31–40 of 58 posts
New York made New York appealing to Amazon. Snark aside, it’s unlikely one can link Amazon’s decision to a single factor. New York being what it has has a large number of assets in its favor: a huge, mobile workforce, strong business community, strong sales community, deep tech pool, a strong transit system, legitimately a world-class city...
strong transit system? no
New York made New York appealing to Amazon. Snark aside, it’s unlikely one can link Amazon’s decision to a single factor. New York being what it has has a large number of assets in its favor: a huge, mobile workforce, strong business community, strong sales community, deep tech pool, a strong transit system, legitimately a world-class city...
The $4.6b in subsidies also helped make NY more appealing to Amazon. >“The taxpayer costs of these two deals is high, both in absolute terms and on a per-job basis, contrary to Amazon’s artful spin. Together, we believe they exceed $4.6 billion and the cost per job in New York is at least $112,000, not the $48,000 the company used in a selective and incomplete press release calculation. [1] [1] https://www.goodjobsfi…
Amazon claimed we didn't have enough programmers, but the reality is that most of our programmers are picked up by automotive companies. There is talent, but they are already high in demand.
If amazon admitted they didn't want to exceed our 6 figure salaries, the response would have been better. Instead I see Amazon as an increasingly crony company.
New York made New York appealing to Amazon. Snark aside, it’s unlikely one can link Amazon’s decision to a single factor. New York being what it has has a large number of assets in its favor: a huge, mobile workforce, strong business community, strong sales community, deep tech pool, a strong transit system, legitimately a world-class city...
strong transit system? no
I'm going to be a Visiting Professor there in 2019, and I'll be teaching a deep learning course. One interesting thing about Cornell Tech is that the faculty all work in an open office space, and I think that's to embrace start up culture. Faculty have "huddle" rooms for meetings. At my home institution, I spend 20 hours per week in meetings. Faculty do have dedicated huddle rooms, though.
Why embrace the bad parts of startup culture (open plans)? Seems cargo cultish: open plans exist as a cost control measure, and make it easier to grow/shrink. Academia has endowments and tends to have a more stable labor force.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The $4.6b in subsidies also helped make NY more appealing to Amazon. >“The taxpayer costs of these two deals is high, both in absolute terms and on a per-job basis, contrary to Amazon’s artful spin. Together, we believe they exceed $4.6 billion and the cost per job in New York is at least $112,000, not the $48,000 the company used in a selective and incomplete press release calculation. [1] [1] https://www.goodjobsfi…
That seems a bit extreme, but that was the response from our engineers in Detroit. Amazon claimed we didn't have enough programmers, but the reality is that most of our programmers are picked up by automotive companies. There is talent, but they are already high in demand. If amazon admitted they didn't want to exceed our 6 figure salaries, the response would have been better. Instead I see Amazon as an increasingly…
I'm going to be a Visiting Professor there in 2019, and I'll be teaching a deep learning course. One interesting thing about Cornell Tech is that the faculty all work in an open office space, and I think that's to embrace start up culture. Faculty have "huddle" rooms for meetings. At my home institution, I spend 20 hours per week in meetings. Faculty do have dedicated huddle rooms, though.
Why embrace the bad parts of startup culture (open plans)? Seems cargo cultish: open plans exist as a cost control measure, and make it easier to grow/shrink. Academia has endowments and tends to have a more stable labor force.
I realize this is a polarizing topic, but personally I've always preferred working in open-plan spaces to having a private office for precisely that reason.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
New York is definitely a world-class city, but Amazon had the opportunity to attract talent to make a city that is not currently a world-class city into one but instead selected an already established one
> Amazon had the opportunity to attract talent to make a city that is not currently a world-class city into one Not really. Big cities operate at scales and complexities far above what Amazon can bring. Density begets density. Meanwhile, that cities have largely been built—and remained—in similar places (protected harbours with navigable rivers and ideally shallow bedrock) implies there are deeper reasons for why den…
New York made New York appealing to Amazon. Snark aside, it’s unlikely one can link Amazon’s decision to a single factor. New York being what it has has a large number of assets in its favor: a huge, mobile workforce, strong business community, strong sales community, deep tech pool, a strong transit system, legitimately a world-class city...
It will never happen but imagine if when articles like this were written you had some understanding of how the article came about? In other words was it floated by Columbia's PR department? Did the author just trip over the subject and then decide to somehow write an article that ended up with the very timely link bait title?
Paul Graham's 'The Submarine' for context:
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Amazon had the opportunity to attract talent to make a city that is not currently a world-class city into one Not really. Big cities operate at scales and complexities far above what Amazon can bring. Density begets density. Meanwhile, that cities have largely been built—and remained—in similar places (protected harbours with navigable rivers and ideally shallow bedrock) implies there are deeper reasons for why den…
I’m not sure about that. Amazon turned Seattle into a truly big city, which it wasn’t before.