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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

#201

Post by purple-again »

AussieWog93 wrote: post #190

I started a PhD in biomedical engineering back in 2017, coming from a EEE background. The topic I was studying was the application of machine learning for neurosignal decoding. Imagine the development of a "thought keyboard" that could be used by someone with motor neurone disease to communicate with their family or drive a robotic arm - young me was excited! While it's true that the field had shifted towards machine…

Really disappointing to hear this. The ML revolution is very real and so is the immense value it’s capable of granting us...HOWEVER it’s really only in a narrow category of problems and people don’t want to admit that so they try to shoehorn it into every corner of everything...not too dissimilar from blockchain.

That narrow problem space where ML has become revolutionary is classification problems where the cost of a false positive is marginal. In the industry we frequently refer to it as “professional judgement” and anyone who has ever referred to that statement in the course of their work should be concerned because ML is coming for you. As far as the false positive part of it, we’ll no on bats an eye when a surgeon loses a patient, but we’re unlikely to accept the same from a computer any time soon.

The biggest area where I can think of that this narrow problem space exists to be capitalized on is...search. Not surprising then that Google became a king of ML because to them it was actually a revolutionary leap forward to their core problem.

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

#202

Post by nmfisher »

temporalparts wrote: post #127
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.

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.

There's dozens already listed - but just to name a few off the top of my head - ARM, TSMC, Spotify, Sony, Nintendo, DJI, TikTok (ByteDance), Atlassian, Skype (pre-MS), Canva, Nubank.

And that's also ignoring the dozens of Chinese companies that dwarf their US counterparts but don't really do much outside China (Ant/Alibaba/Jingdong/DiDi/etc).

"Only the US can produce world-leading tech companies" is the type of thing you say when you get all your news from TechCrunch and have never been outside the US.

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

#203

Post by gedy »

astrange wrote: post #147
keenreed wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

》But as long as more immigrants from other countries come to Silicon Valley because they've heard about how rich people come Why should I come to SV? Living standard, taxes, workforce cost, housing... I may get $5m funding, but that would only buy an office and couple of employees for a few years. And if I ever make it, VC and California taxes would eat 90% of my profit. And do not even let me start on family and chi…

California doesn't have a high tax burden. If you manage to get a house you're actually set, it's a feudal system where you essentially never have to pay taxes again, since your property tax will be below inflation forever.

Prop 13 allows for 2% increase every year[0]. That's more than the (supposed) inflation rate in many years[1], though agreed that feels inaccurate.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1978_California_Proposition_...

[1] https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/inflation-cpi

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

#204

Post by sradman »

rcxdude wrote: post #192
sradman wrote: post #189

> as Theranos demonstrated so vividly, it is harder to sustain a hype balloon in a scientific enterprise than in many of the markets where Silicon Valley has prospered. This narrative continues to frustrate me. Eleanor Roosevelt famously said: > Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people. The big idea behind Theranos was that combining multiple microfluidic tests could produce…

> Ultimately they were foiled by brain-dead regulatory tests that specified blood draw volumes of blood. This regulatory test has to change to accommodate fingerpick volumes of blood; a key feature of microfluidic tests. As I understand it, for many of the tests Theranos was aiming to do there's no real way to achieve it with the tiny volumes of blood they were trying to use: the concentrations of the substance they…

> for many of the tests Theranos was aiming to do there's no real way to achieve it with the tiny volumes of blood they were trying to use

This is exactly the right question to ask. Right from the start we should have had a scorecard of the common lab tests doctors request (under 50 I think). For each test you should ask “is it possible with microfluidics?” and then “has it been combined on a single strip/card yet?”

I’m not sure if any concentrations are too low for microfluidics rather than the dilution required to meet the volumes specified in the standardized tests. Are fingerpick volumes too small or are the regulatory tests outdated?

The same issue applies to self administered rapid antigen tests during the pandemic. Regulators focused on the “gold standard" PCR tests and ignored the benefit of cheap and easy unamplified tests that can be used in a daily regiment.

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

#205

Post by keenreed »

jjav wrote: post #182
keenreed wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I looked a few years back, nice houses would go around 12k/month. Maybe shared condos are not expensive, but not everyone wants to live that way.

Your definition of nice is pretty over the top, even by SV standards, if you'd need 12K/mo to find a place.

Maybe now corona it is better, but a few years landlords could choose from several applicants. 12k was realistic asking price for foreigner with no credit history without waiting.

