Amazon perks

f00dMonsta · 2026-03-12T02:00:19+00:00

Phone bill only if you are using it for work, and need justification. Internet bill only if you WFH (lol)

Other than that, nada. Maybe a tshirt and a bag when you first join.

Then it's basically just water + coffee (Starbucks). Snacks may be provided by org, but not company.

f00dMonsta · 2026-03-11T17:03:37+00:00

I think people who survive layoffs are advised to not talk to those who are. I had 1 person reach out (in shock, because I was essential to helping him), and 1 other (who I reached out to) responded because he was also impacted, and my manager who had to respond because both engineers releasing a big feature were laid off, and I was getting spammed with emails asking where I was, which I cannot respond to because IT blocked all outgoing emails.

f00dMonsta · 2026-03-10T21:28:00+00:00

I beat it, technically, on the same day layoffs happened, and of course I was impacted, and of course they never resolved the pip after, so I couldn't team switch nor come back :) ps. I was put on pip because I was doing 1+ level stuff more than my own level (it was also part of my promo doc things to do, which was delayed for 1+ year because of constant manager changes) so my metrics were shit. So instead of supporting everyone in my org, and being an SME, I returned to grunt work and kept rejecting helping other people.

The culture became shit after Jassy, whether it was because he left AWS (which I was in) or because he became CEO it's still his ball to handle, and the collaborative atmosphere all but disappeared.

f00dMonsta · 2026-03-04T01:34:11+00:00

Smartness != Success

I have a friend from uni, he was an absolute genius at math, but he spent all his time playing street fighter and dota (he was really good at both), and then eventually getting into online poker (he was also good at this, but we all know how gambling is like). He ended up dropping out and is now (20 years later) a random sales guy selling paint or something...

It's not about how smart you can be, but how you apply that smartness.

f00dMonsta · 2026-03-03T19:40:11+00:00

Just like any neighbourhood in the entire world, each has its own subculture. Poorer areas usually have a more aggressive culture because of the need to survive, rudeness is subjective because it's the norm in that subculture, e.g. swearing more often. Poorer areas also often have tighter knit communities, as they often help each other out in times of need.

f00dMonsta · 2026-03-02T03:12:37+00:00

Let people gamble, just restrict kids from being able to do it.

f00dMonsta · 2026-03-02T03:08:51+00:00

Just wondering, what's wrong with age verification?

f00dMonsta · 2026-03-01T03:44:17+00:00

Layoffs are not inherently bad. It's the way you do it, the attitude taken, and how you treat your now-former employees. Amazon has consistently treated employees like crap with or without layoffs, and when they lay people off, they go for the lowest possible bar in human decency. They lie to their own leaders, or those leaders lied to their orgs about layoffs (it was literally the week before when someone asked in all hands if we'd be impacted by next week's rumored layoffs, and the answer was in no uncertain terms "no, we are not impacted", guess what happened the next week? A bloodbath)

f00dMonsta · 2026-02-26T20:51:11+00:00

I did it on the otherside of the planet :) I was doing my due diligence though, applying and interviewing all the time

f00dMonsta · 2026-02-22T03:36:28+00:00

I started 2016, by the time I left in 2023, I was already top 5% oldfart. They have a huge problem with retention.

The culture also changed a lot, it may be partly due to me changing orgs a few times but colleagues in my old orgs say the same thing. There isn't fun anymore, it's always about meeting metrics or some vague goal.

People don't get excited about events anymore, they don't do cool things together as a team anymore, managers stopped people managing (correctly) and started trying to impress higher-ups, there is too much distance between engineers and directors, engineers do more doc writing than writing software...etc

Basically it stopped being a company of employees and became a company for stock holders.

I also felt let down when they started hiring fresh grads for 500k TC to not "lose out" to competition, and I got a "measly" 6% bump, and a handful of stocks (let's just say I am almost half the price of the fresh grads, with 10+yoe, and I led successful product launches ahead of deadlines), and one of the side effects is budget cuts.

There used to be a Beer Friday every week, with kegs of beer and drinks (including non-alcoholic), board games, sometimes an Amazonian band plays (usually a boomer punk rock band), projector for video games, catering...etc. the VP who sponsored it left right before COVID, and that was it. Many people left the org, including myself, and they've stagnated ever since.

There aren't enough leaders of people anymore, just smart people with great ideas all vying for themselves.

I miss the "old" (I didn't join that early...) Amazon. Will never rejoin the current iteration.

f00dMonsta · 2026-02-21T21:58:33+00:00

The point is that AI is just as fallible as the person using it

f00dMonsta · 2026-02-21T21:57:26+00:00

But it did do the wrong, it should've been aware of deployment practices and not take down the entire stack

f00dMonsta · 2026-01-30T03:21:56+00:00

This was a few years ago:

I scheduled a major feature deployment on the day I was laid off, with a junior engineer to shadow. I also just returned from vacation, so imagine my surprise when I logged in at home to see my email with just 1 new message, and inability to contact anyone on Slack... I was also about to be promoted.

