fact that I'm leery of people who are aggressive self-promoters or opportunistic doesn't mean I'm "jealous", I don't actually want to work for Google.
I'm leery because in past experience, the aggressive self-promoters are covering for a lack of something, whether it be scruples or technical aptitude.
I was making an observation and expressing reservation, you're outright saying you wouldn't hire me.
But hey, lesson learned, I'll just make one-off apps that don't actually do anything and promote the shit out of them.
God forbid someone express reservations about the enthusiasm over relatively unproductive demonstrations without getting publicly hammered by a well known startup personality.
You shame yourself and demonstrate why many programmers I know don't take Silicon Valley seriously.
Normally, does getting a job at YouTube require the same hoops to jump through as getting a job at Google, or are their HR departments and processes separate still?
Though it's been a while now, back in 2007 I was offered a job at YouTube without going through the interview process because I co-developed the now-defunct Chime.TV ( http://techcrunch.com/2007/06/12/chimetv-a-prettier-way-to-w... ) and won the Mashup Competition that year. I even confirmed to make sure I wouldn't have to go through the crazy Google hiring practices and was assured that "If you say yes, you don't have to interview - you have a job starting tomorrow on my team at YouTube." It seemed like a very cool proposition too - my code would be visible to hundreds of millions of people immediately. I would've accepted it had my life circumstances been different.
For interns that would be pretty weird anyway, after all, it's not like they are under the kind of employment contract where you could reasonably make the case for that.
In fact, your best interns probably do have side projects.
Facebook doesn't have a 20%-time /program/. That doesn't mean people don't have side-projects on their own time, or even multiple things they're doing at work. Plus they have regular hackathons which sometimes develop into full projects.
I'm firmly of the belief that this is very good for Silicon Valley. How many people do you know who work at a job and a startup on the side? In California that generally won't get you in trouble. Elsewhere?
While I was working at IBM (in California), I tried to get clearance for one of my personal projects [1], the IBM lawyer had this to say:
"No, according to California Labor Code 2870, even if you use your own time/equipment, your project still belongs to IBM if your project relates to IBM's business, or actual or demonstrably anticipated research or development.
So if you think that your project is not close to anything that IBM is or will be involved in, you can tell your manager about it, and if they agree with your assessment, then you can tell me your project and I will try to get it cleared for you. In my experience though, it is hard to get clearance because IBM is involved in practically everything, esp. in the software field."
My manager was ok with it, but the IBM lawyers wouldn't clear it. I doubt they would have pursued any legal actions if I continued working on it, but I figured I'd rather not chance it and let it go.
[1] It was a FOSS Firefox add-on called Map+. IBM had a team somewhere that worked on Firefox add-ons, so even though I wasn't on, near, or had access to that team, it was a no go.
Note, this was IBM's lawyer talking, not your own. IBM's interests were represented there, not yours.
Lawyers are in the business of convincing people that the law says what they want it to say. However in the case of a dispute it doesn't matter what IBM's lawyer says, it matters what a judge thinks. So of course if you ask IBM's lawyers, they'll represent IBM's interests by making the broadest possible claims for what is IBM's. That doesn't make them right, nor does it mean that they would actually pursue it. But as long as they leave you convinced, they've accomplished their goal.
That said, they are correct that the statute gives them that way to claim your work. And the larger the company you're in, the broader that claim can become. And when you listen to their lawyers, the claim will become broader still. Putting that all together, I wouldn't take their word for anything without consulting your own lawyer who represents your interests.
Alternately, if it is important to you, you always have the option of telling your manager that this issue is important to you, and you're willing to leave your job if that is what is needed so you can work on your own project. In that situation it is amazing what miracles can happen once it is made clear to the lawyers that giving you the freedom you want is actually in IBM's interest. (Advice from lawyers is very frequently penny wise and pound foolish. The smarter the business, the more strongly they realize that.)
Depending on the current job market at the time, it may be advisable to line up another job option before attempting such drastic action.
>Interestingly enough, the ambitious Aboukhadijeh was a software engineer intern at Facebook when he created Youtube Instant.
Ouch. Does that mean Facebook own the rights?
Because IT staff are not much more than slaves in our world: anything you create while employed is property of the employer, even if the work is done in your own time.
Google is a big mess of hierarchy, (yes, they're much better than the average -- that's not saying much). Their "eternal" startup mantra is just that. Looks like the world has lost yet another good hacker to the halls of the Googleplex.
I hope he loves it. Unfortunately, I don't think he will.
Kudos to all the work put in for YouTube Instant.
Good luck to your future at YouTube!
Poor guy? I don't notice the man with a gun standing behind him that forces him in to servitude here.
He's a free agent, he made this little project, got offered a job at a very prestigious company, has his name on the map for the future and a reference that will open doors for a long long time to come (being offered a job directly by the head of the video division of Google, formerly an entrepreneur himself is likely not a daily occurrence).
Poor guy indeed.
Somehow I feel this isn't the last we've heard of him, and I wish him the best of luck with what he'll do there, and I don't doubt that if he ever decides to go solo that he'll find a lot of people willing to back his (ad)ventures.
There are much worse things to happen to you than this.
Lisbeautiful — yes. Co-founder and coder. Not profitable yet, but it's working on it.
Fairbooks — not co-founder. Did a lot of work for it before it launched; circumstances didn't work out to be official, but I'm still involved. (It's two really good friends.)
"lost"? This seems a little over the top. He can always leave if he is unhappy. He obviously has a bright future ahead of him, whether it's at Google or not.
It's the place to be, if you want an 8-5 job (it ends up being much more than 8-5).
I don't blame him for taking the job. I just hope he keeps up his entrepreneur's spirit. He's already shown an entrepreneurial bent, just imagine what he might have done on his own. (Based on what he did, it could have been wonderful.)
Kudos to you for responding to comments like these with patience and class. The cynicism on here about doing anything other than starting your own business drives me up the wall, but comments like yours help me keep my head.
I was wrong with my original assertion that he is a "poor guy." He is on top of the world right now. He's got a huge opportunity in front of him.
I was wrong, and the patience of HN people is amazing. Thanks.
I think there is always danger when you take an 8-5 job that you begin to lose your desire to "hack"; I don't think he will. I can't wait to see his work, and, as always, wish him the very best.
Thanks, lukeqsee. I appreciate that. While I understand that its not unheard of for 8-5's to swallow good hackers, there are plenty of people with the drive to hack working day jobs, and not necessarily because they aren't brave enough to take the plunge.
I'd also like to point out that startups can cause hackers to lose the desire to "hack" as well. After the initial stages, so much time is required on other things that hacking often falls by the wayside, and often is never really picked up again.
Have you actually worked for google? Where do you get your information? Not everyone works 80 hours a week there, and plenty of smart people have walked through its halls, left to do their own thing, and sometimes even came back after their company was acquired. It's not a dead end, like you seem to suggest.
Also, are you familiar with the term, "the sum is greater than the parts?" Pooling resources and talent is often more effective than trying to do everything on your own.
I'm pretty curious if we'll be able to spot his 'fingerprint' in the features that youtube will roll out over the next period.