4 ms·

This has been there for a long long time. I remember Edward Snowden went to India to learn hacking. India also has an amazing open source culture. Was quite sh

This has been there for a long long time. I remember Edward Snowden went to India to learn hacking. India also has an amazing open source culture. Was quite shocked to see how high quality they were, since the ones you hire from the large outsourcing companies like Infosys etc are so so bad.

twsdop 3y ago
[flagged]
givemeethekeys 3y ago
The ones for hire at Infosys aren't necessarily untalented. They're very smart, but keeping your job often means fitting in, going with the flow, and doing what you're told.
- alephnerd 3y ago
  Also the very technically adept ones at Infosys are skilled enough to land other jobs within 2-3 years of joining. That said, Infosys and other WITCHes pay very low. My cousins who are farmers earn 2x what Infosys pays thanks to a mix of farm subsidies, government rural employment schemes (MGNREGA), and local government jobs. And this is a common story for a massive portion of India now. It's gotten very difficult for WITCH to pay Tier 1 salaries so they've expanded IT offices in Tier 3 Metros like Indore, Lucknow, Bhopal, etc because $4-8,000/yr goes much farther in those cities.
- jimsimmons 3y ago
  In my college Infosys was always seen as the option only slightly better than unemployment. Actually this was not even the popular view by the time I left.
  - kshacker 3y ago
    I will age myself and maybe out myself but while infosys may not have been a dream job during my college days (pre infosys IPO), it soon was. The company probably wasn't any different in skills but there weren't too many people in tech those days. Minuscule. And post IPO infosys laid the foundation well those days, sold the company well and was indeed a dream job at least for a little while. But that's ancient history now.
    - nsenifty 3y ago
      Indeed. Between roughly 1995-2000 it was the place to be. The hyper growth that followed post ~2002 brought in dilution in talent, benefits were cut (e.g. stock options were discontinued mid 2002) and the emergence of global companies opening India offices made it even less desirable. There's a meme about Infosys' 3L/annum salary. Funnily that was exactly my starting salary there (post confirmation) in 2002.
      - kshacker 3y ago
        Mine was 42K rupees :) annual. Since it is an old thread now hope no one is watching.
_8j50 3y ago
Some of the best actual hackers (not just pentesters and ctf winners) are in india. About the infosys stuff, it's cultural, as in infosys' culuture or rather the culture that comes about when you have misaligned incentives between a 3rd party outsourcer and a cheapskate western company. They don't get paid for quality. If you want to see talent there, look at the folks working for local companies, on their own or for multinationals. But you know, even in US companies that don't outsource I have seen that "infosys" culture of doing things low and slow and with maximum complexity and LoC and support cost, box checking "requirements",etc... Hire accenture or whoevee in the US and your experience would be similar.
- mr_mitm 3y ago
  > Some of the best actual hackers (not just pentesters and ctf winners) are in india. How do you know this?
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
indianhacks 3y ago
> I remember Edward Snowden went to India to learn hacking. Allegedly for 6 days and he also learned java programming apparently. Can someone get Snowden to confirm? I think this is some rumour based ad for a coaching institute.
- denton-scratch 3y ago
  > he also learned java programming apparently "Learn Java in Six Days". That sounds like "I lost 10Kg in two weeks". Sure, you can learn the basics of Java in six days, I suppose; but you certainly never needed to go to India to do it. I was thrown in the deep end with Java; from a standing start, I had to create production software in two months. I delivered, but the code I wrote was shit. And I had no training at all; there was no time. I learned using online resources. [Edit] In the 90s most spam and hacking seemed to come from relatively poor countries, like USSR, India, Africa and China. I assumed it was because with a PC, a modem and a phone connection, you could make a lot more than the average salary. Then outsourcing came along, Indian developers started eating my breakfast, and pay for UK developers nosedived.
  - carlmr 3y ago
    >Then outsourcing came along, Indian developers started eating my breakfast, and pay for UK developers nosedived. I don't know many companies that fared well with this. Pay nosedived everywhere and a few years later when the companies realized it isn't working it went up again.
contrarian1234 3y ago
Why are they seemingly underrepresented on Github? When I check out a library I often peek at who made it. My general demographic "feel" is - 40% some European or American - 40% some dude in Siberia, - 10% Chinese hacker in Shenzhen - 10% some cryptic Japanese hacker I'm always a bit surprised there are very very few South East Asians, Latin Americans, Koreans, Indians
- darnir 3y ago
  I don't know about the others, but there are indeed people like me in India developing and maintaining non-cool, not on Github, free software. If you're here on Hacker News, there's actually a pretty good chance you've run, directly or indirectly, code I've written without even registering it.
  - contrarian1234 3y ago
    What's the popular forge platform in India? I know in China they typically host on Gitee - but it's in part an artifact of the national firewall. Didn't know in India it's also silo'ed off
    - darnir 3y ago
      I wouldn't say its siloed off. Its often on popular forges like Github and Gitlab. But also on smaller ones like sourceforge, GNU Savannah, sourcehut, etc. My point being that a lot of the free software movement in India doesn't create the hot new Rust / Go app. Its more focused on smaller things or on using the existing tools
      - nequo 3y ago
        What are some examples of smaller things that are more relevant in India than in the US/Europe?
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- 3y ago
lern_too_spel 3y ago
> I remember Edward Snowden went to India to learn hacking. According to the owner of a podunk computer training school in New Delhi. If you believe this, I have a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn. https://archive.is/Aq6bU https://archive.is/Aq6bU

twsdop 3y ago

[flagged]

givemeethekeys 3y ago

The ones for hire at Infosys aren't necessarily untalented. They're very smart, but keeping your job often means fitting in, going with the flow, and doing what you're told.

