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Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

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Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#121

Post by stepbeek »

nmfisher wrote: post #76
ping_pong wrote: post #5

Im so tired of random writers, even if it's O'Reilly himself, trying to predict that Silicon Valley is doomed. That's like saying Hollywood is doomed, or Wall Street is doomed. I've been around long enough to know that nothing will unseat Silicon Valley as the tech capital of the world. Silicon Valley has the critical mass of talent, VC money and greed that can't be replicated anywhere else in the world. There's a re…

> There's a reason why we have never seen a world leading tech company come out from anywhere except the US. Probably the most ignorant comment I've ever seen on HN.

This sentiment crops up semi-frequently here and I find it really odd. The USA has a lot going for it, but they don’t have a monopoly on impactful tech.

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#122

Post by qqqwerty »

baby wrote: post #45

I’m one of them. Left San Francisco due to the shitty weather, high crime, high rent, not much to do there, everybody is absorbed by their work, etc. I’ve been travelling and I’m currently wondering if I should come back or not...

Perhaps you are part of the problem? Maybe leaving would be best for both you and SF.

I was born and raised in the area, and have watched as friends and family are forced out due to rising costs. These are folks who legitimately loved the area and were actively involved in their communities. And they get replaced by people who seem to only care about big paychecks and spend more time complaining about the area than actually doing anything to improve it.

The rise in remote work due to COVID seems like a perfect opportunity to correct this misalignment. For those that don't like it here, I think everyone would be better off if you moved to somewhere that suits you better. And as a bonus you can take your big paycheck with you. I don't mean to offend, it just gets a little old seeing people complain about a place when they are perfectly capable of leaving.

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#123

Post by [deleted] »

stepbeek wrote: post #121
nmfisher wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's a reason why we have never seen a world leading tech company come out from anywhere except the US. Probably the most ignorant comment I've ever seen on HN.

This sentiment crops up semi-frequently here and I find it really odd. The USA has a lot going for it, but they don’t have a monopoly on impactful tech.

[deleted]

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#124

Post by WalterGR »

opportune wrote: post #67
WalterGR wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who are these multi millionaires? Clearly I know the wrong people in tech in the Bay Area.

Probably most people I work with in their 30s or 40s are multimillionaires.

Yeah? On paper, 401k, or elsewhere? Where have they worked and for how long?

Because in my experience, the “everyone who works at a FAANG is a multi-millionaire” meme is 100% bullshit. Especially when I read things like https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26336029

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#125

Post by [deleted] »

nmfisher wrote: post #76
ping_pong wrote: post #5

Im so tired of random writers, even if it's O'Reilly himself, trying to predict that Silicon Valley is doomed. That's like saying Hollywood is doomed, or Wall Street is doomed. I've been around long enough to know that nothing will unseat Silicon Valley as the tech capital of the world. Silicon Valley has the critical mass of talent, VC money and greed that can't be replicated anywhere else in the world. There's a re…

> There's a reason why we have never seen a world leading tech company come out from anywhere except the US. Probably the most ignorant comment I've ever seen on HN.

[deleted]

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#126

Post by ojbyrne »

busterarm wrote: post #22
gxs wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, but never say never. The Chinese will for sure have their own version of Silicon Valley and their giants will rival ours, no doubt. I think there will be other critical centers of tech innovation, similar to how Hollywood is Hollywood but NYC has an industry as well.

Also it's very much worth nothing that Silicon Valley no longer has the monopoly on talent that it once had. In fact in some of the more important development areas now, it's shifted to places like Boston or elsewhere.

I think you’re not looking far enough back in the history of computer technology to think it’s _recently_ shifted to places like Boston. There’s always been companies outside SV, and especially in Boston. And there’s always been ebb and flow.

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#127

Post by temporalparts »

nmfisher wrote: post #76
ping_pong wrote: post #5

Im so tired of random writers, even if it's O'Reilly himself, trying to predict that Silicon Valley is doomed. That's like saying Hollywood is doomed, or Wall Street is doomed. I've been around long enough to know that nothing will unseat Silicon Valley as the tech capital of the world. Silicon Valley has the critical mass of talent, VC money and greed that can't be replicated anywhere else in the world. There's a re…

> There's a reason why we have never seen a world leading tech company come out from anywhere except the US. Probably the most ignorant comment I've ever seen on HN.

Instead of calling OP ignorant, can you help us with world-leading tech companies that are not in the US?

I can think of Tencent from China in terms of company valuation, but my impression is that Tencent's dominance is confined to China instead of the world.

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#128

Post by onethought »

ubertoop wrote: post #17
onethought wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the best the world could do is China which just stole US ideas and then built a firewall to keep others out. So where was WeChat and ubiquitous QR codes for everything stolen from? Silicon Valley still haven't figured out how to do Ubiquitous contactless payment... it's like going back in time every time I travel there, and I have to swipe a credit card and sign with a pen. Or Taiwan's COVID/PPE Supply tracking sys…

You've listed literally 4 things. You can't really believe that compares to the innovations to come out of Silicon Valley, right?

Sorry, your right:

- largest electric vehicle manufacturer and adoption

- 5G (still no SV grown solution there)

- Most advanced solar manufacture

- biggest investor in renewable energy and nuclear

- biggest investor in space based technology and delivery

If you’d like more I can keep going. I was responding to: “they steal everything”... I pointed out the most widely used social network that was homegrown and unique.

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#129

Post by onethought »

no_wizard wrote: post #16
onethought wrote: post #6

Isn't another growing/bigger centre for technology innovation now in China/Taiwan? Are we just pretending that Silicon Valley is still Mecca?

I think its fair to say that they're growing for sure, as the government and corporations have been investing there. What I feel makes Silicon Valley unique (backed by the history as I understand it) is the proximity of things - The foundational organizations and proximity to an intense congregation of early innovation orgs, many of which started in Silicon Valley, or always had a large presence from the early days -…

I’m guessing you haven’t been to Shenzhen. Where everything you mentioned is, and growing.

Re: Other challenges to SV’s preeminence are more fundamental than the tech diaspora

#130

Post by weinzierl »

Apocryphon wrote: post #78

The article reminds me somewhat of an earlier O’Reilly piece, which taught me that the man’s got a bit of social consciousness in his critiques of SV: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23657403 I suspect the Pollyanna tone is why people aren’t actually engaging with the material in it. Applying machine learning to medical science is indeed exciting, but it’s hard to envision what exactly is the product that causes…

“The nexus of machine learning and medicine, biology, and materials science will be to the coming decades what Silicon Valley has been to the late 20th and early 21st century.”

I've been hearing the trinity of information technology, life sciences and materials science for over a quarter of a century again and again. Since the first time and ever since it reminds me of these tests where you are presented a list of words that are related somehow and you have to find the one word that doesn't fit in the set.

For me materials science seems to almost fit at first glance, but not really when you look at it. Both the other areas have already changed our life more than anything in the past decades and there is good reason they will continue to do so even more in the near and intermediate future. I don't see this to be true for materials science. At least there seem to be at least a dozen fields that are equally influential.

Does anyone know why materials science is so often included?

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