I been contacted by a recruiter a day or so after submitting my application and we scheduled for a phone interview for a couple days later. In the meantime, I studied up like crazy on the company, practiced mock interviews, etc. I also moved some one of my own meetings out of the way, since the interview had already been pushed back once by the recruiter. About an hour prior to the interview starting, I received an e-mail stating that they were cancelling the interview and that I was not going to be considered for the position any further because the hiring manager had identified their top two candidates. I'm a realist and I know that a job offer is not a guarantee when you're so early on in the process. However, I've never experienced an interview process like that before and was, to put it mildly, justifiably upset at not having even had the chance to interview after all the prep work I had put in.