Silicon Valley.
If you're moving somewhere, why waste time on a city that is distant second, in terms of startup ecosystems? It's not like Boston or NYC are significantly cheaper than the valley.
If you're moving somewhere, why waste time on a city that is distant second, in terms of startup ecosystems? It's not like Boston or NYC are significantly cheaper than the valley.
There's plenty of tech stuff and tech people in NYC. That little kickstarter site isn't in san mateo after all. Your new best friend digital ocean isn't making white house rooms across from twitter. etsy is allowed to be as dumb as it wants.
In NYC you have non-scary transit running 24 hours that'll take you home because everybody is within walking distance of a metro station (and not just to a parking lot where you pick up your car then drive another 30 minutes home while tired at 2am).
Population. SF: 800k (bay area entire: 7 million, but over 40+ miles) NYC: 8 million. In NYC you have lots more people within transit range making people-involved things like meetings, dating, and varied social contexts immensely easier (and more interesting, exciting, unexpected, varied, ...).
NYC has its street people population under control so it's less scary walking around fighting off beggars are street pooers.
NYC's parks are kinda great.
and best of all, no Karl.
I agree with most of your other pro-NYC points though (and I live in SF).
That said, I'd like to point out that every city has it's own learning curve, and there's no real way to be honest, and make promises to transplants that any given city's streets will be paved with gold. (...unless, of course, you literally pave them with gold yourself)
(as for my living credentials go, I've lived in Astoria, Harlem, Jersey City, Long Island City, UWS, ... it's not a park place penthouse, but it is a non-bank-breaking life.)
NYC lets you live near a station much easier than in SF with its linear (in-city) one-line system with a total of seven entire usable city stops.
I think I can destroy your argument with: how many daily private bus services do companies run in NYC vs SF for employees to get from Where They Want To Live to their prescribed daytime slavery zones?
Personally, I don't care for SF and it's surrounding cities. They feel small to me (they are, compared to NYC), I haven't been nearly as intrigued by the culture as I am in NYC or in Boston, I hate cars, I need the seasons, it's far from the rest of my family, etc.. This makes me very interested in ecosystems outside of Silicon Valley.
Well sure, but the goals of the article were in terms of startup ecosystems. I don't think anyone says it's impossible to dislike the bay area (so much to love, so much to hate). The whole article had nothing to do with "liking" a city.
Anecdotally, when I moved from Silicon Valley to Boston, my rent stayed the same price and but I got to live in twice as big a house.
Non-anecdotally, look at these real estate price maps.
Boston (Middlesex County, north side of the city): http://www.trulia.com/home_prices/Massachusetts/Middlesex_Co...
SF (San Mateo County, south of SF): http://www.trulia.com/home_prices/California/San_Mateo_Count...
You can buy a relatively large house within a few miles of downtown Boston for around $400k. I don't think that's possible in SF.
Come to Texas!
Optimize for living near easy access to either the light-rail, bus-stops, or the highways--59 and 45 are the big ones, the 610 loop is as well. Don't live in the Galleria area--too expensive and the traffic is shitty.
Basically, living nearish to downtown or the universities is a good idea. You can get very cheap places if you move outside Beltway 8, but the commute time sucks rocks. Inside 610 is the best if you can swing it.
If you find yourself in town, drop me a line, and we can grab beers--I'll link you in with some of my startup folks here.
That's debatable. I think Boston and the Valley are about the same (with the Valley maybe a little ahead) for biotech. Either way, Boston (as a city) is depressing as fuck, so I would avoid it like the plague.
The biggest difference between BOS and SFO are the big biotechs. SFO has one (GNE), while BOS many.
http://www.cbinsights.com/blog/trends/silicon-valley-financi...
Interestingly, NY is the one market taking some share from SV but the gap remains massive.
I think in the past couple years, things like funding have become more global, and there's a strong case for having a small presence in SFBA and a larger presence in a place like Seattle, Austin, Boulder, or really anywhere with a concentration of talent for hiring. I'm hoping to check out some Asia/Pacific places in October/November, and Central/Eastern Europe around xmas.
Yes they are plus some of us really don't want to live in a place with a 3:1 gender ratio.
http://www.maletofemaleratio.com/wiki/California-CA/San_Fran...
San Jose has been forever in the headlines as one of the worst cities for men to date, how is this news to you just now? http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/weird/San-Jose-Looking-More-L...
San Jose
>> The U.S. Department of the Obvious finds that there are 117 men for every 100 women in the age range of 20 to 44 years old.
>> Mountain View has a ratio of 125 to 100.