So there's silicon alley in NY, silicon prairie in the midwest, silicon forest in portland, what do we call Jersey?
Silicon armpit
Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
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Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#42So there's silicon alley in NY, silicon prairie in the midwest, silicon forest in portland, what do we call Jersey?
Back in the late 1990s during the telecom boom, the gov came out to the Holmdel Bell Labs bldg to proclaim the area be called "Photon Valley". The name didn't quite stick.
Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
Many people on HN seem to forget that many strides in computer science, computer architecture, and mathematics came from schools that don't start with an "S" and are from outside of the Bay Area. I think it is more that the definition of how you measure innovation has shifted over time -- now it is based on how many dollars are raised for your venture vs. actual strides being made in academic fields of study.
I find your comment a bit gratuitous. These seminal figures come up somewhat regularly on HN and it's no secret that these great minds hailed from Austria, Britain, Hungary, Germany etc.
Sure, but 100 years ago none of them would have thought of moving to Northern CA, where now they are more likely to go there than the East Coast.
Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#44So there's silicon alley in NY, silicon prairie in the midwest, silicon forest in portland, what do we call Jersey?
Transistorland (for one Bell Labs invention)?
UNIX shore (for another)?
Claude and Harry's neighborhood (for Shannon and Nyquist)?
The trouble is, the state's name now is Christie's Fiefdom, and that has to fade away.
Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#45For those interested in learning more about Bell Labs I recommend you check out the book "The Idea Factory" ( https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11797471-the-idea-factor... ).
I bought this book a few weeks ago because of how interesting Bell Labs was - great recommendation!
Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#46For those interested in learning more about Bell Labs I recommend you check out the book "The Idea Factory" ( https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11797471-the-idea-factor... ).
I saw this and came to make the same recommendation. I just finished this book and it is excellent. As an EE, the chapters on the discovery of the transistor by Brattain and Bardeen up to the experiment where their prototype starts actually amplifying an input signal for the first time represents such a seminal moment in the history of the world. Arguably, it is the most important invention of the 20th century.
Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#47Even as Silicon Valley was still in its infancy, a group of organizations including Bell, MCI, GM, and others hired Fred Terman from Stanford to make NJ more like what Silicon Valley (NJ and SV share a ton of similarities, i did a tedx talk about it below [1]) but Terman was unsuccessful. He pointed to how Princeton was not focused enough on applied science the way Stanford was. East coast politics and stock market d…
Terman.
How did you do research for the talk without learning the spelling?
Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#48Even as Silicon Valley was still in its infancy, a group of organizations including Bell, MCI, GM, and others hired Fred Terman from Stanford to make NJ more like what Silicon Valley (NJ and SV share a ton of similarities, i did a tedx talk about it below [1]) but Terman was unsuccessful. He pointed to how Princeton was not focused enough on applied science the way Stanford was. East coast politics and stock market d…
Terman. How did you do research for the talk without learning the spelling?
thanks for the correction. Long night last night :/
Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#49According to wikipedia, it also has more engineers per square meter than any state in the US. Not quite the trashy state people are led to believe it is. Now that NYC is not affordable for startups, NJ will become a perfectly respectable tech/Start up hub. And good for it.
Nah, Jersey is done. The same 1950s attitudes/laws that caused it to lose the industry are still there. That's why it's tech scene consists mostly of big doofy defense contractors and Comcast.
and Verizon Wireless!
Re: Before Silicon Valley, New Jersey Reigned As Nation's Center Of Innovation
#50For those interested in learning more about Bell Labs I recommend you check out the book "The Idea Factory" ( https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11797471-the-idea-factor... ).
Bob Lucky, who was one of the directors of research at Bell wrote a number of books and this one is a fun read.
https://www.amazon.com/Lucky-Strikes-Again-Foibles-Engineers...