Thank you for taking the time to provide insightful answers to our questions.

My question concerns EB-1 visas and greencards for extraordinary ability. The usual route to prove 'extraordinary ability' seems heavily skewed towards those with scientific publications under their belt. Would it be possible to qualify for a software engineer leaning towards tangible tech contributions, for example significant commits to open source projects and building online products with a decent user base ?

That said, I can tell you what I know, but takes it with a lot of salt.

You don't need to be anywhere near Nobel winner level to get an O1 -- which is the impression one might get from reading on USCIS description of O1. However, you still need to be demonstrably good. Since the agency is unable to judge whether anyone of a profession is an expert or not - this is not a slight on them, it's just impossible for an outsider to judge competency of any practioner of any profession - they mostly defer to other external validation you've already got in your field: professional award, news about you or your work by mainstream newspaper (even non-US one, I think news in your own country counts), patents, your alma mater, other well known experts in your field etc. Basically it might be a bit of a popularity contest. To make it concrete, I know an acquaintance who got O1: went through MIT, has a couple of patents, working at a good company, couple of highschool awards, had some articles on him when he was a teenager. I don't know exactly the extent of who was writing recommendations and such for him.

I've also seen a HN user who said they was executive of a startup that exited at reasonable high returns, yet unable to secure O1 visa (some other HN users in that same thread indicates it might be a lawyer issue, I don't know).

Finally, can you make a couple of million bucks? That might be the easiest way to get to the US ...

Also as someone else have said in another thread, if you got an offer from the big company, they'd glad to relocate you to another country where they have an office. Everything I said just applied to the US and I think any other country would be much easier.

The criteria for O-1 are particularly tough - after all, you have to prove you're extraordinary and world class in your field. I suspect David's application was based significantly around him being the Google/O'Reilly Hacker of the Year 2005. You need to be at the top of your industry (or be talked about as if you were) to get one of those babies..

O visas are easy to get if you're an author, celebrity, renowned professor, and so on.

I'm not in that category. I have publications in international journals and corporate awards - but an O visa would be a stretch.

It's easier for me to leave the US for a year, and come back and reapply under the EB1 classification, and this is something that I am seriously considering. It depends on what new rules the USCIS makes this year - and also on the outcome of the upcoming Presidential election.

What they want is "objectively verifiable" evidence in the form of press, recognition, awards, earnings, etc. What they value much less now than they used to is famous people telling them how awesome you are (e.g. getting your famous investor to write you a letter is less valuable now). Their stance on this is that if you're as awesome as you say you are, there should be objective third party validation available.

So in your case, since you are a very top expert in a very niche field, you should be able to produce objective verification from experts in the field, peer reviewed publications (or well regarded publications in the field), and so on.

The good news is that the visa actually is designed for people like you :)

Once again though: Talk to an immigration lawyer, this is not immigration advice, just things as I know them :)

If you've been through this process as a software engineer, could you share your experience?

- Could you recommend any particular immigration lawyer/firm?

- Which eligibility criteria did you use?

Thanks

Thanks for doing this AMA. My question is regarding EB1A. I work in large tech firm in US, have masters degree in CS, with couple of IEEE publications and some US approved patents. Original work with total citation count ~40. I am in critical engineering role in my company in their flagship product (can get recommendations as well if needed). What are my chances for EB1? Thanks again!

I know of several people who went the O1 route and basically the process was this:

- A job offer with a "high" salary (basically it seemed anything over 100k would do the trick)

- Judged a hackathon

- "News" coverage of the hackathon

Then a big check to the immigration attorney who wrap it up in a bunch of legalese and send it off to the immigration officials who don't have enough knowledge or insight to question any of it.