> Not the GP but I can hazard a guess:
Please don't, you have no relevant information so your speculation isn't helpful.
"I'm over 40 and now nobody wants to hire me because they're age-ist bigots!!1" is a common refrain that very rarely holds up under any form of scrutiny.
And let's not ignore the fact that if you removed speculative comments with no relevant information from HN we'd lose about 2/3 of the userbase.
> What did you work on during those years?
Line-of-business apps. VB.NET maybe? Or Java/J2EE type stuff. Probably jobs involving mainframes as core legacy systems? Things where "design" was more a function of where your WYSIWYG editor placed controls than conscious decisions.
> Did you keep up with the industry?
Enough to read HN, but not enough to keep learning new technologies and not languish at the same company for a decade writing the applications mentioned above.