Finding a job is almost just as difficult as hiring, even if the person is credentialed and the company has many open positions. If you don't know exactly what you are looking for or what you may be good at, theres a good chance you might spin your wheels.

This is pretty common in the tech industry as I've come to realize. The issue is that many people can be good at programming, and hell, they might even have open source projects or even shipped applications to show for it. But put them in a software engineering interview where they have to walk through a basic dynamic programming or data structures problem and they will probably stumble. This situation is even more likely for interdisciplinary individuals where they don't have typical degrees for their field of interest.

So, point being, it takes a while to find a good fit. One where your skills expectations are agreeable for both sides. I don't see advertising on HN an issue, since we are the target market for this type of situation, but so long as it doesn't become a job board.

As someone else who's looking at SV from the outside and in a somewhat-similar situation, I can tell you that the temptation to turn to HN is strong. I've asked for (and received!) advice here in the past and I'm very grateful for it.

I don't have the OP's history, my own isn't nearly as impressive, but I can certainly relate. I'm sure he could find a job in Iowa, just as I've had no trouble finding jobs in my current location, but the draw of Silicon Valley is high though from the outside can appear more difficult to enter than perhaps is the case.

Better here where like-minded folks hang out (at least, they will have HN News in common), than some random recruiter who have no inkling what either party is looking for

I don't think it's difficult to get overlooked. Not everyone has built up solid connections in the industry that can vouch for them. If no one can vouch for you and you don't have an eye-catching resume (ie recognizable school or company), you end up competing against the other unknowns. At that point, it becomes more difficult for the employer to recognize a good potential candidate from a bad one.

Especially if you want to work on premise. I can understand if you want to get a remote job; that's really hard. Not freelance, but really a fulltime remote job with all benefits without coming into the office more than twice / year or something. No matter how brilliant you are. I think that's a big miss for employers; because they want to have the sense of 'control', they want all people present. Sure in some cases it helps to have the team sitting in one place, but in my experience remote employees are far more productive (as they have something to prove) and work harder than on-premise.

Sorry; offtopic, just a pet-peeve with 'modern employers' :)

What's a better place to look for a job than Hacker News?