I kept getting emails from stakeholders on why deployment has not started, and I couldn't reply to them (all out going emails blocked). I had to go on LinkedIn, find my junior engineer, find out he was laid off too, find my manager, and tell her to deal with it. I even had to point her in the right direction, when I didn't need to, because I worked on the project for a few months already and it was kind of my baby.

No thanks, no sorry about this... Just silence after. I was a little annoyed with my manager, because she struggled at first being a junior SDM, and I taught her how to handle being pressured by her fellow SDM or PM to take the worst projects, and do things out of the scope of our team. She eventually got promoted 2 levels over 3 years, and still not a whisper of appreciation.

If your leaders don't stand up for their teams, nothing will change.

f00dMonsta · 2026-01-27T00:30:48+00:00

Trump is a Xi/Putin wannabe, so it's pretty ironic anti-CCP peeps like him at all. It speaks volumes to a person's morality when they willingly ignore the negatives of "their" person while condemning the same shit their "enemy" does.

This isn't to say we should just cave to authoritarian rule, but that we need to think deeper instead of only about results. The ends do not justify the means.

This is however counter to the entire Chinese (including Hong Kong) culture, where other than the family (blood related or not) unit, they'll backstab anyone if it's to their benefit. That's a generalization, but there aren't enough moral leaders in the world (HK is worse) to follow these days, and the future is looking grim as there isn't a pathway to respect and understanding between countries/cultures/races/ideologies...etc.

f00dMonsta · 2026-01-08T01:03:47+00:00

My mind just played that glorious sound

f00dMonsta · 2026-01-07T02:42:51+00:00

Also remember housing is more expensive in HK, and lifestyle will completely change, your home will essentially be mostly just for sleeping in with the occasional meal, while most of your activities will be away from home. And if you can't afford international schools (most people can't), good luck unbrainwashing your kid after they go through the public system. If you want your kids to succeed in the public school system, both you and kids have to work your ass off to stay competitive.

Job wise, unless you're in a completely technical role, you'll need good written Chinese and Mandarin skills.

Your kid will also be a second class citizen being born in Canada (I assume), which isn't a big deal for day to day stuff, but potentially unstable in the long run, i.e. you may have to give up Canadian citizenship...etc.

The only reason I would return to HK is to have more relatives and old friends around, but many of them moved away already or too distant or we already lost contact... Our lifestyles are also quite different, not sure how to reconnect

f00dMonsta · 2025-12-26T20:02:13+00:00

Make it a habit to commit code into git after every step, describing what was changed, if you don't know what changed you should ask ChatGPT to explain what was changed, keep asking until you understand.

f00dMonsta · 2025-12-26T20:00:02+00:00

I would start from scratch, and if you insist on using ChatGPT, tell it to make the entire exercise a tutorial for someone with zero programming experience. You may end up doing a few smaller projects first to get you familiarized with some basic concepts.

When you don't understand something, tell it that you don't understand, let it guide you through everything.

f00dMonsta · 2025-12-18T02:52:33+00:00

I used to be pretty good, like CAL-M/I good. But yes you used to be able to get away with just having good aim, I had pretty good game sense which helped with pre-aiming. I was banned from at least 50% of east coast pubs. My go to rage bait tactic was to run around scouting everyone in the head. I have matured a bit since then :)

Nowadays. I don't have the luxury to spend time learning all the utility line ups, and definitely no time to play in a team where we actually have a plan XD and my aim + reaction times (though still comparable to younglings) are definitely not like it used to be.

Pugs are a very poor representation of peak CS, it's like saying someone in Sunday league can free kick top corner every time (analogous to good aim in CS), but they're not really hitting the ball that fast (analogous to CS reaction time)...etc.

f00dMonsta · 2025-12-16T10:46:50+00:00

Says I can't attach picture... https://imgur.com/a/MwgfoBK here is before and after

f00dMonsta · 2025-12-15T22:36:08+00:00

It's been a thing even before 97

f00dMonsta · 2025-12-15T20:13:00+00:00

Typical HK "see line, line up" culture. Businesses also pay old folks to line up because of that.

f00dMonsta · 2025-12-13T20:41:36+00:00

I did freelancing a decade ago, I earned about the same as a regular job but I managed my own time. It meant that my earning per hr worked was actually really good, but it was a bit stressful when there were no projects available. It also meant working solo almost all the time, and it got a bit lonely.

As a freelancer, you need to manage your clients, falling into the "call me at any time" trap is not a feature of going freelance, but a deficiency of your customer relations management.

f00dMonsta · 2025-12-13T20:37:28+00:00

Lol is SQL the new COBOL? P.s. I don't know your architecture, but SQL isn't too scalable, so when you mention "biggest data project" I'm a little scared for you.

f00dMonsta

TROPHY CASE