11–20 of 131 posts
This is not a profound statement, but rather obvious. If may calculations are right, there are roughly 6 billion 993 million people outside of Silicon Valley
Clearly population numbers are not sufficient in themselves to explain why the situation will change.
With the greatest respect for Mr. Thiel and his accomplishments I'm skeptical. I've travelled the world and my experience is that very few places in the world have America's, often irrational, can-do attitude, appetite for new venture risk, and societal acceptance of new venture failure as an important part of the entrepreneurial process. I just don't think it's that easy to graft these cultural norms to other cultur…
Europe may or may not have the culture you are suggesting, China might have that hunger but no business started there is safe from gov control, Russia has that control without the economic growth, a lot of places are too small.
But...there's probably a dozen cities in the US where you could get everything you can in SV (ok, maybe not the monoculture, the crazy VCs, the crazy cost of living, and tens of thousands of programmers). There are massive advantages to getting out of the Valley, someone is going to realize that, if it hasn't been obvious for a decade.
Could he just be pandering to his hosts? The concentration of talent and a whole ecosystem that supports entrepreneurs is a significant advantage. It will take time for any other region to amass the same advantages.
With the greatest respect for Mr. Thiel and his accomplishments I'm skeptical. I've travelled the world and my experience is that very few places in the world have America's, often irrational, can-do attitude, appetite for new venture risk, and societal acceptance of new venture failure as an important part of the entrepreneurial process. I just don't think it's that easy to graft these cultural norms to other cultur…
This is not a profound statement, but rather obvious. If may calculations are right, there are roughly 6 billion 993 million people outside of Silicon Valley
Why did Silicon Valley ever become what it is, and why did it continue to be dominant in the tech industry for so long, when there were billions of people outside of Silicon Valley the entire time? Clearly population numbers are not sufficient in themselves to explain why the situation will change.
This is not some profound statement from Thiel, but something very obvious.
With the greatest respect for Mr. Thiel and his accomplishments I'm skeptical. I've travelled the world and my experience is that very few places in the world have America's, often irrational, can-do attitude, appetite for new venture risk, and societal acceptance of new venture failure as an important part of the entrepreneurial process. I just don't think it's that easy to graft these cultural norms to other cultur…
He referenced China. Any big startups come out of there?
Could he just be pandering to his hosts? The concentration of talent and a whole ecosystem that supports entrepreneurs is a significant advantage. It will take time for any other region to amass the same advantages.
Talent is remote and talent is willing to move, especially when they can make an extra 50% through cost of living differences. That ecosystem produces some great stuff, but a lot of it is garbage. Those advantages are perhaps overstated unless your goal is to move to SV and become a unicorn. It's almost tautological.
That's inherent to the process of all creation and business starting. 90% of everything is garbage. That's a case where there's nothing unique about Silicon Valley. I'm sure you're at least vaguely aware of the very high failure rate of all new businesses within just a five year span.
Or see: last 200 years of industrial history. There were hundreds of automakers just in Detroit in the US, experimenting with just about everything they could. Most of it was garbage. It's a required part of the process of experimentation. If someone stands up and proclaims that aspect is stupid and a waste and they know better (they'd never make such mistakes, they'd never need to perform such wasteful experimentation), well, at least then you know who you're dealing with.
With the greatest respect for Mr. Thiel and his accomplishments I'm skeptical. I've travelled the world and my experience is that very few places in the world have America's, often irrational, can-do attitude, appetite for new venture risk, and societal acceptance of new venture failure as an important part of the entrepreneurial process. I just don't think it's that easy to graft these cultural norms to other cultur…
He did say SV, which is probably true. Europe may or may not have the culture you are suggesting, China might have that hunger but no business started there is safe from gov control, Russia has that control without the economic growth, a lot of places are too small. But...there's probably a dozen cities in the US where you could get everything you can in SV (ok, maybe not the monoculture, the crazy VCs, the crazy cos…