A is something HackerSchool can answer, given that they are paid by startups to recruit (https://www.hackerschool.com/faq https://www.hackerschool.com/faq). In

A is something HackerSchool can answer, given that they are paid by startups to recruit (https://www.hackerschool.com/faq https://www.hackerschool.com/faq). In addition, the participants range greatly in experience, so you can a lot more datapoints there. B. There are different types of 'becoming powerful'. Given that you are self-taught, you may want to identify and fill some holes in your knowledge. Maybe you could go through SICP, Algorithms, learn about functional programming in scala, etc. I would personally try to find something really challenging to learn on your own that I've really wanted to learn for a long time. On your website, you mention doing predictions with twitter. Maybe you could go deeper into AI / machine learning. I'm currently going through Algorithms, and it's been a really frustrating / rewarding / mind bending time, and it's definitely shown in my code. Powerful in the sense of creating new and innovating things seems to come more from ideology / beliefs than from using a specific programming language or framework. You might want to read more into Bret Victor and Richard Reynman if you haven't already. Bret Victor's Inventing on Principle comes to mind: http://vimeo.com/36579366 http://vimeo.com/36579366 Richard Feynman's approach to research problems is also really enlightening. Have 10-20 hard problems floating in your head, and as you go about your day, reading, looking, exploring, match everything against those problems to see if you can make any progress on them.