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

#206

Post by nikanj »

purple-again wrote: post #201
AussieWog93 wrote: post #190

I started a PhD in biomedical engineering back in 2017, coming from a EEE background. The topic I was studying was the application of machine learning for neurosignal decoding. Imagine the development of a "thought keyboard" that could be used by someone with motor neurone disease to communicate with their family or drive a robotic arm - young me was excited! While it's true that the field had shifted towards machine…

Really disappointing to hear this. The ML revolution is very real and so is the immense value it’s capable of granting us...HOWEVER it’s really only in a narrow category of problems and people don’t want to admit that so they try to shoehorn it into every corner of everything...not too dissimilar from blockchain. That narrow problem space where ML has become revolutionary is classification problems where the cost of…

And just like blockchain, the reason it gets forced into every field is VCs.

"We are going to challenge existing players in $market" gets you nothing, "We are going to disrupt $market with blockchain/ML" gets you a eight-digit seed round.

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

#207

Post by keenreed »

astrange wrote: post #147
keenreed wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

》But as long as more immigrants from other countries come to Silicon Valley because they've heard about how rich people come Why should I come to SV? Living standard, taxes, workforce cost, housing... I may get $5m funding, but that would only buy an office and couple of employees for a few years. And if I ever make it, VC and California taxes would eat 90% of my profit. And do not even let me start on family and chi…

California doesn't have a high tax burden. If you manage to get a house you're actually set, it's a feudal system where you essentially never have to pay taxes again, since your property tax will be below inflation forever.

Compared to what? California is not exactly known as tax heaven.

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

#208

Post by astrange »

tolbish wrote: post #161
astrange wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The investors care. Traditionally they wouldn't fund anyone who wasn't in easy reach. It's also easier to hire employees since they're all in SV.

I am curious. What else do investors "traditionally" care about? I am referring to aspects that aren't always explicit, like physical proximity. Do investors not also want (competent) exceptions that stand out?

Some VCs want to see you have a good team that works together, and some combination of good ideas and work history that makes it seem like your startup will take off even if you have to pivot and give up your current prototype.

Others are having a midlife crisis and want to be your new rich dad, or they want a cult leader who makes them feel smart and throws cool insider parties. In this case it helps to be a white guy or at least Elizabeth Holmes.

One would hope YC is the first since we’re on their website, but having read pg’s essays and noticed his advice for startups is half post hoc fallacies (“use Lisp because I did”) and half is unethical (“don’t hire women or people with accents to get culture fit”) I dunno.

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

#209

Post by tchalla »

purple-again wrote: post #201
AussieWog93 wrote: post #190

I started a PhD in biomedical engineering back in 2017, coming from a EEE background. The topic I was studying was the application of machine learning for neurosignal decoding. Imagine the development of a "thought keyboard" that could be used by someone with motor neurone disease to communicate with their family or drive a robotic arm - young me was excited! While it's true that the field had shifted towards machine…

Really disappointing to hear this. The ML revolution is very real and so is the immense value it’s capable of granting us...HOWEVER it’s really only in a narrow category of problems and people don’t want to admit that so they try to shoehorn it into every corner of everything...not too dissimilar from blockchain. That narrow problem space where ML has become revolutionary is classification problems where the cost of…

In you view, why do you think the society has an issue when a “machine “ makes a decision vs a human? Can you think of a legitimate areas where trust in machine outputs wouldn’t be favoured vs a human?

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

#210

Post by underdeserver »

purple-again wrote: post #201
AussieWog93 wrote: post #190

I started a PhD in biomedical engineering back in 2017, coming from a EEE background. The topic I was studying was the application of machine learning for neurosignal decoding. Imagine the development of a "thought keyboard" that could be used by someone with motor neurone disease to communicate with their family or drive a robotic arm - young me was excited! While it's true that the field had shifted towards machine…

Really disappointing to hear this. The ML revolution is very real and so is the immense value it’s capable of granting us...HOWEVER it’s really only in a narrow category of problems and people don’t want to admit that so they try to shoehorn it into every corner of everything...not too dissimilar from blockchain. That narrow problem space where ML has become revolutionary is classification problems where the cost of…

Seriously? A narrow category of problems?

ML has been used and is being used to significantly advance image processing, video processing, image classification, speech-to-text, natural language understanding, medical imaging interpretation, medical notes and differential diagnosis, warehouse management, shipping and delivery, transportation, networking, agriculture, biomedical research, insurance, law practice (document scanning), journalism, politics (through better polling, targeting, gerrymandering, whatever), probably other things I'm missing.

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