I actually just got a job there out of school, starting in a few months. Reading these comments is certainly interesting although it's not news to me that Hacker News hates Facebook.
I've long been skeptical of the effects of social media though, and I'm taking this job mostly just because doing otherwise seems like a really poor career choice. Plus it seems like Facebook is here to stay, and I can dream of helping to fix the problem instead of just enabling it.
EDIT: Is HN's Facebook hate getting so heated I'm getting down-voted for sending some good vibes to a newgrad about to start her/his first job?
I bet you all took you first job at Doctors Without Borders helping children in Angola. FFS the Waltons are the scourge of this world but I don't blame the kids going off to work at Walmart. I bet a lot of you pay taxes in the US too-- those taxes financed the war in Afghanistan but you didn't move to Morocco, did you?
Give me a break. Let this kid come in with a good attitude, eyes open, loud and proud. Who knows maybe he'll turn some heads. The guy signed and it is a good career move, what's wrong with cheering the guy up. Disappointed at you HN.
Actually, it is down to you to make a change, and do ethical things. There are ways to influence things which you mentioned from the war in Afghanistan to privacy issues with Facebook. But to do that, you have to care.
That's about all though, isn't it? There's a negligible chance you'll actually fix the problem, unless you manage to leak evidence to the media or similar.
I write software for biologists, am I feel I'm much, much happier doing that than I would be working at Facebook.
I spilled OJ at myself when I read his post. I mean its great he is so gullible to believe he can change something at such big corp, and he reminds me when I was 16 with big head of dreams how to change the world.
But seriously - do we know any single example of an intern coming to a big corp and "saving it" - by that I mean steering it off the dark and deceiving waters and actually bringing it into light for the good of society and people in general??
Getting a job offer at Facebook is a great achievement. Some people I know just moved to US to pursue masters and then apply at Facebook. If you have offers from another tech giants like Google than you can do your own analysis (SWOT maybe) to choose the right options.
Some years down the line you can always switch to any company in the world.
I've long been skeptical of the effects of social media though, and I'm taking this job mostly just because doing otherwise seems like a really poor career choice. Plus it seems like Facebook is here to stay, and I can dream of helping to fix the problem instead of just enabling it.