[dutchrapley]

I would emerge myself into the world of data science and big data. It's the new frontier and is where the web was 15 years ago.

The trend I've seen with web development is that it's mostly a primary skill. While data science will be a primary skill for many, it has the capability to be a much sought after secondary skill in other industries like finance, health, and actuarial science.

[mrfusion]

I don't see that much demand for it. For example if you look on the HN seeking freelancer thread, most people are still looking for RoR or PHP. I don't see much of "please analyze my data and help me make decisions".

Where are you seeing all the demand?

[DLarsen]

I wouldn't expect to see much on the freelancer thread.

Working in advertising tech, we'd be looking for someone to join the team on a permanent basis. Even with data science fundamentals, you have to marry that with a thorough understanding of the industry to develop that productive intuition about how to help folks solve their data problems.

[petercooper]

I don't see that much demand for it. For example if you look on the HN seeking freelancer thread, most people are still looking for RoR or PHP.

True, but HN is not particularly representative of computer science or software engineering related fields (well, it is, but only a small percentage). There's a lot of stuff going on out there both in industry and academia that doesn't make it here or get particularly represented in the jobs/freelancer threads.

[mrfusion]

And random side-rant, why are so many people looking for AngularJS developers when I see almost 0 single page application type websites in my day to day life? What are all of these companies using it for?

[cpfohl]

I've written dozens of sizable single page apps that you'll never see because they're behind a firewall that only my company and its clients can access. Not sure about everyone else.

[dm2]

Large companies and governments are obsessed with big data and data analysis.

You need a degree or relevant past work to land those jobs though.

There are also companies that you would work for that would provide these services rather than being hired or contracted by the company directly. (like SAS)

[endersshadow]

I mean, it pays my bills. But they're mostly large corporations that hire consultancies that specialize in this sort of thing, rather than hiring freelancers--much less posting about it online.