Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

businessweek.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 80 posts

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#71

Post by Crito »

chasing wrote: post #54

There's a related conversation happening in the neighborhood I live in, Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Not about techies specifically, but about the general wave of wealthier young folks moving in and driving up rents. Displacing existing residents. Gentrifying. Etc. Now, I can afford to continue living there, so maybe it's easy to hold this view, but I never felt I could get too upset about this situation. First: It's a gr…

> "Maybe I'm just one of the people the "real residents" get to hate on"

I think here you have touched on the root of all of these sort of "issues": the notion that people how have lived in a neighborhood longer than others are somehow "better", "more deserving", or "'real' citizens".

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#72

Post by wonderzombie »

Man, I am 100% sympathetic to the issues Solnit is talking about -- gentrification, the plight of the poor, public transit -- but I find this approach & framing completely off-putting. It's hard to articulate why. Maybe the whiff of entitlement to SF the way Solnit believes it ought to be, as if that's somehow purer SF than prior waves of change.

The upshot is that I'm way more conflicted than I might have been otherwise. And while it's not like I, as an individual, have some great sway over this debate, I can't imagine I'm the only leftie who feels sympathetic but alienated.

Maybe that's that cost of doing business here, so to speak. It's no secret there's a huge libertarian streak running through tech. And it's not difficult to imagine how unpopular a lot of obnoxious young white men in tech might already be in some areas.

And finally: big name tech companies = big headlines.

Disclosure: I work for one of the big companies discussed in this piece.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#73

Post by BashiBazouk »

raldi wrote: post #67
BashiBazouk wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But your argument as to why has little to do with the actual reasons to two public transportation systems differ and you make assumptions about the history of California that are flatly just wrong. Not to mention ignore the differences in geography. California has a certain flavor of liberal politics but remember that this is recent and has not always been so, and to this day varies quite a bit depending where you ar…

> Much of the explosion of building in the Bay Area has been recent and during a period that no one wanted public transportation, they wanted a car. You're saying that the region's transit was built up during a time when people didn't care about public transit. I think that's mostly true, and it led to a milquetoast "well, let's just sort of put some train stations around the edge but not do anything that might upset…

"well, let's just sort of put some train stations around the edge but not do anything that might upset anyone"

And this is the crux of my point. Those CalTrain stations, when they were built, were EXACTLY where people wanted to go. The center of each down town. Look on a map. Caltrain is a very direct route to San Jose. The opposite of your argument that it is in any way "milquetoast". Even BART served where people wanted to commute to when it was planned out. The Bay Area has exploded with building since then.

"If you think you can't build good transit late in a city's history, how do you explain London or Paris?"

Uh...train technology not existing for most of those two cities histories?

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#74

Post by nostrademons »

mbesto wrote: post #48
wmf wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

many would be happy to live in low-COL regions (instead of cramming into SF) Isn't Mountain View (or pretty much anywhere else in the valley) cheaper than SF? If these people have no time outside of work to appreciate SF and can barely afford the rent, why are they living there?

It probably correlates more to age than anything. SF is a more popular place to live if you are young, single, and outgoing (i.e. more to do there). Mountain View (and areas like PA, Menlo Park, etc) are much more appealing to people with families.

And introverts. I've never understood the complaints about the South Bay being socially dead. I've got a very busy social life here with a number of friends within walking distance, it's just my idea of socializing involves going out to dinner or over to someone's house for Starcraft or board games or a movie instead of doing a pub crawl of half a dozen bars or having a raucous house party.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#75

Post by nostrademons »

raldi wrote: post #55
BashiBazouk wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uh...have you actually ridden Caltrain? Outside of SF, Caltrain stops in the very heart of each down town. San Bruno, Burlingame, San Mateo, Belmont, San Carlos, Redwood city, Menlo Park, Palo Alto, Mountain view, San Jose all have stations that border the historical main down town (I think Sunnyvale and Santa Clara as well). In SF proper, it's probably more to do with geography than land purchases. Trains really don…

> Uh...have you actually ridden Caltrain? No, and that's sort of my point. I've lived in SF since the summer of 2008, and not once in all that time has Caltrain ever been useful to me. It doesn't pick up anywhere near anything, and it doesn't run to any place I want to go. Meanwhile, when I lived in New York, I rode the subway, the LIRR, the PATH train, Metro North, and even Amtrak all over the place, in no small par…

FWIW, I live in Mountain View, have a car, and still frequently use Caltrain to get up to friends or events in the city. I'm within walking distance of the station, and during rush hour traffic Caltrain will often get me there faster than 101 will.

