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Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

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Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#31

Post by tenpies »

redthrowaway wrote: post #27
vtange wrote: post #15

I can't help but notice right now that Toronto's name has been increasingly pushed as some sort of "next tech centre" (well, many cities in the world want to be something like that). Can someone who's actually there fill me in on what's happening there? How does Toronto's scene compare to say, New York or Seattle?

Toronto is the finance & arguably tech centre of Canada. Great universities & access to VC cash, lots of startups. It also shouldn't be ignored that labour costs in Canada are less than half of what they are in the US, due to the weaker dollar, lower wages, cheaper medical insurance, and SR&ED credits that let you write off developer salary costs.

> It also shouldn't be ignored that labour costs in Canada are less than half of what they are in the US

Should add that this works both ways. Most Canadians who can, do end up leaving for the US since they can easily make 2 - 4X the income, even after CoL and insurance. There is a non-trivial amount of brain drain happening in Canada.

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#32

Post by redthrowaway »

tenpies wrote: post #31
redthrowaway wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Toronto is the finance & arguably tech centre of Canada. Great universities & access to VC cash, lots of startups. It also shouldn't be ignored that labour costs in Canada are less than half of what they are in the US, due to the weaker dollar, lower wages, cheaper medical insurance, and SR&ED credits that let you write off developer salary costs.

> It also shouldn't be ignored that labour costs in Canada are less than half of what they are in the US Should add that this works both ways. Most Canadians who can, do end up leaving for the US since they can easily make 2 - 4X the income, even after CoL and insurance. There is a non-trivial amount of brain drain happening in Canada.

Absolutely. The talent in the US is certainly higher than it is in Canada, due in no small part to the brain drain which has been happening for decades.

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#33

Post by dannyr »

oculusthrift wrote: post #12
dannyr wrote: post #6

Crazy. People on Hacker News are still upset at Google for shutting down Reader.

you realize they shut down like 80 percent of what they start? or atleast abandon it?

Where did you pull that 80% from? Or you just feel like it's 80%?

Most of Google's big projects are still alive today. Search, Gmail, Android, GSuite, Chrome, Drive, AdWords, YouTube, etc.

There are a few big projects that they shut down but most are smaller projects.

Do we want Google to just launch products that they will keep alive indefinitely whether it succeeds or not?

Should Google not have started its self-driving car initiative, Calico, Fiber? Yeah, Glass failed. So what?

Do you want a company to innovate? Have them try different things. You can't change the world by only doing things with 100% certainty.

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#34

Post by dannyr »

idank wrote: post #30
Animats wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And their fiber-optic to the home ISP. That's quite relevant here.

Fiber is still alive. Here's an announcement from last month. https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/04/googl...

Also it pushed the broadband industry forward by providing competition. AT&T and Comcast stepped up their development of Gigabit Internet in the US.

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#35

Post by parasubvert »

tenpies wrote: post #31
redthrowaway wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Toronto is the finance & arguably tech centre of Canada. Great universities & access to VC cash, lots of startups. It also shouldn't be ignored that labour costs in Canada are less than half of what they are in the US, due to the weaker dollar, lower wages, cheaper medical insurance, and SR&ED credits that let you write off developer salary costs.

> It also shouldn't be ignored that labour costs in Canada are less than half of what they are in the US Should add that this works both ways. Most Canadians who can, do end up leaving for the US since they can easily make 2 - 4X the income, even after CoL and insurance. There is a non-trivial amount of brain drain happening in Canada.

s/most/some

I was an expat in the US for many years, the story was the same in the mid-90s. Many try it, some stay, some come back. I still work for a US company but moved back.

The current political climate has a big impact on encouraging people to stay in Canada, especially with NAFTA and the H1B programs hanging by a thread. Imagine thousands of Canadians with TN status getting told they need to move back immediately (More likely 30-60 days after a status change application) upon withdrawal from NAFTA. It will be a chaotic brain drain in reverse.

Amazon, Microsoft, Google all have large Canadian outposts lately for a reason.

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#36

Post by eigenvector »

> He’s also hinted at tech’s ability to overhaul zoning rules and control housing costs, a particular interest of Alphabet’s Page.

Yeah, right. Toronto is one of the most retrograde cities on housing intensification (it still hasn't intensified around the Bloor-Danforth subway that was built a generation ago)[1]. In fact many neighbourhoods are losing population as the region grows due to extremely restrictive zoning rules.[2] A bit of Google money isn't going to change the electoral calculus of the local politicians that control that stuff.

The most likely scenario is Google convinces the government to sell/give them land in Toronto's Port Lands at below market value, and they make a killing on developing it with some technological window-dressing like free ad-supported wi-fi which AFAIK is the only thing Sidewalk has launched to date.

[1] http://brandondonnelly.com/post/152616141303/the-yellowbelt [2] http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2017/02/2016-census-mapping-toro...

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#37

Post by bitmapbrother »

oculusthrift wrote: post #12
dannyr wrote: post #6

Crazy. People on Hacker News are still upset at Google for shutting down Reader.

you realize they shut down like 80 percent of what they start? or atleast abandon it?

80%? Post your analysis and let's find out the real percentage. Don't worry, I won't be expecting a response.

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#38

Post by sanswork »

wungsten wrote: post #28
sanswork wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When that student wants property in the most prime space in the region probably not. Toronto already allows tons of new units(like this project) what more are you expecting from the city?

The problem is that U of T spans some of the best real estate in the city, and obviously students want to live near there.

So the uni should relocate or build more extensive student housing? Not sure how that is a problem for the city itself. Not everyone gets to live in prime areas.

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#39

Post by adrianratnapala »

theCricketer wrote: post #13

Out of curiousity and so we can all concretely imagine how Sidewalk Labs plans to transform cities, can someone explain what are the speicific changes and associated benefits in this new kind of city? It mentions, autonomous transit, ride sharing, cheaper housing (how?). Can someone paint a fuller picture of what will be new and how it will be beneficial. I'm not skeptical at all, in fact I'm very hopeful. I just wan…

If an artificial town could be self sustaining, a lot of the benefits you want explained might just happen just by not having legacy stuff. E.g. the roads, and road rules could designed with new forms of transport in mind. Housing might (initially!) be cheaper because zoning requirements don't force prices up.

There's wishful thinking in all of the above, but I think that is concentrated in the wish that such a town could get off the ground at all. But about the only kind of artificial town that I find plausible is when a state wants to build a new capital -- and that will immediately be a gravy train for parasites who want to crank up the costs.

Re: Alphabet’s Sidewalk Labs Eyes Toronto for Its Digital City

#40

Post by parasubvert »

vtange wrote: post #15

I can't help but notice right now that Toronto's name has been increasingly pushed as some sort of "next tech centre" (well, many cities in the world want to be something like that). Can someone who's actually there fill me in on what's happening there? How does Toronto's scene compare to say, New York or Seattle?

Toronto and Waterloo have long been tech centres, though not as large as New York or Seattle. Probably it has been most similar to Chicago's tech scene evolution, just smaller scale. A big factor are the quality of schools here and increased (though not universal) desire for Canadians to stay in Canada since 2001.
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