"Grimm says, 'I love code. I dream of code. I enjoy code. I find writing high quality code deeply satisfying. I feel the same way about helping others write code they can feel proud of."
How is that not passionate?
Anywho, I feel like everyone who is bashing on the desire for passion has just become so jaded in a Dilbert-world that it's just ripped that passion out of them.
Here's my stance though - I'm a huge fan of the passion criteria. It's not the only thing we're looking for but it's a major component. Why? Because we can always train technical skills. Personalities we can't really tweak too much. We need tinkerers, people who like solving problems, who can be geeks like the rest of us. This focus has created a really awesome culture here where innovation is more than some corporate buzzword for more money. We actually just want to make cool shit because we think it's cool. We're all compensated just fine for our efforts. What's awesome is being able to say "what if we..." and being able to find someone who can get as excited to work on this as you are. Now, this is a quality we all look for within our teams so it's not JUST some management demand - and maybe this is what the difference is?