I didn't get to be a (retired) 100x engineer by posting on HN. I don't post stories regularly but did in this case because a friend sent me the link.
I did post it to warn others about CF.
> Since you posted the link and I see very little history here, I can't acknowledge your claim of authority yet and I can only suspect, without certainty, personal grievances or conflicts of interests.
Suspect away. When someone you care for is treated badly by a corporation I think that's fair game to relay to others and amplify the message.
But since we're on the subject:
> Based on contact with their support + social media + communication here + being a customer + discord + attending, although infrequently, community calls.
Maybe you just don't want to believe a corporation you believe in so strongly could be awful to their employees or have an internal culture that sees individuals as disposable.
Maybe it's you that has the undisclosed conflict of interest. Maybe CF cares about what HN thinks of it.
As someone very close to an ex-CF employee, I can state with authority that the company does very little to help it's employees come up to speed.
Their training process is essentially a bunch of CF employees doing unimpressive powerpoint presentations. Their internal documentation is a huge Wiki and it's not really very well maintained. Their internal config management system is absolute trash and I'm convinced that the only reason they stay in business is they've got a few long-time internal employees who know how everything REALLY works.
So, I can understand how someone without the experience inside of the company can come to the conclusion that this is justified but CF's process is essentially a broken recruiting and training pipeline connected to a woefully unimpressive sales and support org. The dysfunction is endemic to the organization and nothing short of a major calamity or a change of leadership will expose it.
For my part, I've warned off high-performing colleagues who knew of my connection and wanted the inside scoop after getting called by CF recruiters. Nobody to my knowledge ever accepted a role there after talking to me privately. I'd imagine part of the problem at CF is that the real 100x engineers know better than to suffer in a poor work environment. I was sent this Tiktok link by someone who reached out to me to thank me for the culture warning.
If I was a strong candidate I'd be very wary of a CF promise. Caveat emptor.
I guess my intuition from reviewing the lists over time is that some supercomputers start at the top of the list and then drop as improvements to technology crown new winners.
But if you had to build a machine TODAY to just get on the bottom end of the list, what design choices might you make?