I'm in Australia and I have been working working in a startup as full stack developer (React + Golang) for over a year now. Prior to this I work in desktop application development and mainly using C++.

Online learning
I jumped online learning back in 2016 when I saw the possibility of machine learning, artificial intelligence and self driving cars. I took a few courses on Udacity to study those subjects, hoping I could get jobs in related areas. It was quite fun to taking those courses and quite an eye-opener experience. And I do get some attention from recruiters on LinkedIn but no offer or even interview opportunity.

First LeetCode encouter
At that time, I also thought of doing LeetCode to prepare interviews. I remember there're about 300 algorithm questions back then and I like its simple interface, clear question description and most importantly a vibrant discussion forum.

But eventually I didn't choose it because as I said there're many algorithm interviews for me to take so why bother preparing for it? Most interviews I had involved working a take-home assignment in which you're asked to solve a particular problem (e.g. implement a parking lot manager, a tamagotchi etc) using OOP principle.

Land a job in web dev
So my udacity experience doesn't land me jobs in those fields but I do struck to recruiters as a person who like to learn new things and take challenges. So in the begining of 2018, I joined my current employer and starting to do web development. I'm glad I made the move as I think I'm now in a much better position for further career advancement.

Now in hindsight, I think there're mainly two reasons why I end up where I am. First, udacity experience is only helpful to you a junior job in those fields if you just follow the course without doing further study by yourself. And second, there're just not so many opportunities in ML, AI, and SDC etc in Australia, where software engineering jobs are much less than in US and out of those jobs, most are web development related, which is why I ended up doing for now.

2019 Goal and LeetCode premium
I like my current job but I feel my growth is likely to stagnate soon. And deep down in my heart I always have this dream of working on one of FLAG (or FAANG) level companies as I think I can learn a lot from talented people, working on influential products, and getting crasy salaries and perks.

So one of my new year resolutions is to join a FLAG level company this year. I know it's gonna be hard but I will definitely regret if didn't give it shot.

So I thought of LC again this year as I know to join FLAG, you have to be really good at solving algorithm&data structure problem.

After 3 years, the number of questions on LC skyrockted to almost 1k! But community is more active than ever. This time I didn't hesitate and walk away. I join the yearly subscription when it was on a 50% discount. I think this could be the most rewarding investments I've ever made.

Final words
I initially create this post to just participate in the free T-shirt event until I realize how much I wrote. I'm still a newbie to LC (only 22 questions solved so far) but I'm determined to finish at least 500 question in the first half year, which means ~3 questions a day. So I'm gonna stop right here and finish my daily goal now...