Senior Full-Stack Web Engineer
Role
We’re building Mosaic, a web app that helps people and automation work together to think through difficult questions.
We hope that the research we do with Mosaic will inform how to apply artificial intelligence to supporting and automating deliberation in a scalable fashion, so that AI becomes increasingly helpful given better algorithms and more compute.
As our senior web engineer, you take responsibility for Mosaic, from UI/UX to creating an elegant backend architecture. You interview users to learn how to make the app better for them, work with our research engineer to implement backend architectures that are a good fit for automation, and hear from our experimenter about features we need in the app to move forward with our experiments and research. Mostly, you write lots of clean code with good abstractions.
Your work will be the backbone of our research, so you will be listed as a co-author on any publications based on Mosaic. All of your work will be open source.
About you
Requirements:
- You have practical experience writing clean, maintainable code and devising intuitive architectures
- You have built complex web apps, and have expertise in Javascript, HTML, and CSS
- You know how to use Git and how to do code reviews
- You communicate clearly about engineering topics
- You’re excited to join a new research organization which currently has just a few employees, and to play a key role in its development
- You’re motivated by the long-term impacts of AI, and believe that Ought’s research program is promising from that angle
- People enjoy working with you
- Fluent written and spoken English
Good to have:
- Experience with modern web technologies such as React, Typescript, and GraphQL
- Strong UI/UX design skills
- Experience with functional programming, compilers, interpreters, or “unusual” computing paradigms
- Experience in machine learning, artificial intelligence, or data analysis
- Experience with HCI, crowdsourcing, or experimental psychology
- Experience managing projects
- Interest in and experience with mentoring fellow engineers
- Experience thinking about organizational strategy, and interest in helping Ought think about strategy
- Interest in stepping outside of your job description to help Ought improve as an organization
You may be a particularly good fit for this role if you know and love at least a couple of the following things:
- Programmable software, e.g. Emacs, Vim
- Functional programming, immutable data structures
- Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs
- Software based on firm theoretical foundations, e.g. Dixi
- Haskell, Julia, Lisp, Scheme, Prolog, OCaml
- Programs that reason about programs, as in static and dynamic program analysis
- Interpreters and compilers
- Probabilistic programming languages, e.g. Church, WebPPL, Pyro
- Formalization of mathematics and physics, e.g. Structure and Interpretation of Classical Mechanics
- Automated theorem proving, e.g. Coq, Lean
- Symbolic AI, e.g. Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming
- Recreational programming language implementations, e.g. Mal, Norvig's Lispy, Matt Might's Scheme
- Computing stacks from scratch, e.g. Bitwise
- Unusual computing paradigms, e.g. Propagator Networks, Natively Probabilistic Computation
Benefits
- Health, dental, vision, and life insurance
- 20 days of paid vacation per year (in addition to national holidays)
- Modern workspaces, with funds available for equipment of your choice
- Relocation assistance
- Flexible hours
Considerations
- Take into account that we're a new organization. You will have unusually large leverage and room for growth, including the potential to manage other employees and contractors in the future, but you'll also need more initiative than at an established company and you'll wear many hats.
- We strongly prefer applicants who can work on site, but will consider remote work for exceptional candidates, including internationally.
- We're a mission-driven non-profit. The position is best suited for someone who deeply cares about our mission.
- Salaries are competitive. We generally pay Bay Area market rate based on comparable positions at other organizations, including for-profit companies.
- Not sure which position to apply for? Just pick one for now, add a note on alternatives you're considering, and we'll discuss.
EEO & Employment Eligibility
Ought is an equal opportunity employer. All applicants will be considered for employment without attention to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, veteran status, disability status, or any other status protected by federal, state, or local laws.
About Ought
Ought is a non-profit research organization. Our mission is to leverage machine learning to help people think. Our office is in San Francisco (North Beach), next to Washington Square park.