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How Cornell Beat Stanford's Bid to Build an Engineering Campus in NYC

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Re: How Cornell Beat Stanford's Bid to Build an Engineering Campus in NYC

#11

Post by wdewind »

nitashatiku wrote: post #6
wdewind wrote: post #2

Yet another time I want 5 minutes of my life back from reading a betabeat article...when will I learn. To save the rest of you some time... TLDR: 'But both city officials and Cornell say it was the school’s superior offering that clinched the deal. “The catalyst was that Cornell was beating them in every single category,” said source close to Cornell, citing the speed of construction, the size of the campus, and the…

Thanks for your comment. Most of our posts on Betabeat take way less than 5 minutes to read. In fact, I'd peg the bulk of the breaking blog posts on news about the campus at about a minute. This was an investigation into the backstory of how the deal for the $2 billion engineering school that could change New York's economy and tech scene went down. Did Stanford drop out because it was going to lose or is Cornell the…

That actually doesn't say otherwise. What it said is that Cornell met certain conditions that Stanford didn't. It doesn't at all speak to the quality of the schools, the bidding process, or anything like that. The opposing sides don't actually seem to disagree with what happened, it just wasn't a deal that wasn't worth it to Stanford, while it was to Cornell.

It seems the story is pretty short, and again I think the quote I used summed it up pretty well: Cornell gave the best offer based on what the city wanted. Stanford didn't, and claimed the factors like environmental cleanup were "out of their control," while Cornell's offer dealt with them. You spent the entire first page of the piece reintroducing the issue to an educated audience, and I think the rest of your piece makes it seem like there is a lot more contention and competition between the two schools than there actually is.

Also don't change the title of links when you submit them to HN - it should match the title of the blog post (ie: "Safety School? As Stanford Says ‘See Ya!’ Bloomberg Hops in Bed with Big Red").

Thanks for being here to defend your piece, though. I do appreciate that you are willing to discuss, and I hope you don't take my critique personally.

Re: How Cornell Beat Stanford's Bid to Build an Engineering Campus in NYC

#12

Post by nitashatiku »

wdewind wrote: post #11
nitashatiku wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for your comment. Most of our posts on Betabeat take way less than 5 minutes to read. In fact, I'd peg the bulk of the breaking blog posts on news about the campus at about a minute. This was an investigation into the backstory of how the deal for the $2 billion engineering school that could change New York's economy and tech scene went down. Did Stanford drop out because it was going to lose or is Cornell the…

That actually doesn't say otherwise. What it said is that Cornell met certain conditions that Stanford didn't. It doesn't at all speak to the quality of the schools, the bidding process, or anything like that. The opposing sides don't actually seem to disagree with what happened, it just wasn't a deal that wasn't worth it to Stanford, while it was to Cornell. It seems the story is pretty short, and again I think the…

No, we (Betabeat and I) totally welcome feedback in any form--criticism, questions, concerns, etc. Have at us!

We usually change the headlines from paper to blog and from the blog to Hacker News only because the paper ones tend to be more opaque and literary and it seems like HN readers like it a little more straight-forward, so they know what to expect when they click on it. I've noticed other submissions doing that too, although maybe it's not the norm?

Stanford was taken aback by the unusual penalties in the contract and the negotiating stance of the city. Cornell says it was par for the course, but other NYC institutions agreed with Stanford.

I totally hear you about reintroducing issues people familiar with the backstory are already well-versed with, it's something we wouldn't do in a blog post, but the idea here was a feature that stands on its own, to encapsulates what happened over an unexpectedly tumultuous 72 hours.

Really appreciate the feedback. Always looking to improve.

Re: How Cornell Beat Stanford's Bid to Build an Engineering Campus in NYC

#13

Post by nitashatiku »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #9

And Cornell is in NY state and probably has more relevant connections with authorities than Stanford...

Yeah, the idea of knowing how to build in NYC was a big plus. There's actually still so many hoops to jump through still: the land use agreements, any remediation of the site, potential community benefits, etc.
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