H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home • Hacker News Board

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#21

Post by TomVDB » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 2:39 PM UTC

DiggyJohnson wrote: post #5

manishsharan wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>India is like 5-10 years behind USA in the tech space I don't quite understand this. Do you mean that they are still using Internet Explorer , Java 5 , Windows 7 and Myspace? Please explain.

This idiom is referring to the maturity of their tech industry at a high level, not their tooling (though that could be a minor part of it). As an example, a country with paper-only tax filing might be said to be a decade behind a country with easy online e-file. It’s referring to the difference in technical capabilities, capacity, and/or innovation.

Putting a check in the mail (or pressing some button on a web form to make it so) is one of the things that comes to mind.

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#22

Post by geodel » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 2:40 PM UTC

I guess happy ending for every one. US got enough H1Bs that's why rejected excess applications. Indian govt get to crow about thriving startup ecosystem. And Indians got some cheap deals on fashion and other household goods. As a result of all this, this guy got to be billionaire or some such.

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#23

Post by paxys » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 2:48 PM UTC

yardie wrote: post #9

Note this was in 2007, during the height of the H1B body shop scams. The USCIS visa system was overwhelmed by companies like Infosys and Tata just submitting 1000s of applications for clearly underqualified, yet cheap candidates for jobs that didn't exist. This writer probably got their visa rejected over a less qualified candidate because of the quota limits for H1b.

2007-2012 was actually the easiest period to get an H-1B visa. It has become significantly harder since then.

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#24

Post by davidw » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 2:50 PM UTC

kshacker wrote: post #13

going_ham wrote: post #2

Does it mean it costed the US of potential opportunities? I don't think it made any difference in the US. But it surely helped in his home country. While we are at it, what do you think of current visa issue in the USA? For a long time, I thought it was difficult only to people of Asian countries to migrate to US, but turns out it is equally difficult for any other nations. In the long term, does it make a difference…

> Does it mean it costed the US of potential opportunities? I don't think it made any difference in the US. But it surely helped in his home country. Our immigration service hands out N visas a year. You reject one, someone else will pick up that slot. On an average it should not make a difference either for US or the other country unless they are so small their number of visas doubled or something because of this on…

> N visas a year

That number is pretty clearly a number pulled out of someone's ass, rather than anything 'scientific'. It's a nice round number that sounded good to someone, but is pretty completely disconnected from reality.

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#25

Post by manuelabeledo » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 2:52 PM UTC

aleem wrote: post #14

Three worst addictions: Heroine, Carbohydrates and a monthly salary - Nassim Taleb It's more common for people who are in-between jobs to take things that would be otherwise compromise their monthly salary income. It's less common for someone to quit a high paying job and take on a risky endeavour. Relatedly, the Tarzan strategy is another way to mitigate this risk (side projects or finding your next gig before just…

> Three worst addictions: Heroine, Carbohydrates and a monthly salary - Nassim Taleb

Nassim Taleb is a bit of a wack.

This sentence doesn't make sense. I really hope it was taken out of context, because otherwise, there's absolutely no value to it other than glorifying risk for the sake of it. May as well be talking about gambling money away.

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#26

Post by dxbydt » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 2:59 PM UTC

In the early 1990s when I came here, the prevailing wisdom was that its categorically better to immigrate to the US from India if you get a chance. India was too far back in the tech space, too much bureaucracy, corruption, red-tape etc etc...

In the 2020s, the consensus is quite mixed. A lot of people I personally worked with, who successfully got their visas and green cards, have given it all up and gone straight back to India because that's where the action is. It was quite baffling to me because it takes a lot of work to get these documents. But after a few trips to India, I must say it makes a lot of sense. The startup funding situation, tech jobs hiring scenario, cost of living, telecom, healthcare, no prevalence of gun culture...every aspect is much better in India currently than the US. If you have high 6 low 7 figure USD saved up, and not too deeply tied to the US, you should consider moving back if you want to tap into a potential windfall. That said, if you only have 5 figure USD, coming to the US is the better option if you can swing it. If you're already here on a visa, stay frugal & grow that nest egg. Going back with a 5 figure sum is quite risky unless you have some solid contacts in the startup space or are ok with the Indian job scene. Interviews over there are insanely competitive. 500+ LC. Kids just stay at home grinding LC all day. There are dedicated youtube channels in Hindi & other regional lang telling you how to dynamic program, backtrack, div & conquer, two pointer....its a whole different scene.

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#27

Post by paxys » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 2:59 PM UTC

US immigration policies for Indian and Chinese nationals has been a blessing for their home grown tech ecosystem. There is no path to a green card or citizenship for anyone who immigrated in the last ~15 years, and the top 5% talent that used to come over by default is now working at or founding companies at home instead. This is directly correlated to the number of tech unicorns in these countries growing exponentially in the same time period (0 in India before 2010, 100+ in 2022).

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#28

Post by adamsmith143 » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:02 PM UTC

strikelaserclaw wrote: post #3

going_ham wrote: post #2

Does it mean it costed the US of potential opportunities? I don't think it made any difference in the US. But it surely helped in his home country. While we are at it, what do you think of current visa issue in the USA? For a long time, I thought it was difficult only to people of Asian countries to migrate to US, but turns out it is equally difficult for any other nations. In the long term, does it make a difference…

agree, since India is like 5-10 years behind USA in the tech space, most unicorns in India are just companies that already exist in some form in USA. In India, the execution of a business is the hard part by far, and not the novelty of the idea.

This is true all over the world. Some of the most valuable companies in Asia or South America are just Uber or Doordash clones for example.

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#29

Post by geodel » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:02 PM UTC

manuelabeledo wrote: post #25

aleem wrote: post #14

Three worst addictions: Heroine, Carbohydrates and a monthly salary - Nassim Taleb It's more common for people who are in-between jobs to take things that would be otherwise compromise their monthly salary income. It's less common for someone to quit a high paying job and take on a risky endeavour. Relatedly, the Tarzan strategy is another way to mitigate this risk (side projects or finding your next gig before just…

> Three worst addictions: Heroine, Carbohydrates and a monthly salary - Nassim Taleb Nassim Taleb is a bit of a wack. This sentence doesn't make sense. I really hope it was taken out of context, because otherwise, there's absolutely no value to it other than glorifying risk for the sake of it. May as well be talking about gambling money away.

Huh, just a couple of centuries back maybe 90% of world population was self employed. It was not the greatest risk but simply a way of life.

Re: H1B rejected – builds unicorn back home

#30

Post by deadcoder0904 » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:07 PM UTC

strikelaserclaw wrote: post #3

going_ham wrote: post #2

Does it mean it costed the US of potential opportunities? I don't think it made any difference in the US. But it surely helped in his home country. While we are at it, what do you think of current visa issue in the USA? For a long time, I thought it was difficult only to people of Asian countries to migrate to US, but turns out it is equally difficult for any other nations. In the long term, does it make a difference…

agree, since India is like 5-10 years behind USA in the tech space, most unicorns in India are just companies that already exist in some form in USA. In India, the execution of a business is the hard part by far, and not the novelty of the idea.

dude no. most foreign apps won't work in india bcz we don't like to pay for apps.

"people come to india for dau, not arpu" ~ kunal shah on the knowledge project [0]

tiktok executed perfectly bcz they were optimizing for dau but even flipkart is doing better than amazon here. many apps just won't work bcz they don't understand. see how netflix lost by asking to pay?

people don't understand india as much as they think they do so i'd suggest you to watch the video below as it covers actual india from an actual indian who understands it.

[0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nl1PIagzgUo