Your Search Patterns Could Land You A Job Interview At Google

It's no secret that Google's search engine is littered with Easter eggs, but the latest discovery has to be the coolest. When Max Rosett wanted to refine his programming skills, he did what most people would: he hit up Google. The responses to his searches weren't quite so typical, though. When issuing queries like "python lambda function list comprehension" and "mutex lock", the search results page folded downward to reveal a question: "You're speaking our language. Up for a challenge?"

Google's no stranger to creating neat little games, but this is different. This is serious. What Max didn't realize at the time was that this game is in effect a job application, and a challenging one, at that. After clicking "I want to play", the user is brought to a Unix-style command prompt that starts off with a simple file you must read to see what to do. Simply typing in "request" will get things underway.

After issuing a request, a challenge will be delivered, with multiple challenges needing to be completed per "level". Once the fifth level is cleared, the user is greeted to a pop-up that lets them enter their name and some other personal information.

After Max submitted his, it didn't take long for his life to change. He was contacted by a recruiter mere days later, and after spending a day in Mountain View, he landed the job. This, all stemming from some "simple" Google queries.

As of the time of writing, neither of the queries that worked for Max have worked for me, so it could be that Google issues this to very specific queries at specific times. Either way, if you're on Google searching up some programming help and happen to get this message, you might just not want to ignore it.