This is horrifying to read. So much bias...
When I put together a resume, I figure I have about 3 seconds to get them to decide to continue reading the resume. So I do my best to put in whatever it takes to accomplish that (within the bounds of truth).
No one reads a resume straight through; they skim for the highlights they want to see.
The more skimming passes you get them to make over your resume because you've kept their interest up, the more likely the interview.
And if you're thinking that a resume is a poor format for getting this job done, you're right. :)
You also state that you want to see "passion" for the technology they have used. I don't really know how to put that in a resume. I have a lot of passion for most of the tech I use- I think that would show within minutes during a conversation or interview. But I'm not confidant my resume really communicates it. Putting "I Love Python!!!" in my resume seems a bit over the top...
Passion for tech - you are right that this is hard to boil down to a formula. I'm looking for people who exhibit signals like (for example) they read HN, have interests in learning languages beyond the ones they're comfortable in, have maybe messed around a little with hardware, were in technology clubs in high school or college, learned programming as a kid, have a hobby project, etc. It's not so much about the hours that people will put in, but rather their engagement / pride-in-work / creativity / ability to propose alternate-solutions, all of which are good things to have, and are easy to qualify for with "enjoys technology."
I suppose I should consider a way to indicate the I read Hacker News on my resume :) Thanks for responding, I may be able to improve my resume some by considering how to show more of those things. Right now, I focus a lot on Python in my resume, because that is my primary language of expertise and what I use every day. But I am very interested in Rust and various functional languages in general too.
CRUD stands for Create, Read, Update, Delete. Isn't every UI, at some level, a CRUD UI? A wiki is a CRUD UI. A recipe tracker is a CRUD UI. A custom CMS for a community organization is a CRUD UI. A custom web forum is a CRUD UI. Facebook is a CRUD UI.
Someone could reimplement Mediawiki, and you'd reject them because "it's just a CRUD UI?"
Frankly, I like that not everyone is conforming to the exact same hiring metrics. As somebody who's built dozens of personal projects (a few of which I've been able to monetize), this would have been precisely the kind of hiring manager that a younger version of me would have liked to see.
Look like his rationale is if you can't speak high level and you can't resist over-engineering solutions; it isn't going to work out. That saves everyone time and sounds reasonable to me.