If one were to use Hacker News as their only source of information, it would seem that machine learning is a very overrated topic. There is something related to it on HN's front page almost every day. This proliferation of courses, resources, books and startups would hint that machine learning is becoming more and more accessible to the average programmer and that the market is on track to getting saturated quickly. Is this the current trend? If yes, is it limited to the US? What about the machine learning scene in Europe? Maybe someone here could provide some perspective.
Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
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Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#2I considered a graduate program in data science, but compared to average programmer salaries, it doesn't seem like data science pays all that much (excluding data science jobs for PHD's in silicon valley). It's more interesting that programming, but seems like a much tighter market with no discernible demand driving salaries up.
Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#3Currently, Gartner analysts place ML at the "peak" of its Hype Cycle for Emerging Tech [0] with a runway of 2-5 years for mainstream adoption.
Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#4I am curious about this as well. I think the difference between machine learning and software engineering is that companies may only need a few dozen machine learning engineers. They may need thousands of software engineers. There may be increasing demand, but the demand will never reach the demand of software engineering. Except at the premium ultra competitive level, where a data scientist who is globally known can have a massive impact on the companies bottom line. But we arent talking about those types of jobs.
I also believe that most traditional companies do have data scientists, but they havent really start incorporating machine learning into their products, they are analyzing information about their customers, but their products are not reliant on using data. Once that becomes more common, things will pick up.
Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#5I have only anecdotal experience (I live in Warsaw, but do contracts mostly for Poland, UK and US).
General data science is in need. I can get contracts easily, I know that people looking for competent people need to wait; especially as it is a skill much harder to pick than, say, front-end web dev (unless someone starts from a highly quantitive background like physics, modelling in biology, etc). My general impression are:
- ML (especially practical one, like logistic regression and random forest) is often integral parts of many data analyses (or at least a plus),
- there are not as many jobs solely focused on ML; and if so, often they require some specialistic expertise,
- and even less only for deep learning (also, for DL there is relatively high threshold for having skills at "hireable" level).
Some of my tips on how to learn data science: http://p.migdal.pl/2016/03/15/data-science-intro-for-math-ph... (on purpose I put the emphasis on general data exploration/analysis before machine learning).
Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#6The startup I work at really favors their data scientists, though I am not one of them (I'm a frontend guy). The CEO and CTO pretty much keeps a personal eye on those guys' work.
Right now however the theme I've heard from the higher ups has been profitability, and this applies to all tech companies in general. Easy capital is gone and now companies are in the spotlight for not making profits.
So at least from my company's perspective, it's not that data science is saturated, it's that we're trying to not break the bank and hire too much.
Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#7Worth a serious effort if you are going to use it originally in your own niche / industry, otherwise statistics will still help you more in any given market. So just learn statistics very very well and then ask again.
Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#8Like about everything on HN... You're either in the Silicon Valley or it doesn't apply to you.
In my opinion, you could start by defining what is a data science, a quant, or a machine learning job. Because that's not clearly defined. It means different jobs to a lot of people, jobs that are all hard to learn and absolutely NOT interchangeable.
Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#9[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: What's the state of the job market in data science and machine learning?
#10Stack overflow salary calculator shows a significant 50% premium over Developer salaries, all other things remaining the same. [1] Even though in my opinion the tool is flawed and actually significantly underestimates (stackoverflow underpays) salaries in SV/NYC. It is still a good indicator.
The major issue is that Data Scientist is a very fuzzy term with it being applied to everyone from undergraduates with Stats degree and to those with PhDs and papers at KDD/ICML/NIPS/CVPR.
However rather than doing a Frontend or Mobile developer coding bootcamp, a data science bootcamp is likely to lead to more transferable skills in case you wish to get an MBA etc.
[1] http://stackoverflow.com/company/salary/calculator?p=7&e=1&s...