Can you take advantage of the Portuguese educational system to train for a professional career while you are living and working there? If so, I think that might tilt things in favor of Portugal especially if the prospect of obtaining an EU passport is there.
I don't know if even they know that they're looking for with the question as they marked it as experimental and optional but the explanation perhaps gives some hint:
"Optional: attach a coding agent session you're particularly proud of.
This is an experimental question for the Spring 2026 batch to give people a chance to show off their skills with AI coding tools."
Maybe they're hoping to gain some signal around a correlation between good AI coding skills and future company success?
Sometimes the why is discovered when you try to change the code to what you think it should be and see it fall down in some cases you didn't anticipate or some other system is affected. It's often really hard to find out the why but either it will become clear at some point when the code is refactored or it will be irrelevant.
Unless you have a paying customer willing to pay you with just a promise of something to be delivered (see kickstarter et al, Steve Blanks's customer discovery, etc.), you don't. If it solves a problem you have and in a better way for you than other solutions then you personally get immediate value from it. From there, it's possible others may have the same problem and will be willing to pay for it. It's not guaranteed but the number of people getting value from the software will be at least n = 1.
What’s the virtue signal in not wanting to travel to a country that might arbitrarily decide to illegally deport you to a different country other than your home country or detain you indefinitely?
While Venezuela and Colombia only get bombing threats, this US administration was actively advocating to take over the Canada and turn it into the 51st state
They talked about taking over Greenland and Panama and even sent out diplomatic missions to that effect
"I know it’s not going to cancel because it’s a robot"
I won't be at all surprised when they start calculating their profits in real-time, if they aren't already, and cancelling or delaying trips that are deemed unprofitable in the moment. They are robots after all.
Waymo already does that through its surge pricing mechanism and limited availability of cars at busy times. And if they really don't want to serve you they'd just not let you book.
Living cheaply is relative though. I have no idea if this person’s living cheaply is doable on my current savings so it’s meaningless to me until I have some hard numbers.
The trick is living cheaply while earning. Not starting living cheaply only once the money-hose dries up. Obviously, this advice is too late for many people.
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