> I'm always taken aback by this fascination and heroification with John Carmack (or similar figures) on HN. I love Doom and Quake too, but that doesn't qualify him any more than any other random senior engineer to work on something totally different.
According to Sriram Krishnan, John Carmack was at Facebook's highest engineering level and achieved the top possible rating of "redefines expectations" for his level three years in a row. They had to create a new tier for him. Nobody else has ever reached that level. He replaced a "hundred person team" and maybe was better than that team.
I have no inside insight to the matter, but this seems like something beyond a "random senior engineer".
According to Sriram Krishnan, John Carmack was at Facebook's highest engineering level and achieved the top possible rating of "redefines expectations" for his level three years in a row. They had to create a new tier for him. Nobody else has ever reached that level. He replaced a "hundred person team" and maybe was better than that team.
I have no inside insight to the matter, but this seems like something beyond a "random senior engineer".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXbSOiqnQxQ&t=711s