The initial communication was promising, with a straightforward and cooperative response from one of the founders. This was followed by a 5-7 minute screening call with general questions and answers with the a person from the operations team. It was quite a red flag for me, that when he asked about my salary expectations, he indicated that they would start negotiating after I shared my desired salary. Now, they didn't know yet what I could bring to the organization, how much I would ask for that, but they already signaled, that they want to pay less. I was confused weighing the discrepancy between the initial LinkedIn communication and the second call. Fast forward, nearly two weeks later, I received a trial task. I appreciated that they provided actual data, allowing for meaningful work. The task was to create a strategy based on this data. I replied that a comprehensive strategy would require significant time and asked if there was compensation, such as a coupon that I can give away for a friend or so, or if a less in-depth analysis would be sufficient. The answer was both saddening and some sort of shocking for me: "We are interested in your way of thinking in the test task! It's enough to put in as much as you find worthwhile at this point. We cannot provide extra coupons, but you can safely tell your student friends that they will find the highest possible discounts on Diverzum, as we always go to the wall and beyond :)" In other words, the message was clear: the most important is to not pay my time, while they were even expecting me to promote the company. Despite this, I spent 1.5 hours on the task to see whether there is some way of cooperation that could benefit both of us. After submitting it, I received a prompt feedback that they would get back to me soon. However, nearly three weeks later, I still had no response. I then sent a follow-up letter offering an alternative way of cooperation. A month later of the follow-up, and almost two months later of submitting the task, I still had no response. I had been completely ghosted.