haha, this was at Microsoft, and the dash button was a glowing success compared to the project I'm talking about

I'd better not dump any more details though, since it's technically still under NDA..

What I'd really like would be a good set of questions to ask as the job interviewee to help me filter out bad teams/orgs. I guess the ability to do that could be considered part of the skillset of a good VP of engineering, though, so maybe it's unreasonable to expect us grunts to pull it off..

Just ask why they like working there. Ask for specifics. Ask for things they don't like. Ask for specifics.

Best idea is not to go somewhere without having friends on the inside who you trust and can tell you what it's like.

was it a talking staple?

It sounded like that story was at Microsoft to me, but now that I know you thought it was Amazon, I can see that it’s ambiguous and could be read either way.

Ah you're probably right that it was at Microsoft. My brain must have forgotten the first line by the end of reading the comment, among all the other Amazon specific stories in this thread.