Vantaggi
Everyone is hyper-focused on the product -- we often talk about work at lunch and brainstorm ideas. I love my friendly, very competent coworkers, and everyone is pulling their own weight. They encourage a "fail early" concept where they try different approaches, even risky, cheap ones, early in product development to find out what they can get away with. It's great knowing it's okay to fail as long as it gets you where you need to be. I expected to work on Saturdays, but it turns out hardly anyone works Saturdays at this location (Redmond). Frankly, I also enjoy the challenge of the ridiculously short timelines because it forces us to pick the best option right away and run with it, rather than scoping out a whole bunch of different options. The priorities are never fuzzy! I actually still get bummed every time Friday comes around! Also, every time I learn about another technology here my mind is just blown. It's so amazing. I also love that the traffic is so light here, and it's very quiet.
Svantaggi
The base pay here does not scale with the cost of housing. While you do get granted a big chunk of private stock, you don't actually vest it until 9-15 months after you start, and then you'd need to hold it another year to qualify for capital gains taxes. Basically, after 15 years of PhD level work and careful money management before I came here, I found the houses in this area are double the price of the one I sold and I still cannot afford a house nearby.