This blog was adorable. I have some minor constructive criticisms. Going on hikes or eating with coworkers isn’t “surreal” and cheapens the writing. I noticed a few frequent typos that a spellchecker would have caught. Your criticisms and defenses of Goldman Sachs feel inauthentic because you haven’t experienced much outside of Goldman Sachs. The same inauthentic feel goes for the portion about open source. That didn’t sound like you, it sounded like something you heard e.g. “open source is good, closed source is bad”
Consider not bringing up “drama” if you don’t want to share it with the readers. That may have been one of the most interesting leads and it didn’t go anywhere. That sounded like you, while the rest sounded mostly political.
Thanks for the constructive criticism! When I said surreal I didn't mean the hikes, I meant the way they took me into their inner circle and treated me like just another team member as opposed to just a temporary intern. I'll have to run a spell checker, no real excuse for that. I can only draw from my own experience when writing the blog, so I just wrote about how I felt while going through it. As "inauthentic" as that might sound. Also Goldman wasn't my first paid SWE job, I've had previous jobs where I've had to write production software and my thoughts on Open Source are my own, through my own experiences. I'm not simply regurgitating a position.
I have to agree with the 'adorable' comment, me being someone in his 50s and wishing I could have had the same experience. While I, too, thought that the blog started a bit uneven, it was cool that you then focused on the technical side and finished on the successful project conclusion and the human connections made.
Whether the friendships end up lasting forever or not, what I can tell you is that you'll never forget how you felt on that 7am zoom call or when you got the invite to return later. That excitement is palpable to me as a reader, in the same way that it will be to you as you advance in your career and look back.
I read "surreal" as "it was surreal how whole-heartedly they welcomed us" as opposed to "hiking with your coworkers is a totally surreal, bizarre experience." The surrounding context doesn't support your interpretation at all: the blog post is about how well he was treated, not how strange the experience was.
That didn’t sound like you, it sounded like something you heard e.g.
“open source is good, closed source is bad”
Wow, what? Accusing him of parroting others' opinions is just weird and again, maybe you're right (I can't read the author's mind) but there's nothing else in the post to support this.
Your criticisms and defenses of Goldman Sachs feel inauthentic
because you haven’t experienced much outside of Goldman Sachs.
How many years should somebody spend in the industry before it's okay for them to share their thoughts? 5? 10? 20?
It would be an entirely different story if the author was misrepresenting himself, but considering the post is entire
Consider not bringing up “drama” if you don’t want to share it
with the readers.
I think his brief mention of this and the other minor downsides is precisely what helped this article feel so authentic. It gave me what felt like a balanced picture of life at Goldman Sachs. Leaving out the actual content of the "drama" is 100% appropriate, for a variety of reasons.
Consider not bringing up “drama” if you don’t want to share it with the readers. That may have been one of the most interesting leads and it didn’t go anywhere. That sounded like you, while the rest sounded mostly political.