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Comment by shostack | Hacker News Reader

Reading headlines these days, I can't help but feel this is yet another article trying to foretell the end of the good times.

The market had a correction! This is the end!

People realized China's numbers were not totally accurate! This is the end!

Housing prices in the Bay Area have reached ridiculous levels (again)! This is the end!

Everyone seems to want us to hit another downturn to be proven right. My fear is that once the media engine revs up, it can in fact create a self-fulfilling prophecy.

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I completely agree with what you said. Media is putting the fear on you. It'll turn into.. 'Whether you think you can or you can't, you're already right.'. People will fail simply because they think they will.

Just to note: Facebook just had 1 billion unique users in 1 day (2015). The year 2000 only had 350+ million INTERNET USERS.

It doesn't help that we are reminded by our predecessor's to watch out for the impending doom (something that might not have been expected). In the scheme of things, the context of where technology/internet was at the time was completely different to now.

I think there's a difference between a moderate downturn and a cataclysmic crash, and since 2000 was especially bad for tech and 2009 especially bad for everyone we're not used to mild to moderate downturns around here. A downtown doesn't mean people stop using technology, just that the market conditions change.

Pundits have always made somewhat of a sport predicting a tech bubble bursting. Some of Manjoo's ideas of what could bring about a "bubble" bursting are ludicrous (read: a "Donald Trump inauguration??") If anything VCs and angels may fund fewer or safer startups, but there are numerous reasons why this business environment isn't a bubble like in the early 00's

The point is not whether or not there will be a downturn. In any sector, there will be a downturn ... eventually. That's just capitalism. (And it could be triggered in the short term by something like the small reasons you mock - it is merely not wise to bet your shirt on one or the other being the exact proximate cause.)

The point according to OP is that the start-up scene has become soft and flabby, and lean times, whenever they arrive and for whatever reason, will toughen it up - and for those who can survive the initial chill winds, lower costs of labour, real estate etc will provide a boost.

This article actually seems to be suggesting that a downturn would be a good thing for Silicon Valley because it would help sort the wheat from the chaff, and allow the wheat to get resources more cheaply.

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