It's somewhat ironic (and telling about SF) that as a suburban commuter I've made better use of public transit than you have in the city, but it really is pretty convenient if you're going to any of the downtowns on the Peninsula, anything BART-accessible, or Candlestick Park.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#76

Post by yuhong »

michaelochurch wrote: post #63
11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any company with $250k++ execs working 11:00-3:00 is not going to be around very long. Among the execs in those ranks I've known, if you're a corporate exec making $500k+, the company owns you. When the CEO calls at 2:00 AM Sunday and says, "We've got a problem is Shenzhen", you're on a plane a 6:00 AM, too bad if your daughter's senior recital is 2:00 PM that day.

Any company with $250k++ execs working 11:00-3:00 is not going to be around very long. Actually, there's something worse for a typical company than a typical exec making $250k++ while working 11-3: that same exec working a full day. if you're a corporate exec making $500k+, the company owns you. When the CEO calls at 2:00 AM Sunday and says, "We've got a problem is Shenzhen", you're on a plane a 6:00 AM, too bad if y…

Note the words typical company though, it depends a lot on the culture I think. Reminds me of this BTW: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2011013

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#77

Post by mistakoala »

ChrisNorstrom wrote: post #35

"Are Job Creators and Tax Paying Workers Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit", fixed that for you. The idiocy of this article is disturbing: "Twitter got this tax break to stay in San Francisco that they blackmailed out of the mayor" (They "blackmailed" him? Really?) "young men coming in, and they’re transient. They’re not committed to the place" (which is why they bought a house in a dump neighbor…

"young men coming in, and they’re transient."

Isn't that similar rhetoric that was employed in the 20s and 30s? That comment conjures up memories of reading Of Mice and Men.

She should just have the balls to say she's anti-immigrant, wherever they're from.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#78

Post by logfromblammo »

wf wrote: post #19
logfromblammo wrote: post #8

In nature, when a single-celled organism grows large, it divides. Silicon Valley--or more accurately the tech companies located there--needs to diversify geographically. It has gone beyond a critical mass and is starting to hurt itself and the surrounding communities from the excess. The problem is that there are few other nucleation sites that a viable tech community can condense around. The major tech employers are…

>>The problem is that there are few other nucleation sites that a viable tech community can condense around. What? There are lots of places that could fill this role.

30 is not "lots", in my opinion. I don't have the same freedom to choose my hometown that nurses or auto mechanics or plumbers enjoy. I'm stuck with a few metropolises and a handful of other areas. And some of those areas are predominantly government contract work, which are almost universally terrible.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#79

Post by raldi »

nostrademons wrote: post #75
raldi wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Uh...have you actually ridden Caltrain? No, and that's sort of my point. I've lived in SF since the summer of 2008, and not once in all that time has Caltrain ever been useful to me. It doesn't pick up anywhere near anything, and it doesn't run to any place I want to go. Meanwhile, when I lived in New York, I rode the subway, the LIRR, the PATH train, Metro North, and even Amtrak all over the place, in no small par…

FWIW, I live in Mountain View, have a car, and still frequently use Caltrain to get up to friends or events in the city. I'm within walking distance of the station, and during rush hour traffic Caltrain will often get me there faster than 101 will. It's somewhat ironic (and telling about SF) that as a suburban commuter I've made better use of public transit than you have in the city, but it really is pretty convenien…

> It's somewhat ironic (and telling about SF) that as a suburban commuter I've made better use of public transit than you have in the city

Who said I don't take transit? My wife and I both take trains to work, and ride transit whenever possible. The primary factor in choosing our home was to be within walking distance of transit.

It's just Caltrain that I've found totally useless.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#80

Post by gaius »

sliverstorm wrote: post #44
gaius wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why should he have to fix it? Who was there first?

The spectrum WiFi operates in is free for any and all to use, and you don't get squatter's rights. If you want a frequency nobody else has the right to use, you are going to have to buy your own spectrum.

While technically true, that is clearly a bad way to think about this. It's analogous to someone playing loud music on the bus, and you telling someone, if you don't like it buy your own bus.
Post reply on HN