Reasons startups move to Silicon Valley And Things Boston can do to keep them | Hacker News Reader

Reasons startups move to Silicon Valley And Things Boston can do to keep them

masshightech.com

Here's a suggestion: have Boston develop a culture in which people have actual friends (as opposed to colleagues) and discuss things other than their careers.

Boston is a weird place. In some ways it is incredibly liberal and progressive, but in other ways it is unbelievably conservative and stuffy.

As a Bostonian since 2005, November, December, January, February, and March are pretty compelling reasons to move.

Ugh, I can already feel my SAD kicking in :<

Also June, July, August, and about half of September.

Really, Boston is only tolerable for that one glorious week each in the spring and fall.

I do miss Boston. But not the weather. It'd be nice if we got an occasional thunder storm out here, though.

I enjoy the Boston weather. People in CA have weather which is too 'nice' all the time (SF excluded, big time) and as a result never know how to appreciate good weather.

I love having seasons and wouldn't trade my beautiful autumns just to be in CA.

Cambridge is basically a micro-silicon valley. Although I think Boston will continue to remain a strong contender for the #2 spot in tech, I don't think it will eclipse the Valley.

Boston does however already eclipse the Valley in terms of academics.

Simply put, schools are what Boston does best. Startup activity is and will always continue to be a side effect of the strong academic presence here. In the Bay area, it seems to be the other way around.

this resonates at different levels for different communities. most important to me: Dollars/(Control+Speed) Ratio

A close second is also the number of deals an angel has done. It signals two things to me: a) they are comfortable/know how to do this b) they have an extensive network of other people they have done deals with. 20 different deals with an average of 4-5 investors in each, means a network of 80-100 investors they've coinvested with. will obvi be some overlap. You can disregard this for newer angels and use a gut instinct to see if this is something they really want to do. I know you just started doing investments as an angel, but it's very clear out there that this is something you plan on doing, enjoyit, and know the way it works.

Honestly, I think non-competes are really the lynch-pin and belong on that list. Non-competes last 2-5 years.

2 years? A startup thats just, uh, starting up may not know if they're going to be around in 6 months, never mind being able to wait 2 years.

All this reasons have to do with raising money and valuations. I will concede that this is important but I think the problem that any other area runs into when trying to take something back from Silicon Valley isn't the money, but the community.

The Boston tech community, like the Chicago, Austin, or NYC ones, have a few technological superstars. Yet, Silicon Valley has more. A ton more. It's had decades of a headstart.

That, imho, is the biggest asset that Silicon Valley has. Part of that has to do with money (all the reasons the article mentions) but a lot of it just has to do with the fact that the Silicon Valley network and community is just so damn good.

He gets into that in point five:

>To paraphrase Terminator II, the Valley is an order of magnitude closer to being self-aware, and evolving at a rapid pace as an innovation ecosystem. ...Whether it’s Y Combinator’s special access to Facebook’s latest private-beta APIs; ... or sharing secret tips over beers on what viral or SEO or marketing technique worked for Quora, Mint or Tagged, there is a big knowledge-sharing and access advantage.

The other issue in Boston is one of focus. The reason Boston tech events and community blog posts, conversations, etc tend to be about funding is that it's all the consumer Boston startups have in common.

There's no concentration (like NYC) and not enough volume (like SV) to get 10 people in a room all making startups that have similar issues beyond fundraising, hiring, and office space. That's not how communities are built. Communities are built on what makes them unique. Many Boston entrepreneurs find their peer communities in SF.

Talking about fundraising all the time is boring.

But its a self-fulfilling prophecy - if we don't do everything to keep companies where they are founded (which requires VCs and Angels to be more forgiving), it will only continue to improve the SV area and hurt the other tech communities, like Boston. I think if you are a founder, you should really focus on grabbing money in your local ecosystems and STRESSING to VCs/Angels that this is an investment in the local economy, and strengthening our presence in the entrepreneurial community.

But as a founder, what are your priorities? Strengthening the local economy, or making your business work? I don't think most founders have the luxury to insist that they get funded in their hometown.

Agreed, it's a tough problem. I think Boston investors want to support Boston startups, but because of their structure/individual limitations (mentioned in the article) they can't necessarily "take one for the team" if it's investing 20% of their 'dry powder' for the year.

That said I do think startups can play the "fund us locally" card a bit.

It's not REALLY a priority, but a tactic for fundraising. Mint bought their domain from a VC by saying he could be the only investor in the NYC area and that would stroke his ego. The same thing needs to happen in Boston.

however, once a consumer web start-up in boston does get some initial traction and raise money, it has incredible access to talent. gemvara.com and SCVNGR are two great examples. they've been able to use the dearth of consumer web investments in boston to their advantage and recruit all this great young talent, and not needing to fight with 10 hot competitors to retain them.

The problem here is that if you really want to work in a company like that and you're young, you probably still are going to try to move out West (at least this is what I did).

It's possible there is somewhat of a brain drain occurring due to the lack of startups from East to West, I don't really know of a lot of people that have moved the reverse.

I went to Northeastern University and the coop program is great, but it always seemed like established companies (I worked for 1 startup which was an amazing experience, and 2 defense contractors) were a lot more aggressive about hitting them up for talent instead of startups (which could have taken advantage of young, cheap, aggressive engineers).

Naive Optimism.

"...the Valley is an order of magnitude closer to being self-aware." LOL.

I don't know why I'm getting downvoted. That quote from the article was funny.

I should preface this next statement by saying, I'm not trolling, this doesn't apply to the Valley in particular and this is serious food for thought:

Does anyone worry that all the sharing of tips about what worked for company X and what new thing company Y is doing actually stifles innovation by creating an echo chamber of sorts?

Do these tips and tricks become "rules" that keep a person's thinking inside a box? Are the innovations just re-applications of existing ideas?

Not in every case, but certainly in many. Not to pick on anyone in particular, but let's look at Posterous. It's an email gateway for a blog. It's simple and elegant to use (I use it and love it), and they obviously rock at the biz/dev/marketing aspect of the business --- but is it really that innovative? How much does Posterous further the evolution of the Internet?

How about Quora? Again, great site --- but it's a question and answer app. It's been done at least a dozen times before. Does Quora increase the pace at which the Internet evolves?

I remember reading something from PG about music startups (paraphrased), that "the music industry is a just a vacuum to suck your VC dollars." Hence, he's not super stoked on investing in music startups.

He's obviously seen his share of failed music startups and has talked to others in the Valley who also have first hand experience with failed music startups.

But, is it possible that the Valley isn't thinking creatively enough about music startups? That maybe the Valley can't think creatively enough because it innovates between the lines?

It's also crucial to recognize that most disruptive businesses don't start in the Valley. They move there so their VC can keep an eye on them.

I don't know. I'll probably get banned from HN for thinking a little dangerously and questioning the established thinking so openly.

You got downvoted not because you're critical of Silicon Valley but because your comment was a useless 3-character "LOL" that adds nothing to the conversation. As soon as you explained why you thought it was laughable you got upvoted.

Adding LOL next to a pretentious statement like, "the Valley is an order of magnitude closer to being self-aware" adds to the conversation that I think it's a silly statement. I didn't think more words needed to be written to get that point across.

But, you're clearly in the majority, so point made. No more LOLs from me. I'll explain myself fully from now on.

I think those are very fair questions. On the one hand I agree a lot of startups can be derivative and may not pass the "how is this making the world better" question. But at the same time, that's a much higher bar than most companies are held to...

As far as Quora and Posterous as examples, I think their excellent UX do advance the world in that they help people share their thoughts and experiences better/more easily than with previous generations of those ideas.

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