[penland]

I think you overestimate the quality of developer in the outside, "non-hacker-news" world. Labor is always the biggest outlay management worries about; if they don't have technical experience, there are tons of small to medium sized companies that will hire someone at 20$ or 30$ an hour with no degree to bang out bad GWT or jQuery.

In the enterprise ( or small enterprise ) world, when was the last time a web dev needed to write a bloom filter in Go?

[icatchcows]

You're probably right. I try to surround myself with other people who are passionate about what they do and are trying to become better developers.

Even if someone didn't have technical experience, banging out code at a small company could be the starting point, for someone who is driven, to develop their skills and attain that six figure position.