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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

#251

Post by baby »

bsenftner wrote: post #196
tolbish wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Investors want to meet a slightly smarter but younger version of themselves. This makes them feel comfortable with the risk of their investment, they imagine all kinds of congruencies between you and them, even if they don't exist. They want to convey some nugget of wisdom that you, the entrepreneur, reverence as they key to their success. But most of all, they want you to be a money tree that buds and flowers and be…

Considering the amount of random cryptocurrency being funded, heh

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

#252

Post by baby »

jjav wrote: post #180
axaxs wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't figure it out. I'm fairly well travelled in the world, and San Francisco is my least favorite of any city I've ever encountered. But some tell me I just don't understand, which, in fairness, is also a true statement.

But San Francisco isn't Silicon Valley. For most of the history of Silicon Valley, SF wasn't any part of it. It is only in the last decade (roughly) that a handful of high profile companies have established in SF, so arguably, perhaps, SF is today part of Silicon Valley. Even today, none of FANG is HQ'd in San Francisco.

That feels unfair, they can’t be HQ’ed in SF because there’s no space for an HQ.

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

#253

Post by baby »

qqqwerty wrote: post #122
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 a…

I’m totally part of the problem! I actually had that theory that most people in SF are just temporarily here to get as much money as possible before leaving. Knowing that why would they try to improve anything? To improve homelessness you need both a national effort and a local effort. Both are embarrassingly small compared to the seriousness of the crisis.

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

#254

Post by helen___keller »

tjr225 wrote: post #248
helen___keller wrote: post #197

There are countless takes on this, but I'll add one more: Silicon Valley's failure is in being unable to diversify effectively from a failure in city-building. For a good stretch, the bay area was the place to be. Lots of people wanted to be there, whether or not they were engineers. The cost of living made these ambitions completely unreasonable, except for the well compensated engineers. Monoculturalism is a failur…

People have been saying SV will be the next Detroit on HN for the past 5 years. I think this might be more of a wish than based in any sort of reality. Perhaps if it _does_ go the way of Detroit then I can afford to move there!

To be clear, my position on "next Detroit" is

> rising and falling in step with the industry it's built around

The tech industry is definitely still rising

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

#255

Post by baby »

qqqwerty wrote: post #162
astrange wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are not leaving SF because tech employees are coming in. If nobody moved in, the economy would just get worse, housing wouldn't get any more available. The problem is that your parents go to every community meeting and get all the housing projects shut down to prevent "greedy developers". That's been happening consistently since the 70s.

> People are not leaving SF because tech employees are coming in I didn't say that. I literally said they are "forced out due to rising costs". I am all for tech workers moving to the bay area if it suits them. What I don't like, is tech workers who show up and then just complain about how much they hate it here. If you don't like it here, either leave or get involved with your community and help us fix things (inclu…

One day you too will move somewhere else, and realize that either you love it or that it’s pretty bad and... think “why should I try to improve this place when I can just move elsewhere?”

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

#256

Post by Lammy »

helen___keller wrote: post #197

There are countless takes on this, but I'll add one more: Silicon Valley's failure is in being unable to diversify effectively from a failure in city-building. For a good stretch, the bay area was the place to be. Lots of people wanted to be there, whether or not they were engineers. The cost of living made these ambitions completely unreasonable, except for the well compensated engineers. Monoculturalism is a failur…

> Silicon Valley's failure is in being unable to diversify effectively from a failure in city-building.

What if it's the other way around? Public school didn't teach me about the Second Great Migration of black Americans westward during and after World War 2, and I was unaware that there was basically zero black population here until then. Check out the first graph in particular in this article: https://belonging.berkeley.edu/racial-segregation-san-franci...

It's impossible for me to ignore the time correlation between these demographic changes, the civil rights movement, and the birth of California's various anti-housing policies like Prop 13. All the houses in my area of San Francisco had racial deed covenants making it illegal to sell them to non-whites, and this was new construction in the 1940s and '50s! That obviously became illegal in the 1960s so segregation became economic, locking in existing segregation by pricing out newcomers and letting existing residents pass homes to their kids down with no tax reassessment: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/OEHRENWBSHNO

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

#257

Post by emteycz »

whatever1 wrote: post #233
underdeserver wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 (docume…

Please. The vast majority of the above are fields where ML failed spectacularly. If you had any idea about medical diagnosis, biomedical research, supply chain optimization, politics and journalism you would know that machine learning is a laughing stock in these fields. ML had 2 big wins: (image & data) Classification & NLP. It is stupid to not use ML for these problems, but it equally stupid to try to fit ML in fie…

Let's not claim something has failed when it has just begun... Given today's hardware and given that it's a very new topic of research, IMHO the accomplishments are incredible. It's not yet production ready, but that doesn't mean another 10 years of progress won't get it there.

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

#258

Post by jstepka »

6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #243
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…

> Buying $3m house, so homeless guy can expose himself in front of my daughter... :( You’re talking about a few limited neighborhoods out of an entire metropolitan area.

that it's normalized is his point

shame on us for that

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

#259

Post by WalterGR »

mrgordon wrote: post #68
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.

Maybe you should check what some of their houses are worth lol

The people I know in tech in the Bay Area rent. It’s their parents, who bought their properties in the 1980s or before, who are the land-owners.

That said, I’d definitely be interested to see actual statistics about own vs. rent for people in tech in the Bay.

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

#260

Post by ubertoop »

onethought wrote: post #128
ubertoop wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

This list includes no genuinely new innovations except for maybe 5G. You are listing that China is a major manufacturer, which is true. The OPs point was that China has a record of stealing IP from the US, which is also true. Listing manufacturers in China doesn't disprove this point.

So please, if you'd like, a list of genuine technologies who's origins can be traced to China... I'll be waiting.

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