I haven't figured out what the (self taught) part brings to this equation. The way I interpret it is that self taught has a factor > 1.0 which is better than someone who would have learned in college or some other form of learning? I get the (human communication skills)... that makes sense in the equation. Care to explain it? I figure if you take the time to write an equation, it might as well be explained in terms more formal? :)
Self taught really should mean someone that has the initiative, drive, determination and passion for their particular project. I don't think any self taught coder, starts off wanting to write code, they just need to move their particular project into code realm. My passion was stocks, when excel couldn't handle my calculations, I had to teach myself code to handle the calculations. Being self taught allow me to think in non traditional ways, to solve code problems.
I also get a lot discrimination in the web development world, because I don't have a CS degree. I was once told from an interview, "We would like to hire Chad, he is well educated and smart, but we can't cause he doesn't have a CS degree." It wasn't a requirement. Since then I embrace the fact that I'm self taught, some might see it as weakness, I see it as a strength.
