I think some of you forget that the rest of the world isn't New York/Austin/Bay Area. For most of us, just because we're competent programmers and have a pulse doesn't mean we'll get snatched up off the street. Programming is a very competitive job situation in many mid-sized cities across the USA and Europe, and networking is unfortunately quite necessary to both get a job and to advance your career. By far, the most successful programmers I know around here and those who network the best (I'm unfortunately not very interested in networking, and have suffered accordingly).

Also, once you hit around 40, lots of people who once would have loved to have you don't seem to want you anymore.

Programming was a great career when I was 20 and self-taught. Twenty years later, it's not looking so hot, even though I've very much kept up with the latest stacks and languages. Still, I love writing code, so what am I going to do, go into management?

Hell, even if you do live in one of those places you're screwing yourself to shun networking.

The tech industry isn't special in this regard. Being a good programmer is important, but if your only approach to career growth is reading job boards and sending cold resumes, you're going to hit a ceiling.

Anyway, many of us have family situations that don't allow us to easily uproot and move across the country, as much as we might like to do so sometimes.