That's a lot of questions... here goes:

>Do you have any social proof to speak of? Testimonials from previous employers or even just a well-designed case-study of the work you did for them?

Yes some social proof, but none in SF and most of it related to EFL, running a small-business and sales.

>In any of your interviews did you engage the client in terms of their value proposition to customers and suggest improvements above and beyond what you were being hired to do?

Yes. Many, many times.

>Can you demonstrate technical skill beyond what the clients are expecting of you?

No. My technical skills are fairly modest. If the market is "on fire", though, surely there are places looking for junior developers as well as experts, no?

>For example, if you didn't use backbone.js or some higher level abstraction around your paginated list, were you able to discuss the tradeoffs of using that sort of framework?

No. As I written in the GP post, I'd never even heard of backbone.js. Also there was no discussion after sending the widget. It was just a "we regret to inform you that we won't be continuing this". I did however re-engage and ask what I could have done that would have been better and they were kind enough to give some solid feedback, which is why backbone.js is on my radar now.

>If you have only one months professional experience with ruby, did you at least send an example rails application over to them for their developers to look at?

I've never used rails at work. I used some ruby server-side scripting for my previous employer. If you look at my LinkedIn profile, you'll see projects I've worked on and links to the code and in one case video.

>If I click on your HN profile or a link in your email signature, do I get linked to your portfolio website that clearly outlines your value proposition to potential hirers? What is it exactly that you can do for me? Your LinkedIn profile for example is mostly about your non-technical experience, which is great, but doesn't make me feel better about hiring you.

I'm working on building a site like what you mention, but to be honest, my value proposition isn't that I've already built amazing technical things.

>You have a list of technologies but what exactly is it that you're a specialist at?

I'm not a specialist! There is no technology that I'm an expert in, but we all have to start somewhere, right?

>As someone who is charging a hefty daily-rate, with nowhere near the level of acclaim as patio11, with comparable technical skills to you living in a city with a substantially smaller tech scene, I get the impression that your lack of secured work is more to do with your communication/sales skills than it is with your technical ability or connections.

I find this odd since I've done a lot more communication and sales than tech stuff in my career. FWIW, I also had a much easier time finding a tech job outside CA. I did it with no professional experience at all in Beijing, on the basis of selling myself and my hobby projects. It took about 3 weeks.

Since, I'm successfully "getting my foot in the door" about 70% of the time, but having a harder time with the technical interviews and challenges, I have 3 alternate theories:

1) The bar is higher in the bay area. There are lot of companies looking for talent, but their definition of talent is more demanding than it would be if I lived in Colorado or Texas.

2) I've lived for so long in the Chinese-speaking world that I've adapted in ways that are good for marketing myself there, but bad here. Maybe my vibe is off for job hunting in the US.

3) Maybe age is a factor. Lots of fresh grads who know even less ruby or objective C than I do are getting hired as interns or junior devs. It's possible that companies are subconsciously grading me against what I could have been if I'd had a straight and narrow technical focus for the past 10 years.