I didn't finish the problem in my interview, and got hired. I asked the PM later why, and he said "we wanted to see you try to solve a problem we know you couldn't, so we could see your problem-solving process and how you handle stress."

The author of the article comes off as defensive and blame-shifting. I'm not surprised he didn't get hired. Since when is it ok to say "why?" when someone asked you to perform something in an interview? Do you really think the multi million dollar news agency will need you to program a maze at some point, so they're testing your ability to? Just how dumb do these engineers think recruiters are?