Just watch out for mirrors when they’re doing the room check. 
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These are pre-interview screenings, I’ve had a similar (I don’t recall it being quite so invasive though) from Google. I also didn’t have this sort of screen when I applied for a few positions at Amazon, probably depends on department and how you get into the system. My bureaucracy hell with them was when I wanted to apply for one role I was good for, but couldn’t because I was “reserved” for another department but they couldn’t tell me who it was so I could contact them or get them to release their hold. It’s expired by now and I’m getting contacts back but there’s plenty sour taste in my mouth from their recruiting system.
This is an asymmetric scenario. The screener knows their work, the candidate may not.
The latter is the important thing. They want to ensure that you’re not just googling the entire problem in another tab and copy-pasting. They want to see you do the work and explain the work as you’re doing it.
The method is Orwellian, but still mimicking the whiteboard breakdown of the in-person interview.
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Younger software devs have been manipulated into all kinds of undignified workplace practises since the 1990s. Despite (or perhaps because of) their skill levels and education they’re almost a testbed for ways that corporations can extract unpaid labour from employees and intrude on their personal time.
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I went through several rounds with Amazon 4 years ago. Wasn’t so orwellian then, I was told they found a local candidate yet they still contact me regularly about jobs although I’m happily employed and have no desire to move to any of their locations. If they insisted on the above, I’d kindly tell them to remove my name from their system and never bother me again.
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still by and large paid very well compared to the rest of the labor force. Regularly I have been paid more than my bosses (to be fair they were glorified hr/administrators and nothing technical but still “boss”).
Reaction time is a factor in this, so please pay attention.
Now, answer as quickly as you can.
One-one-eight-seven at Unterwasser.
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I worked for a company who got around that by mostly hiring H1B labor, fresh out of college. 60+ hours/week wasn’t unusual.
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Interview exams? What the freakin’…
It’s stupid enough that idiotic companies do the inane “oh can you write some code on the board to solve…” stuff because they can’t be bothered to have a meaningful interview process and just tell some random, utterly inexperienced and uninterested developers.
I’ve had friends that interviewed at google/apple/etc for high-level techie jobs where real expertise is needed, and yet they get dropped on some poor junior devs who think that asking a 20 year experienced engineer to write a rating algorithm on a whiteboard is a valid bit of interviewing.
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I interviewed with Amazon a number of years ago. And, echoing many of the other commenters here, I found the interviewers professional and the interview itself tough. I didn’t wind up taking the job after I started learning a more about the work environment there (this was about 5 years ago, and I have heard that the environment is less stressful for most devs). I now have many friends who work there and like it.
I hope and expect that this interview incident is not a normal procedure.
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In other news… hacker completely owns young developer desperate for work by using simple social engineering.
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I resemble this comment! Years ago, I had a minimum wage job at a fast food company (the same one whose current ceo is being targeted to be the US Labor Secretary). I got a transfer to a location downtown, where parking isn’t free, and weekday lunch is the only busy time. Instead of a measly 11am to 2pm shift to cover the lunch rush, they would schedule us for 11:30 to 1:30. Just enough to pay for our parking. Actually, after taxes, I was losing money at this “job”.
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After reading about this on Hacker News as well, it seems like the Amazon experience is highly variable for programmers. Both have a high likelihood of being the truth.
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Just a reminder that Amazon, whose CEO Jeff Bezos also owns the Washington Post, is a CIA contractor to the tune of $600 million. http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/07/the-details-about-the-cias-deal-with-amazon/374632/
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Oh, don’t get Cory started!
“All Amazon Job Interview Videos Automatically Uploaded to CIA Contractor”
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Another example of outsourcing a task for “cheaper” and getting what you pay for.
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My problem is that he doesn’t specify when it happened, just “some time back”. That could be 3 days, weeks, months, or years.
While I don’t doubt it happened, the intentional vagueness with when this happened makes it seem like this is something that actually happened several years ago, and is not really valid any more.
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Of course, the Cory clickbait formula also means his Amazon Affiliate links on Boing Boing lead to this:
“Popular Tech and Culture Blogger is Paid CIA Contractor Shill”!
Oh, now I get it! Writing Truthy Headlines is fun! 
(But still bad and wrong if they are posted as news, no matter which side is doing it.)
(To be fair, though, I think the headline for this particular OP is pretty well justified. The situation with the proctor company and spy software is justifiably described as Orwellian, even if it isn’t government spying, which is, in my mind, usually a key component to “Orwellian,” especially a “literal” one.)
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Was that true when calculated on an hourly basis? Those 60+ work weeks at tech companies that operate on eternal crunch time can dilute those big salaries quite a bit.
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Somebody really should write an automated “Cory Doctorow Headline Generator.” (Maybe me, if I can find the time.)
I love Cory, but he’s always so over-the top with in his articles/headlines. 
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You where probably a US citizen, the developer making the report said they where not a citizen of any north american nation. So, your experience is very likely different then what a non-citizen with an Indian sounding name, and no experience would receive.
