Respectfully, terrible places to meet ‘startup people’. Great place to meet H1Bs though. Valuable perspectives too.

‘Startup people’ tend to congregate in very dangerous, played out, empty neighborhoods like SoMa, FiDi, and lower Market. Great place to get jumped by the way. You’ll find software people all up and down the peninsula, sure, but those aren’t the droids you’re looking for. Those are comfortable salarymen. You want a ‘startup person’ - someone crazy enough to start a business in this market, and naive enough to be the obvious mark at Peet’s near the ferry building with his new MacBook falling out of his backpack.

Edit: punctuation

I don't know if these have the density and walkability I'm looking for. I am thinking more Palo Alto, Berkeley, perhaps parts of SF.