I feel like you are being harsh.  Recruiting seems like a pretty essential part to a fast growing company.  And to say they affect the “local intelligence culture”, well there’s a lot of locals in SF who say that about all of tech and there’s many a way to define intelligence.<p>As a developer, I appreciate the role recruiters play.  Reaching out cold to people isn’t easy and the fact someone else spends time on this while I write code is great.  And the fact that my LinkedIn has multiple leads from people about job opportunities should I want to move is fantastic.  Are we so spoiled to scoff at people offering us jobs when so many people can barely find quality work.<p>Certainly there are some shady players, but not really more than I’ve seen on the Engineering side, and my main issues have been less with recruiters and more with the hiring managers who the recruiters work for.  “Oh, your rocket ship hasn’t grown revenue for 6 months straight yet you told me 100% YOY growth.”  It was two directors of engineering and not a recruiter that lied to me about growth at a well respected YC startup.  I blame the people crafting the message more than the messenger.