I'm a software developer. By far the best interview I've had in the past few years was with a very small startup in NYC with some cool tech. We had a fairly extensive and relatively detailed tech interview over the phone that included mostly general questions like explaining how DNS lookups work. They then gave me a fun, throw-away programming project to do offline in a day or so that utilized their preferred stack, and they PAID ME with for it with a $150 Amazon gift card. I can't tell you how many bonus points they earned with me, both for the enjoyable, puzzle-free interview and for signalling that they understood that my time had value. I was ultimately told that they had "changed direction" and weren't going to hire at all, and I have no reason not to believe them. I don't feel like my investment in time with them was wasted or that I was insulted/abused in any way, quite the opposite and that was refreshing.