I'm a little surprised Chicago is not on the list. The Chicago tech scene is not huge, but it is growing, and it is definitely much more dynamic than Philly or LA or San Diego. It is the third largest metro in the country with a large hinterland, so cost of living is still fairly affordable. Tales of crime are overblown by the media -- they are mostly outside the city, and normalized to population, is not significantly higher than other large metros.

There are also two elite schools here: Northwestern and U of Chicago, with many other middle tier schools that can supply tech talent like UIC, DePaul, etc. Being the mecca of the midwest, it also draws talent from many excellent midwestern schools like UIUC, Purdue, Michigan and Wisconsin.

Argonne National Lab is also based out here. The major economy is finance for now, but transportation is also huge (Chicago is a major transport hub).

Google, Microsoft, Amazon etc. all have presence here, and startups like Uptake and Spothero are based here. Groupon has kind of imploded though.

I don't think these folks are really looking in the right places.