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Software Engineer, Communities

Tin Can · Seattle · On-site

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About Tin Can

The super-magical Wi-Fi landline for kids. No screens, no texting, no strangers — just real conversation with Grandma, besties, and contacts you approve. Plug in, twirl that cord, and time-travel to pure voice fun. Backed by Greylock.

About the role

A Tin Can is only as good as the list of people a kid can call. When a whole class or block gets Tin Cans together, the phone arrives with friends already on it. That’s Communities: hundreds of schools, neighborhoods, and groups have already bought Tin Cans together, and it’s one of the fastest-growing parts of the company. We’re looking for a Software Engineer to own the product side of it end to end.

What they're looking for

  • 4+ years building and running web services, with real ownership of what you shipped
  • Strong TypeScript across the stack — you’ve built and run an API in production (ours run on AWS Lambda with Postgres) and can ship a Next.js front end a PTA volunteer can use
  • You can design a relational model for membership, permissions, and audit history, and you think about who leaves before who joins
  • You treat authorization as a product feature, not a checkbox — who can reach a child, how fast “no” takes effect, and how you’d prove it
  • Fluency using AI as a multiplier across prototyping, build, and analysis, this is how we work, not a nice-to-have
  • A reliability mindset — you instrument what you ship, and you’d rather catch a broken directory with an alert than an email from a PTA president
More about this role

Tin Can is building a safer, simpler way for kids to connect — without smartphones. We’re creating screen-free, delightful devices and services that let families call the people who matter most, free from the noise of today’s digital world.

We’re building a bold, authentic, nostalgic, and kinda quirky brand that resonates with folks who want something simpler & better for their kids than the tech-infused lives we’re currently living (and who have a sense of humor about it).

A Tin Can is only as good as the list of people a kid can call. When a whole class or block gets Tin Cans together, the phone arrives with friends already on it. That’s Communities: hundreds of schools, neighborhoods, and groups have already bought Tin Cans together, and it’s one of the fastest-growing parts of the company. We’re looking for a Software Engineer to own the product side of it end to end.

Today a community directory is set up by hand: an organizer collects families in a form, our team turns it into a roster, and every kid in it can call every other kid. You’ll make that something organizers and parents do themselves, down to the rule in our call-routing service that decides whether a community...

Read the full posting on Tin Can's site ↗

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