Half the time there is no client... They are just luring you in, and once they have your resume, it gets spammed out to as many employers as the have in their address book. Your resume gets used as "bait" in order for them to find new clients.

Even at DeveloperAuction we get clueless recruiters pitching us Java Engineers in NYC (We're rails in SF) and sending us "blinded" resumes with personally identifiable contact details removed. It's craziness!

That's my biggest concern. The other is, often I find their claims to be mis-repesented. "We have a large media client downtown" really meant "a company of 20 people, and 3 developers". If they had told me the name, I would have seen right through the BS.

The way to get this information is to signal interest. What they're trying to prevent is you just getting the name of the company and then you going around them and applying directly. Honestly, the name of the company doesn't matter while you're in the pre-screening stage. Ask questions like, "what is the environment like? Is it a large company? Who will I be reporting to? Is it just dev or are there other roles I'll need to fill?" Eventually you'll satisfy their prescreening and they'll open up.

They don't want you to just say, "Oh, Company X is hiring, I'll decline this, and send my resume directly."

Then they should provide value.

Well, the value is that they know there is an open position, and you don't. What they really need is a better way to monetize it. Of course, this falls flat in the case of a company contracting to a recruiting agency to find someone. I'm not sure if you would be able to short-circuit the recruiting agency for the position in that case (though it just might depend on the contract between the agency and the hiring company).

I agree with the GP post. What they need is better value. If all they have is that they know about it and you don't, why are they being paid such a large rate? If that's all they do, they should be paid slightly more than a job posting rate, because they are acting only slightly more useful than a job posting.

OTOH, we've seen posts before from a company trying to be the equivalent of an agent for developers. Negotiating better salary and finding jobs the developer is going to enjoy more is indeed a service that is worth the expense for the developer; the company is also more likely to get a long-term, quality (viz. someone at least interested in the company's vision) hire. The problem is that this kind of recruitment requires effort, real communication, and thoughtfulness, instead of email-blasting as many addresses as you can find.