I applied in-person. I interviewed at BuzzFeed (East Los Angeles, CA) in June 2017
Interview
The hiring and interview process was very smooth. I was waiting for response from couple of companies during the same time and buzzfeed was very accommodating. I had two rounds initially that were technical phone screen - two with engineers from NY. It was standard screen share interview and one of them was more of overview of buzzfeed tech stack.
On site was in Downtown LA office and it had a great vibe. I had a chance to get a tour of Tasty studio, their office and everything around. They have a sponsored parking lot where you can park and take a quick shuttle. It was not that bad. I live in West LA so driving took roughly more than an hour.
The questions were pretty standard -
one interview - technical questions, algorithms and coding
second interview - design analysis and coding
third interview - product overview
fourth interview - tech questions and explanation of how buzzfeed techstack and future is
fifth interview - talk with VP/CTO of buzzfeed. He was super nice guy and gave me a tour of tasty studio.
Overall I really like the vibe, the tech stack and people there. They have a smaller tech team compared to NY and that is one of the reason they are working to build it out. The preparation is standard like any other tech company. I really love buzzfeed videos and I make videos for my food blog too so I read a little bit about the company before going to the interview.
I had decline the offer due to a non-compete with my existing content and also my current company countered the offer. I would definitely recommend this company it has a lot of chances to grow.
Got a referral and the process was very fast. Had an initial conversation conversation with the recruiter and then took an onsite interview (maybe the wanted to fill this position quickly). 3 hour interview, 2 hours for talking about previous experience and the role at Buzzfeed then 1 hour for two exercises: whiteboard coding and systems design. Did't get an offer, my guess is that my interviewer perceived that I wasn't too excited about the specific role, which was true. The were very professional all the time.