If unsolicited apps are 1/10th as effective as solicited ones (generous!) then you only have to research 4 companies to outdo 30 shots in the dark.
You can find e.g. the name of the CTO of Fog Creek. It's FizzBuzz-level difficulty or less.
You can find e.g. any published work of Thomas Ptacek to bond over. You didn't have to run into him at Black Hat, or even know that he has spoken at Black Hat, to find a video of him speaking at Black Hat.
You may not know who is in charge of Fraud at Square. You know who probably knows? Well, to a first approximation, any engineer there should (or be able to find it out trivially). Can you find any engineer at Square?
We have the good fortune to be in an industry where people are hyper-connected, publicly identified, and Internet routable. Use these facts to your advantage when looking for a job.
I don't think we're talking about unsolicited vs. solicited applications. Surely a candidates odds are substantially better when the company initiates contact.
I'm talking about official vs. unofficial channels: does it makes sense to have an official (job site / resumes) channel that pretty much funnels into the trash, along side an unofficial one (where the real hiring happens) that rewards insider connections, friends of friends, cyber-stalking, cold-calling, and/or exhaustive research into companies? Is that the best we can do?
Also not arguing that the unofficial channel is ineffective. Clearly that's where all the hiring is going on, but is this the way it _should_ be?
It sounds like you guys are talking past each other. Patrick is telling you the reality of the situation. You're telling Patrick that the situation he describes is silly and unfair.
That's certainly true, but it's definitely not helpful to point it out then continue doing what you're doing.
The correct thing to do when faced with a series of silly steps that are 10-100X more effective than the "fair" way that an engineer would design is to learn how to follow those silly steps and follow them.
This pattern hangs engineers up quite often in life. See also salary negotiation, promotions, dating, etc. etc. It's worth taking a step back, looking at how the real world operates, then finding a way to make yourself operate in that real world.
You can find e.g. the name of the CTO of Fog Creek. It's FizzBuzz-level difficulty or less.
You can find e.g. any published work of Thomas Ptacek to bond over. You didn't have to run into him at Black Hat, or even know that he has spoken at Black Hat, to find a video of him speaking at Black Hat.
You may not know who is in charge of Fraud at Square. You know who probably knows? Well, to a first approximation, any engineer there should (or be able to find it out trivially). Can you find any engineer at Square?
We have the good fortune to be in an industry where people are hyper-connected, publicly identified, and Internet routable. Use these facts to your advantage when looking for a job.