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Admin
Waaaaaay overdone... Bert would hardly remember one of doubtless many flamewars from 20 years ago. What good is it to destroy your enemies in revenge if they don't know why it's happening. One of the sweetest scenes from "The Count of Monte Christo" is when he reveals himself to his opponents so they know who destroyed them and why. It just doesn't work for such a minor issue like a flamewar.
After checking his skillset he should just have said something along these lines and sent him home:
Dear Mr Glanst(r)on,
I would like to conclude the interview now. I talked with my college after he interviewed you and I can say that we won't be hiring you.
In case you can’t tell, this is a grown-up place. The fact that you insist on using your ridiculous outfit and don't know how to behave clearly shows that you’re too immature and too stupid to be working here.
Your technical and social incompetence is exactly what’s wrong with applicants today. They are dragging down the whole industry with their idiocy! I wished they would all be banned from it completely!
Go away and grow up.
Admin
Sarumanatee = epic win
Admin
It is a frequent misconception that people who sound as though they are batshit insane or raging morons or both online are actually quite normal people when you get to meet them in person.
No. No they're not.
Admin
WTF are "buster brown loafers"? Not even Google could help me...
Admin
I'm with you. FidoNet....wow those were the days. I ran Zack's Shack from San Antonio, TX and later Warner Robins, GA. In the mean time I was the Sysop for the Telix support BBS in Cary, NC.
Admin
The site's under construction, but there's text at the bottom: One of the world’s best-known children’s shoe brands, Buster Brown took its inspiration from the massively popular comic strip adventures of Buster and his dog Tige. Since 1904, Buster Brown footwear has been pleasing children and parents alike with a blend of classic and modern style, quality, and comfort for growing feet. Today, Buster Brown kids’ shoes showcases the finest in footwear for kids from infant to grade school, all made with the same dedication to quality and style. Find a great selection of Buster Brown for kids of all ages on Shoes.com.
Does that answer your question?
Admin
Why did he need to consult with his alma mater in this situation?
Admin
Why would he need to consult with his alma mater?
See, he would have consulted with his high school, not his college.
Admin
I think the real wtf is that he still remembers a 22 year old internet argument.
Admin
Is it just me, or have 100 people already said this?
Admin
Kids these days, with their flashing-soled-shoes with wheels on the heels...
Admin
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ok, popquiz wise guy: you are standing in the hallway in front of the large pile of fresh donuts, there are no one, absolutely no one around you to ask if it is ok for you to have one donut, and you are starving. so, what are you going to do, huh? what are YOU going to do ???
Admin
This had the potential to be epic, but fell way short.
Very anti-climactic.
Admin
Yeah, or like some guy in his 50s who has nothing better to do then get on some web site and read mildly amusing stories about 20-year-old flame wars and post comments about them ... oh, wait ...
Admin
Like, duh, you get on thedailywtf.com, read the stories, and post comments, of course.
Admin
Personally, I have fond memories of the days when I wrote my own ZMODEM program in C, and when I wrote to the screen by poking bytes into a memory-mapped screen image. Back then, you knew everything that was going on inside the computer and every byte that was being sent over the wire. I found it much more emotionally satisfying: I was in control.
These days, everything I write is a call to a Java function that calls a Windows function that calls a BIOS function, with many many layers in between. I am very far removed from what is really happening.
Sure, there's no way we could write the complex apps that we write today with assembler and memory-mapped IO.
When I was a kid I laughed at the old folks who said, "Back in my day, we didn't have these fancy electronic calculators, you had to know how to do the arithmetic yourself ...". I suppose the young folks today will laugh at my reminiscing about the fun days when we had REAL computers, like a PDP-10 or an IBM-370.
But your time will come. A few decades from now, the young kids will be laughing at that primitive Java and C# that the old man programmed in. And what's that crude XML thing! Ha ha! You silly old people!
Admin
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A little clarification here, as some liberties were taken to embellish the story I submitted. This first addresses the most common thing, "why did I hold a grudge?" Keep in mind this interview was held in 2000-2001, so it was only 12 year "grudge" at that point. :P
I didn't really hold a grudge; I was just intensely curious. His real name was very unique, and had a name that has a kind of New Jersey-mob quality to it, like "Vincent Scarbolini" (which also not his real name). As I went through the stack of resumes, it seemed familiar, so I thought he had the same name as some actor. It was only when I looked it up on the web that I found a random news feed from 1992 that I suddenly remembered, "OMG NO WAY!" Kind of like your childhood bully showing up for an interview. You just HAD to see him, right?
Back in the 1980s, his actions towards me, which really were only because of my user name mishap, were persistent and insulting. The sysop of the board acted on my behalf, but Vincent was so insulted, SO INCENSED, that I used a common handle instead of a real name that he raised a holy tirade that demanded that the sysop remove me and so on. I at first apologized profusely, which only made him angrier. He claimed I used "big words to make myself seem older," used foul language, vague threats, and eventually the sysop asked me to just drop off the board for a while just to get this guy off his back, and I could sign in under a new fake name if I wanted. I decided just to let it go; I had other boards with FIDONet feeds, anyway.
