The large companies that converge on these contests in a feeding frenzy of head-hunting would beg to differ on your assessment of how good a proxy such contests are.<p>Poland has a long tradition of brilliant mathematicians, logicians and chess players. Just look at all the Polish names in the industry or in open source. They tend to get excited at the deep problems with mathematical implications, not so much with the shallow problems (by shallow, I don&#x27;t mean insignificant, or trivial for industry). Most of the shallow problems in programming have been solved by now, and the next step is beyond a wall of mathematical depth that is barely understood even now. This is the time for programmers who operate at that nexus between mathematics and programming to shine. You can be sure that the Polish will be at the forefront of this.<p>It is a tragedy that the Polish tend to have to go abroad to succeed. This is an industry that should not be affected by the lack of transport infrastructure that is a legacy of Communist occupation.