I am annoyed at how much the hacker/startup scene sucks here in India. All the cool people and projects are in the USA and the people who don't emigrate end up working on the outsourced Java/RoR enterprise program from hell simply because there aren't any technically interesting jobs. Beng teh greta outsourcing destination for crap legacy code creates an ecosystem of substandard "programmers" who all get certified in J2Ee (or whatever the latest crap is) and then move on to become "managers" asap.

I've found my niche in Machine Learning, and have escaped this fate somewhat, but damn, it is a small and lonely niche. It would be great to go out and have a beer with engineers working on technically challenging projects, like you can in San Fransisco. (I'd love to hang out with the Data Drinking group for e.g.). The amount of talent wasted on legacy enterpriseware maintenance is unimaginable.

I've lived in the USA and I love the place, but I don't want to choose between doing good work and living "at home".

Meanwhile, HN keeps me sane. I don't have great engineers to talk to and learn from in the Real World, but online is a different matter.