As far as "wasting time" to interview him, he was already selected and flown in for an interview by the company. Why? He faked out the HR hiring process to claim he know more than he did (which was a common problem: you had to fill out a web form with dropdown boxes that didn't have "I don't know anything about this subject" as options half the time), it was only when he sent us (the hiring managers) his copy of his resume, we said, "Huh... we don't see a lot of... modern stuff on here." His former job, IIRC, was as a Lotus Notes (2.0 with MACROS... oooh) programmer for a accounting firm that had recently went out of business. He (along with 5 other candidates) were part of a "mass interview" of these candidates, went among the staff that would be responsible for working with him. I mean, one way or another, he was gonna sit in someone's office or in the lobby with the other candidates. He was being chosen for an entry level programmer-analyst position, so in theory, he could have been useful if he showed up well and seemed eager to learn.
He was not.
In fact, while the donut-eating part was pretty accurate, there were other problems he had. One of them was his wispy beard/mustache was a collector of all sorts of things, not just powdered sugar. For instance, it was difficult to see where his nose hairs ended and his mustache began. But the biggest was his "no technology worth noting has been invented since 1991" approach, which was the killer right off the bat. He seemed a little put off that every manager who interviewed him was younger than he was, and immediately felt that this was poor reflection on our company's image. I got the feeling he was looking for some "good ol' boy" former warhorse to hire him as a fellow who knew the glory days.
The manager who lost the donuts was going to have him sit in the lobby the rest of the day, but I asked if I could meet him because "I just have to meet a guy who stole your team's donuts." Based on his name and anger, I expected Al Pachino or Joe Pesci, and got Abe Vigoda or Emo Philips. I was shocked that a man with such vitriol and bile was so meek and sad in person. I actually felt bad for the guy.
And it was not I who had said, "I have never had a conflict," it was him. And the way he answered my question was, "I have never had a conflict with someone worth my respect." Okay, then. I had NO illusions he'd remember me, mostly because his war was mostly with the sysop of the board. I am sure that sysop was one of many.
Hah. Sure. Like he'd remember. The next day, during a meeting where we discussed the candidates, I told the story to the other managers who thought it was awesome. I mean, what are the odds? For a few years afterwards, there were little cartoons passed around of a bearded guy chasing after donuts as a private joke between us.
This I almost did. Allllmost... [gggnnnn]... But what then? All kinds of things did occur to me, including dark Danny Elfman soundtracks, dimmed lights, and OH SNAP! revenge. But I would have looked seriously immature and what happens next? Cut to next scene? Not in reality. I just acted like it was the standard end of an interview.
Yeah, but we didn't hire you because no one had used VT-100 codes to program online software in nearly a decade. You should have AT LEAST known was "xterm" was! Or actually, you know, GIVEN ME LAWN CARE ADVICE you old goat... ;)
And you replied to it? Now I have also wasted YOUR time. Seriously, I am very impressed at your contribution. You sure showed me. :P
Admin
"retrospect" is probably the word you're looking for...
Admin
Maybe if I wasn't having a little pun with it.
Admin
FTFY
Admin
So, basically, Bert raped Greg twice, once in FIDOnet times, secondly stealing Greg's time?
Admin
Oh my god that would have been awesome.
Admin
So, the WTF is that someone was cruel enough to raise someone's hopes for a job with absolutely no chance that he might get it - whether or not he was a jerk thirty years ago - just to satisfy mild curiosity.
Admin
Did Bert/Vincent write the Wikipedia entry on WWIV? It's just a rant about FIDONet sysops. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWIV
Admin
TRWTF is the last sentence of the "The Interview" paragraph.
Admin
I was expecting a WTF about WOODEN tables!
Admin
Yes, but we remember YOU. You only need to remember that paybacks are a bitch. And you have a lot coming your way.
Admin
Yes, it answers my question quite completely. Thanks!
Admin
Yeah I'm thinking Orff's Carmina Burana-O Fortuna would be more suitable here.
Admin
No kidding.
The post tries very hard to make it sound like Greg is "oh so cool", and Bert is somehow "not quite with it". However, reading between the lines, it is Greg that remembers the supposedly insignificant put-down from Fidonet days, while Bert has apparently moved on. Oh Freud, where art thou!
The real WTF is Greg, not Bert.
Admin
Methinks that thou doth protesteth too much!
Greg, look in a mirror. The real loser is you.
Admin
You have insulted me, my family and the Shoalin temple. You must die.
Admin
FTFY^2
Admin
I'm sure all of us can remember a few confrontations from our younger days.
Seriously, if you had the chance to take some light-hearted, no-consequence revenge on the school bully, would you take it?
I would.
I'll also bet that Vincent oops, I mean 'Bert' had kept transcripts of the 'glory days' too....
Admin
Lucky he was still a jerk then, what are the chances... ;-)
Admin
I'm Dawgone Disgusted at anyone who used Fidonet those days. (Hoping this is seen by R.B.)
Admin
Admin
The closest I ever came to one of these was a situation where a "contractor" disappeared after stealing a bunch of software and manuals from our office. He later had the gall to submit a resume to another business unit of our company (where I happened to work). I reviewed the resume and warned my boss to "run away screaming" from this turkey.
Admin
What son of a bitch that greg!
Admin
Interviewer sounds like a jerk to me to be honest.
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That would've been perfect!
Admin
Shoot the donut.
Admin
last!!!
for real akismet
Admin
That would have been awesome. Unprofessional but awesome.