Thanks for the great explanation of the evolution of telecom technologies.

However, I found the business case lacks substance. The author claims that an offline retail giant will have a higher chance of success when they try to go online because they own a telecom arm. There is no reasoning or justification provided.

This makes me thankful for Amazon's document-writing culture. Ambiguous words like very/could/should/few/large are avoided or at least qualified with a range. This helps us avoid ambiguity, regardless of the amount of context a reader has.

If you're living in Canada, you're spending money in CAD. I don't think its fair to convert Canadian salaries to USD to make the comparison. Still, $160K CAD is considerably less than $200K USD.

If you are living in Canada, everything retail is more expensive anyways, so just converting to USD isn't very accurate.

I was asked pretty much the same questions for an SRE position at Google. Note that I only found the recruiter phone screen to be this kind of 'pop quiz'. The engineering interviews were more detailed discussions with engineers.

About 8 years ago I had the same questions.

Mine was 2 months ago. I'm surprised how stale these questions are.

Have you considered an online Master's degree in machine learning from Georgia Tech? Its offered through Udacity so its cheaper and more flexible, but you also get a full degree from Georgia Tech.

Full disclosure- I'm currently in that program and loving it.

Is it possible to do a Master's from GA Tech without a BS/BA from a STEM major? I have a BA, but it's in the humanities, although I'm currently employed as a software engineer.

Yes, I think it should be fine considering you have some work experience.

Once you're accepted though, you'll have to complete two foundational courses within a year (with a grade of at least B) in order to continue to be eligible. This applies to all new students.

From my own experience, some of the courses are pretty easy, so getting a B or higher isn't difficult.

I've done both the nanodegree and am nearly done with OMSCS. the nanodegree is pretty value less in general.

It's not that rigid or difficult and carries no real weight.

I keep getting marketing emails from Udacity about their nanodegrees. Some of them sound pretty attractive (like the ones related to self-driving cars) and I've been tempted to take them. Glad to hear an actual review from someone :)

They're very light. Since they don't carry any weight you'd at least hope to learn something.

You'll get as much if not more from the free machine learning Georgia tech course with Tom Mitchell's book than the nanodegree.

As a follow up, I took Thruns robotic driving course and it suffers from being a purely software course. There are optional hardware projects but no imparted hardware instruction.

So I'd be especially leery of an automated driving nanodegree degree online.

How many hours per week is the program and how long does it take? how far are you into it?

I only take 1-2 courses each semester. Which means it'll take me a total of 3 years to graduate. Right now I'm about a year in, with 3 courses under my belt. One of the courses I took was time-consuming and difficult- maybe 15-20 hours a week. The other two however have been relatively easy, where I've spent less than 10 hours a week on each.

Adding to this, there's an informal course review site that gives you pretty good reviews from other students. It should give you some more context: https://omscentral.com/reviews

What was your math background before beginning?

I have an undergrad degree in Computer Engineering, and have been working in the field for 3 years. So I took 1st year and 2nd year Math courses during my undergrad, but I haven't really used them since.

I hadn't thought of it that way, thanks for bringing it up. Yes, I'll have to ask to see how its viewed culturally.

Maybe you can add some details about what stage your company is at (seed vs Series A/B/C), instead of identifying your company?

In the past year, I've had 3 colleagues quit their jobs at a Vancouver startup to work remotely for a US company (to get paid in USD). Tech salaries in Vancouver are too low for the cost of living.

Its especially discouraging to see an employer with offices in Seattle and Vancouver offer their Canadian employees salaries that are >30% lower than their American counterparts. I won't be surprised if Canadians working remotely becomes commonplace.

I'd agree 100% on this. As a Canadian, looking at our future career prospects it is in our best interest to learn how to work well as remote employees.

I like that they're allowing customers to build custom applications using their SDK. Also, targeting industries seems like a much better way to build this kind of technology than building a mass market consumer product.

My girlfriend lives this philosophy of minimalism, and I try to follow it as well. She's had to move at least once a year every year for the past 8 years, and she brings her stuff down to two suitcases each time (with no storage anywhere else).

I'm not as regular at it as she is, but I go through 'stuff cleansings' about once a year. I probably have 4 suitcases/boxes, along with some stuff stored at my parents's place in India.

Living minimally is very freeing. It allows you have to a low maintenance lifestyle, while giving you a sense of security. On the other hand, getting into any hobby becomes a trade ofd between buying and maintaining the equipment, or paying absurd amounts to rent it.