Ask HN: How to break into finance without prior exp. or a prestigious degree?

I have 6+ years of experience as a data scientist and ML engineer. I'm interested in the software engineering or quantitative developer roles in hedge funds, trading firms and investment banks but it seems like they require previous finance experience or a degree from a top university, often both. I'm getting a 0% callback rate from cold applications.

Any tips for getting interviews? Is it even realistic to target these roles?

I did it by writing articles on Medium that attracted the attention of those in the capital market space. After a year or two of this, fund managers would email me - "I read your article..." However, these were small funds.