But one thing I never did was put up arbitrary barriers.  Yet, "top companies" (sorry bro, your pre-seed startup might be a great idea, but it's not a top anything yet) want a show of meaningless effort as a proof of value. And job seekers will comply because we need employment to access capital, or more specifically, food, shelter, health care and social mobility. It's pretty bleak.

And then the Author weirdly dismisses startups that are looking for talents. Startups that have no reputation, no stability, focused projects, small teams and less money. But they have much less "arbitrary" barriers. Here you go, you have your solution right there in front of you, in your text. Working at a startup or any small company will give you "food, shelter, health care and social mobility". But that's not what you really want. You don't really know why your interested in that big company instead of smaller ones. That question wasn't arbitrary after all.

You can't have a cake and eat it too.

We were getting some 30-40 applications a day when we were at peak search, and when you get so many, after a few weeks, you start looking for anomalies, show me some glint of greatness, a spark of wit, evidence of original thought, something to show youre not just pasting slop or ticking boxes.

The candidate on the other side of this might say "but theres so many applications to do, I cant do that for every one" and maybe thats the crux, the candidate who puts in the extra effort to stand out will win, and thats the purpose of these questions.