He has sample projects, functional games actually. Portfolio pieces specifically made to rosy up his portfolio. And he aced the programming interviews by being fresh with that material.<p>He also had great referrals, and counteroffers.<p>And wound up with a pretty average salary.<p>I am envious of the illiquid RSU package, but the 130k salary is pretty average.<p>He didn&#x27;t get a &quot;Senior Staff Architect&quot; title. He didn&#x27;t get &quot;Principle&quot;, he landed a software engineering role at an average salary with an awesome signing bonus and RSUs.<p>This is what you are supposed to be armed with. Portfolio, referrals, counteroffers.<p>Are you concerned that AirBNB&#x27;s code will suffer? It won&#x27;t. Are you concerned that he will burn out? More credentialed engineers burn out.<p>This is just misplaced jealousy plain and simple, someone else optimized their time and leveraged inefficiencies in this system in a way we already know already works.