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Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

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Re: Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

#151

Post by tinyhouse »

JauntTrooper wrote: post #53
rapsey wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is only one aspect and I think a minor one. What made silicon valley is access to capital, proximity to stanford and a feedback loop of successful entrepreneurs using their experience to create the next generation of successful entrepreneurs

I wonder why Boston hasn't risen further, with Harvard and MIT both at their doorstep along with a lot of other really great universities and good companies.

Boston is doing pretty well and many things started in Boston such as YC, Facebook, Dropbox, etc. Boston is small and already expensive. Plus the weather. I also think it doesn't have a lot to offer for single people. It has much more to offer for families.

Boston is also more diverse in terms of opportunities. If you're a researcher or biologist let's say, you are more likely to find a good job in Boston than SF.

Re: Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

#152

Post by enraged_camel »

dmode wrote: post #137
myspy wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yey, living in SF where junkies shoot on the street and everything is littered with excrements because fuck you good social security system. Let‘s live there! Plus, everything really expensive to live there. And if I work at Google I drive two hours with a bus there. I don‘t know but reading about that place it‘s insanity. And the output is Hit and miss. I know of no startup in the last ten years that‘s any substanti…

Only a small portion of SF is matches the dystopian vision you claim. Even those portions are not any worse than other urban areas. There is a reason why housing here is extremely expensive. People want to live here.

>>Only a small portion of SF is matches the dystopian vision you claim.

Actually, I’m pretty sure the vast majority of people in the Bay Area have very long commutes.

Re: Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

#154

Post by amelius »

vincentmarle wrote: post #79

> I still expect a significant % of the $10B+ startups will get created here, so it makes sense for investors to still focus here. But I bet a lot of the ~$100M startups will happen elsewhere. > There are still some things—e.g great startup executive talent, particular kinds of engineering talent—that are much harder to find outside the bay area. This is spot on and it becomes a real bottle neck if you want to scale…

> particular kinds of engineering talent—that are much harder to find outside the bay area.

Does that also hold for biotech talent?

Re: Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

#155

Post by humanrebar »

ramraj07 wrote: post #149
sytelus wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why doesn’t your employees move out of Bay Area with you? Assuming if you keep offering same comp, this would cut down mortgage expenses to half and even gain much better housing in better school areas. It should be no brainer to move out if comp remains same. So you can come in to shop for talent, have them work remotely until they are ready. No need to open expensive offices in Bay Area.

So you're gonna trust your company will not lay you off in a year? What will you do after two years even if it didn't,? I doubt you'll continue to keep finding similar paying jobs in Dallas.

> I doubt you'll continue to keep finding similar paying jobs in Dallas.

You are replying to a post about how employers should stop paying such a premium for a SF ZIP code with the observation that the premium exists.

Re: Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

#157

Post by nostrademons »

enraged_camel wrote: post #152
dmode wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only a small portion of SF is matches the dystopian vision you claim. Even those portions are not any worse than other urban areas. There is a reason why housing here is extremely expensive. People want to live here.

>>Only a small portion of SF is matches the dystopian vision you claim. Actually, I’m pretty sure the vast majority of people in the Bay Area have very long commutes.

If you work in tech and a short commute is important to you, you can make it happen anywhere in the Bay.

I had a 2 mile commute when I was working at Google - it was 5 minutes by car, and about 12 minutes by bike. I've got a 30 foot commute now - I work from home. I've put about 30k miles on my 10 year old car.

Many of my friends are the same - live in Mountain View, work at the Googleplex, ~10 minute commute. Well, at least back when I was still commuting. I've heard traffic over the 101 bridges has gotten stupendously bad such that it can take 30 minutes to drive 100 yards, but that's easily averted by walking or biking. (Apparently it now takes less time to walk from most of North Mountain View to the Googleplex than to drive, during rush hour.)

You do pay for the privilege, and you sacrifice in other ways (eg. there's not much in the way of night life in the South Bay). But most of the folks with the 1-2 hour commutes in the Bay are a.) not in tech, and therefore screwed in many ways b.) consider living in the city to be non-negotiable, and therefore willing to put up with all sorts of literal shit to maintain that lifestyle or c.) consider living in the mountains to be non-negotiable, and so are willing to put up with a long but beautiful commute to maintain that lifestyle.

Re: Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

#158

Post by jeffasinger »

amelius wrote: post #154
vincentmarle wrote: post #79

> I still expect a significant % of the $10B+ startups will get created here, so it makes sense for investors to still focus here. But I bet a lot of the ~$100M startups will happen elsewhere. > There are still some things—e.g great startup executive talent, particular kinds of engineering talent—that are much harder to find outside the bay area. This is spot on and it becomes a real bottle neck if you want to scale…

> particular kinds of engineering talent—that are much harder to find outside the bay area. Does that also hold for biotech talent?

My understanding is that biotech is actually better in Boston than the bay area by a pretty wide margin.

Re: Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

#159

Post by DrAwdeOccarim »

jeffasinger wrote: post #158
amelius wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> particular kinds of engineering talent—that are much harder to find outside the bay area. Does that also hold for biotech talent?

My understanding is that biotech is actually better in Boston than the bay area by a pretty wide margin.

The difference between Boston and SF for biotech is so interesting. SF has a lot of future-tech looking biotech companies, super cool DNA sequencing, longevity, synthetic biology, whereas the Boston area is much more pragmatic. It is so funny how west coast vs east coast biotech really is--romantic futurism vs pragmatic present.

The other way to look at the divide is protein vs nucleic acid. A lot of very interesting MAb and designer protein companies are in the bay area, but all the major CRISPR, mRNA, siRNA companies are in Boston. Sure you have Ionis and Caribou in CA, but that's really it.

If you believe the future is in the digital information nature of nucleic acid, Boston is the center of gravity by a huge margin.

Re: Sam Altman: Bay Area is no longer the obvious place for startups

#160

Post by heartbreak »

nostrademons wrote: post #157
enraged_camel wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>Only a small portion of SF is matches the dystopian vision you claim. Actually, I’m pretty sure the vast majority of people in the Bay Area have very long commutes.

If you work in tech and a short commute is important to you, you can make it happen anywhere in the Bay. I had a 2 mile commute when I was working at Google - it was 5 minutes by car, and about 12 minutes by bike. I've got a 30 foot commute now - I work from home. I've put about 30k miles on my 10 year old car. Many of my friends are the same - live in Mountain View, work at the Googleplex, ~10 minute commute. Well,…

Working from home and still choosing to live in the Bay Area sounds like an inefficiency. A major, 5- to 6-figure per year inefficiency.
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