Yeah I feel like this is sour grapes from midwits that aren't as good at programming as they think they are. Sometimes you get a dick interviewer that asks you a trick question, but most interviewers don't care if you get a problem exactly right, they just want to hear you discuss a problem intelligently and show expertise while coding.
I agree, it's sour grapes. These companies grew to be the most powerful in the world, even electing presidents, through these interview processes. The midwit memes can be summarized:
(low IQ) acting on simple instinct vs. (mid IQ) paralyzed by complex rationale vs. (high IQ) acting on simple instinct
The high IQ guys who just do the work to grind LC show enormous signal for being effective software engineers.
Leetcode seems like the epitome of the midwit meme to me. "I'd just use a library" vs "I'll write a custom optimized solution" vs "I'd just use a library".
