There's also the danger of being ahead of the market (at least your local market): in '98, I wanted to take this great language (Java) I'd spent a year working

There's also the danger of being ahead of the market (at least your local market): in '98, I wanted to take this great language (Java) I'd spent a year working with but none of the companies in Ireland had adopted it yet. Now I'm itching to ditch Java for Rails which I've been using in my spare time. Now all the local companies only want Java :( Matching your skills to market isn't just about learning the latest tech. And, incidentally, most of these companies still discount any experience that isn't "commercial"