I would think if your "other knowledge", what you know aside from programming, is important there's "fellow" kinds of positions. Somebody has to grok the techn

I would think if your "other knowledge", what you know aside from programming, is important there's "fellow" kinds of positions. Somebody has to grok the technical underpinnings in a niche market - how to do finite-element analysis, fluid dynamics, chemical modeling, stereotactic image processing, ... None of these are what you read about on HN, really, but they exist and the companies in these segments make their bucks. Small, flat companies don't have hierarchies to promote. Small private companies don't have a stock market to satisfy, merely customers.