[JOB OPP] Amazon Recruiting (fwd)

Date: Tue, 27 Apr 2004 16:48:16 -0400 (EDT)
From: Lisa Meeden 
To: job-opps@cs.swarthmore.edu
Subject: [JOB OPP] Amazon Recruiting (fwd)
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Reply-To: Lisa Meeden 

This is a nice opportunity for graduating seniors.  Both Chuck and
Jordan would be great to work with.  Lisa

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Lisa Meeden				Computer Science Dept.
Associate Professor and Chair          	Swarthmore College
meeden@cs.swarthmore.edu		500 College Ave.
http://www.cs.swarthmore.edu/~meeden	Swarthmore, PA 19081
610-328-8565 (voice)			610-328-8606 (fax)

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 27 Apr 2004 13:33:34 -0700
From: Chuck Groom 
To: meeden@cs.swarthmore.edu
Cc: Jordan Hay 
Subject: Amazon Recruiting

Amazon.com is hiring software engineers! We're interested in hiring
graduating seniors.

Specifically, I want more Swatties in my team. Amazon is a great place
for folks with a strong software background and the broad range of
skills obtained in a liberal arts environment.

I graduated in 2000 and worked in Berkeley for a few years doing
embedded systems engineering. I moved to Seattle last summer.  Now I'm
an engineer in the Platform Trust team, which makes sure the Amazon
Marketplace (which allows 3rd party merchants to sell their products
on the Amazon site) is a good place to shop. This includes vast data
crunching to identify early indicators of problem sellers; exposing
metrics; finding anomalies in item pricing or descriptions; working
with business teams to create automated workflows, such as for
managing buyer refund requests; &c. I work alongside Jordan Hay,
another alumna.

[Q] Why would I want to work for Amazon?
[A1] Well, it's cool to work for Amazon. Everyone knows who Amazon
is. It's a company basically run by engineers. It has a fast
development cycle, so within months you can point your friends to a
chunk of code that you built and deployed. There are always hard
problems to tackle.
[A2] I'd encourage most seniors with a CS degree to work in industry
for a year or two. You'll gain practical skills that complement the
theory you have learned; you'll be forced to learn lots of new things;
and you will learn good software design practices that effectively
coordinate team efforts.

[Q] What's the development environment?
[A] Everything runs on Linux. Most programming is done in C++ and
Perl.

[Q] What are the requirements?
[A] A degree. C or C++. Object-oriented design skills. Comfortable
with lists, hash tables, trees, ye olde standard algorithms, big-O
notation; can talk about graphs. Familiar with Unix paradigms,
distributed systems.

[Q] Do I get free books?
[A] I wish.

[Q] Where is Amazon?
[A] Lovely Seattle, WA.

[Q] Would I have to move to Seattle?
[A] Yup. Amazon would help with the move and finding housing.

[Q] Will I like Seattle?
[A] Goodness, yes. It's got natural beauty: there's an ocean, islands,
lakes, and mountains. There's too much fun stuff to do: more bands and
arts than you can shake a stick at. It's cheaper than SF or NY or
Boston. There's great food (amazing sushi!). It is easy to get around;
I bike everywhere. It does get rainy, but it doesn't rain hard. And
coffee, lots and lots of coffee.

Interested? Even if you don't have a resume yet, drop us a line:

Chuck Groom: cgroom@amazon.com, 206-266-3611
Jordan Hay: jhay@amazon.com
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