Why I Chose New York

Yeah. I think the answer there is: fuck those companies. The sooner we start new ones that get this right, the fewer their days are numbered.

But you may have missed my point by a couple degrees. It wasn't that companies should look at initiative and aptitude directly. It's that those are the things that drive you to acquire the skills that make you good. Then you can prove that you're good.

How exactly to prove you're good, or for companies to tell who's good, is a billion (trillion?) dollar question that's in flux right now. But clearly it has more to do with showing work and less with weak proxies like years of experience (which may be years of doing things badly) or resumes (a skill uncorrelated if not inversely correlated with good programming). Since startups are starved for good hackers, somebody's going to figure this out, gain a huge edge, and pave the way for the rest.

In the meantime, training/retraining programs are not going to increase the talent pool much. Something fresh like Hacker School might, though.

Edit: in my opinion the eventual answer is going to be found by reasoning backward from Christopher Alexander's great question, "What feels more alive?" But obviously that isn't much help to someone in the situation you describe right now. So how did it work out? Do you like accounting or would you rather be programming?

> ...insane amount to pay for housing.

SF is definitely cheaper but not that much cheaper. I have friends who share a 2 bedroom for $2400 not far from Golden Gate Park in a shitty apartment. I can find any number of shitty apartments for $2400 in the city if I want.

Another point: you earn higher salaries in New York than less urban areas (this is true of SF too). If I earned even $30,000 less and lived in the Midwest, financially speaking I'd be worse off. It may even be $20,000.

> Eating fast food Who said anything about fast food?

> Bull...

During the day, that's the time. Out of hours trains are less frequent but isn't that kinda the point: they're still running. Caltrain stops at about 11. Not sure when the muni-buses and BART stop.

> Also, NY culture is a consumption culture.

Nonsense. Or, rather, only if you want it to be. If you want to keep up with the investment banker set, then that's your choice. If you want to go to expensive bars and drop $100-200 on drinks, that's your choice. You're able to do that in any number of major urban centers.

I don't feel the need to go down Fifth Avenue and do my shopping at Prada or Bergdorf Goodman (Gap/Old Navy/Urban Outfitters are just fine with me). If you do, that's your choice.

A friend of mine once took us to a noodle bar off Union Square. The music and noise was so loud you could barely hear yourself think. Me and a friend said "screw this" and went somewhere else. Later he was like "you have to put up with waiting and noise". No, you don't. If you want to hang out at the hipster joints, then sure. But again, that's a choice.

I find this with New York (and London) in particular: you either decide to like it or you don't. If you've decided not to like it, you'll notice certain streets smell like urine, the garbage smells, homeless people on the subway, homeless people defecating in trash cans or urinating in phone boots, the lack of space and so on. But that really is just a state of mind.

I know people who are addicted to their large houses, having a back yard, their cars, etc and look past their long commutes, the costs of car ownership and so on. That too is a choice.

Your post comes across as very bitter. You've decided to not like New York. You probably have your reasons. Fair enough. That's your choice. But in no way are you presenting anything remotely objective about New York.

I'm going to second the reply to your comment. I thought what you think too, but it turns out the energy of a city matters. I moved from the Bay Area to San Diego. I LOVE San Diego. Still have many friends there. Unfortunately the tech community there is really small. So I moved my entire company to Austin. We are much happier here. Plus, our revenues have doubled in the three months we've been here--just from the connections we've made.

Austin feels like a "mini-Bay Area" to me. I didn't want to start my next company in the bubble, especially since we're working with a lot of "oldschool" businesses. Austin is booming, but things are still relatively inexpensive here, and there are plenty of customers. Plus, we found an amazing Python developer here--I'm not sure that would have been as possible in the Bay Area.

I'm still willing to travel to the Bay Area; I just don't want to live there again.

You mean trendy rather than nice. There are plenty of nice areas of Brooklyn, and Queens for that matter, that are affordable, safe and have multiple transportation options to midtown and downtown.

Places like: Prospect Heights (A,C,2,3), Long Island City (7,N,R,Q,E,M,F), Lefferts Garden (Q,B,2,5), Astoria (N,Q), and Woodside/Jackson Heights (7,M,R & LIRR).

You may not be able to find a place to buy $6 PBRs or $5 coffees right around the corner, but I consider that a plus.

Don't forget about how expensive housing is in NYC. If you want to live in Manhattan and have ever lived anywhere else, to get an apartment that vaguely resembles what you consider an apartment, you're going to be paying $3000 a month. Recently, it seems, Brooklyn has realized that it is not very far away from Manhattan and the rents have gone up to match. In Chicago, I lived in a brand new building, downtown, and had an 820 square foot apartment for $1400 a month. In Brooklyn, I have about 500 square feet, no AC, no microwave, in a building built in 1883 for $2400 a month. And, I had to pay a broker two months rent for the privilege of renting their apartment. (Yes, Brooklyn Heights is a particularly expensive neighborhood and the commute time to Chelsea is less than from many places in Manhattan. But it's not a $1000 value-add from what I had in Chicago.)

Ultimately, I can afford this because Google pays me a lot of money and buys me three meals a day. But if you are bootstrapping a startup, you probably don't have this much money to burn, and there's really no compelling reason to live in NYC unless you spend all your time doing social things. If you're programming, buy yourself a more comfortable apartment in Kansas City, or something. $2400 a month buys you the entire city :)