alephnerd 3y ago
Also the very technically adept ones at Infosys are skilled enough to land other jobs within 2-3 years of joining. That said, Infosys and other WITCHes pay very low. My cousins who are farmers earn 2x what Infosys pays thanks to a mix of farm subsidies, government rural employment schemes (MGNREGA), and local government jobs. And this is a common story for a massive portion of India now. It's gotten very difficult for WITCH to pay Tier 1 salaries so they've expanded IT offices in Tier 3 Metros like Indore, Lucknow, Bhopal, etc because $4-8,000/yr goes much farther in those cities.
jimsimmons 3y ago
In my college Infosys was always seen as the option only slightly better than unemployment. Actually this was not even the popular view by the time I left.
- kshacker 3y ago
  I will age myself and maybe out myself but while infosys may not have been a dream job during my college days (pre infosys IPO), it soon was. The company probably wasn't any different in skills but there weren't too many people in tech those days. Minuscule. And post IPO infosys laid the foundation well those days, sold the company well and was indeed a dream job at least for a little while. But that's ancient history now.
  - nsenifty 3y ago
    Indeed. Between roughly 1995-2000 it was the place to be. The hyper growth that followed post ~2002 brought in dilution in talent, benefits were cut (e.g. stock options were discontinued mid 2002) and the emergence of global companies opening India offices made it even less desirable. There's a meme about Infosys' 3L/annum salary. Funnily that was exactly my starting salary there (post confirmation) in 2002.
    - kshacker 3y ago
      Mine was 42K rupees :) annual. Since it is an old thread now hope no one is watching.

_8j50 3y ago

Some of the best actual hackers (not just pentesters and ctf winners) are in india. About the infosys stuff, it's cultural, as in infosys' culuture or rather the culture that comes about when you have misaligned incentives between a 3rd party outsourcer and a cheapskate western company. They don't get paid for quality. If you want to see talent there, look at the folks working for local companies, on their own or for multinationals. But you know, even in US companies that don't outsource I have seen that "infosys" culture of doing things low and slow and with maximum complexity and LoC and support cost, box checking "requirements",etc... Hire accenture or whoevee in the US and your experience would be similar.

mr_mitm 3y ago
> Some of the best actual hackers (not just pentesters and ctf winners) are in india. How do you know this?

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

indianhacks 3y ago

> I remember Edward Snowden went to India to learn hacking. Allegedly for 6 days and he also learned java programming apparently. Can someone get Snowden to confirm? I think this is some rumour based ad for a coaching institute.

denton-scratch 3y ago
> he also learned java programming apparently "Learn Java in Six Days". That sounds like "I lost 10Kg in two weeks". Sure, you can learn the basics of Java in six days, I suppose; but you certainly never needed to go to India to do it. I was thrown in the deep end with Java; from a standing start, I had to create production software in two months. I delivered, but the code I wrote was shit. And I had no training at all; there was no time. I learned using online resources. [Edit] In the 90s most spam and hacking seemed to come from relatively poor countries, like USSR, India, Africa and China. I assumed it was because with a PC, a modem and a phone connection, you could make a lot more than the average salary. Then outsourcing came along, Indian developers started eating my breakfast, and pay for UK developers nosedived.
- carlmr 3y ago
  >Then outsourcing came along, Indian developers started eating my breakfast, and pay for UK developers nosedived. I don't know many companies that fared well with this. Pay nosedived everywhere and a few years later when the companies realized it isn't working it went up again.

contrarian1234 3y ago

Why are they seemingly underrepresented on Github? When I check out a library I often peek at who made it. My general demographic "feel" is - 40% some European or American - 40% some dude in Siberia, - 10% Chinese hacker in Shenzhen - 10% some cryptic Japanese hacker I'm always a bit surprised there are very very few South East Asians, Latin Americans, Koreans, Indians

darnir 3y ago
I don't know about the others, but there are indeed people like me in India developing and maintaining non-cool, not on Github, free software. If you're here on Hacker News, there's actually a pretty good chance you've run, directly or indirectly, code I've written without even registering it.
- contrarian1234 3y ago
  What's the popular forge platform in India? I know in China they typically host on Gitee - but it's in part an artifact of the national firewall. Didn't know in India it's also silo'ed off
  - darnir 3y ago
    I wouldn't say its siloed off. Its often on popular forges like Github and Gitlab. But also on smaller ones like sourceforge, GNU Savannah, sourcehut, etc. My point being that a lot of the free software movement in India doesn't create the hot new Rust / Go app. Its more focused on smaller things or on using the existing tools
    - nequo 3y ago
      What are some examples of smaller things that are more relevant in India than in the US/Europe?
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
3y ago

lern_too_spel 3y ago

> I remember Edward Snowden went to India to learn hacking. According to the owner of a podunk computer training school in New Delhi. If you believe this, I have a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn. https://archive.is/Aq6bU https://archive.is/Aq6bU