Well the evidence sure seems strong they could have done the same job with at least 13% fewer people. I wonder how many of the remaining are also absolutely essential for the service to operate and grow?

Music licensing, streaming and revenue sharing is hardly a “go to the moon in the 60s” complexity problem. And having a lot of end users doesn’t mean you need massive employee head counts in digital service delivery, it just means you have a lot of customers and need to build your digital delivery systems to handle a larger scale which is generally expressed as a modest pressure on engineering groups to build most scalable systems and not a rocket science level problem.

The high head counts are always present at the end of boom cycles, but a LOT of what companies are doing at the end of these cycles is simply busywork.

The busywork problem exists because managers equate business with productivity, and their organizations reflect that.

The perception is not just that a busy worker is engaged and making an effort, but even that their industriousness gives them a higher value than their less busy colleagues. But really only a relatively small number of employees do the vast majority of the work (Pareto principle). The whole corporate management theory sets up a dynamic in which two office workers completing identical tasks can be judged on their busyness, rather than their results. Who appears to be more engaged: the busy worker who skips lunch to get things finished, or the efficient worker who finishes early and uses the time saved to buy groceries online?

This, when applied at scale, leads to highly staffed organizations with a LOT of busy people who don’t really do that much compared to their potential for output.

If you don’t see the metaphor between a large engineering project and an engineering organization that seems over staffed, that’s fine. But do try to have the social grace to not call people dumb. There is just no call for insults here.

Why are you mixing up complexity of work with volume of work (and comparing incomparable industries at that)?

Spotify's work might not be getting people alive to the Moon with 1960s tech, but there is A LOT of it since they need to cover so much more.

Rest of your post is pretty much bloviating with assumptions you have no grounds for - not to mention your almost insulting minimization of work that's not TrueEngineeringWorkForMoon(tm).

I've worked in streaming industry and I can tell you that there is a stupid amount of work getting all the licenses and content in order across all the nations that Spotify is present it. You can call it "busywork", but it's no more busywork than jockeying JavaScript to make your CI happy. It's critical for company operations - Spotify lives and dies on amount of content they have, the speed they get new content and the ability to payout artists across the world for their content. Not to mention take money from people across the world.

It's outright hillarious how everyone here underestimates a problem like "we need to legally pay out money in Germany to Rammstein for a song", it's like watching HBO's Sillicon Valley in real life.

There’s nothing incorrect about pointing out that the modern workplace reinforces busywork over meaningful engineering and managerial headcount justification. The data supports it.

Implying that “Jockeying JavaScript” isn’t real enough engineering work is also a look.

Arguing that engineering projects of scale can’t be compared because one can’t tell the difference between volume and complexity is rough conversation.

The idea that engineering on large technical projects can’t be compared across industries or eras isn’t true in an objective sense either.

Not super happy I took the time to reply to you and got told I was to get called blovating. That’s unkind.

That while stating that “everyone on HN underestimates things” and doesn’t understand how hard problems like paying someone for streaming actually is exactly the kind of nonsensical thinking that is building these large headcount companies.

Your argument is that “global payments are harder than people realize.” But it’s simply not true. They are profoundly easier than they have ever been in history and people on hacker news are many of the very people creating those payment rails.

So I think calling their opinions “hilarious” while insulting the entire community and the person you’re talking to… it’s not… great. Calling it a “real life” Silicon Valley kinda is though, because well, it kind of literally is. This is the website of the most successful Silicon Valley incubator.

I come on here to learn and have positive interactions with people, grow intellectually and this isn’t quite what I am looking for. Thanks for your interaction though. Have a great day.