The talent wars in the tech industry are legendary.
Even though debate rages over whether the tech talent shortage is real or a myth in terms of raw numbers, tech companies know this: good programmers and good designers are definitely hard to find.
So they've gone to some pretty crazy lengths to find them.
A bicycle, an Iron Man 2 Deluxe Helmet and ... a cow
In 2011, New York company Amicus, which helps non-profits raise money, was looking to hire some programmers.
It offered a long list of perks, NextWeb reported: $2,000 in cash, a full-year supply of Counter Culture Coffee, a local gym membership, an iPad 2 (for prototyping), an Iron Man 2 Deluxe Helmet, an unlimited supply of your favorite beer, a fixed gear bicycle and a cow.
Yes, a cow.
The cow would be donated in the programmer's name to Heifer.org, which provides livestock to impoverished nations.
A paid-for vacation
It's trendy for companies these days to offer employees "unlimited vacation."
But Airbnb, a site that lets people rent out their spare rooms, goes it one step better. It pays for at least one vacation with an annual $2,000 travel stipend.
Bands, games and unlimited storage
File sharing site Dropbox is able to offer its employees a unique perk: All-you-can-eat storage in the cloud.
For many a geek, unlimited storage is a very big deal.
But wait, there's more. Dropbox also lures them with free breakfast, lunch and dinner daily, a complete music studio equipped with drums, P.A., amplifiers, and a lot of gaming.
It offers "Starcraft, dedicated game rooms, DDR (yep, a real machine)" in addition to the usual ping pong tournaments.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider