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Comment by mathattack | Hacker News Reader

I think it's fair to start with, "No industries or geographies are pure meritocracies." Then it's worth asking, "Where does Silicon Valley fit in the spectrum?"

Is it more or less meritocratic than teaching? Being an actuary? A politician? A banker? A lawyer? Advertising? Writing?

I don't know all of the answers, but my impression is the market forces on startups (Can you get funding? Can you get customers?) at least pushes them towards being meritocratic. Software also is more binary than fields like writing. The program does have to compile and work.

But is it a pure meritocracy? I doubt it.

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The thing the author is challenging here is not whether Silicon Valley is a meritocracy, but whether it is as much of a meritocracy as its participants believe. It doesn't matter much how it compares to other industries.

In my (limited) experience, among successful founders and investors -- the "trend setters" of startup culture -- there is a widely held notion that anyone with a computer, a good brain, a decent idea, a little bit of luck and the gumption to do some hard work can build a billion dollar company. The author is suggesting that this is not true.

I'd tend to believe that if you have a badass business deal that is truly worth 1B, you have know-how to get it off the ground, and have exceptional presentation skills (its all about the sell, at this point) a VC wouldn't say no because a person is black, female, gay, or all 3. VCs are their to make money, and they see white male harvard dropouts with no social life to be a safe bet. Convince them that you have a plan to net a return, that is, convince them based on your MERIT, and you'll be successful.

Meritocracy is based on merit, not "giving everyone a fair chance," even if that's what the author would prefer. Though, that's not to say that a bias doesn't exist.

It says enough that when thinking of what would overcome the obstacles of being black, female and gay you come up with a "sure-thing 1 billion dollar deal."

I'd tend to believe that if you have a badass business deal [...] a VC wouldn't say no because a person is black, female, gay, or all 3.

But what data causes you to 'tend to believe'? That assumption is kind of at the heart of the article - not that SV is a pure meritocracy (I doubt many places in the world really are) but that people's perception is that it is a lot more meritocratic than it is - and no-one ever checks to see if their perception is backed up by fact.

But what data causes you to 'tend to believe'?

Probably the same level of data behind the article we're discussing.

If she had started the article with "I'm just basing this whole article on my own biases and no real data, but..." then we wouldn't really have much to argue about.

I think in this case the article is trying to shift the burden of proof. Why should it be on someone who's asking whether it's a meritocracy rather than on the folks who're repeating this claim? And if the answer is in the affirmative, let's have that discussion.

This isn't directed at you as such. Just that a lot of folks assume the burden of proof ought to be on the questioner(s) of this proposition rather than the proponent(s).

If you're a SV demographic outsider (say: black, gay, female) it's still going to be an order of magnitude harder to raise institutional money. You're not going to socialize in the same circles and thus your referral network will be tiny. If you get a meeting, you're going to need to spend the first 15 minute somehow counteracting the generalizations piling against you.

That said, starting with the same skills and money it shouldn't be any harder to bootstrap a tech business. If you're profitable and growing, raising money should also be pretty fair. Traction is the real meritocracy.

> You're not going to socialize in the same circles and thus your referral network will be tiny.

I don't think white nerdy males from top schools (like MIT) socialize much in rich VC circles either.

They socialize with entrepreneurs and senior mgmt who have been funded by VCs - which is a common and effect intro path to said investors.

Fair enough. But I'd suggest that it's much easier to get to $20 million as a non-white-Male than it would be in most other fields with similar educations. I don't see too many non-white Males at the top of law firms, in our country's cabinet, or atop large investment banks.

But this is speculation. What would be interesting to see is hard data based on an entry point (People graduating with CS degrees applying for VC funding versus people with law degrees applying for an associate spot) and watching how the funnels change over time. This type of data has to exist somewhere. It won't prove causality, but it will at least tell part of the story better than personal experience and anecdotes.

> in our country's cabinet

http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/20120730-cabin...

I stand corrected. I wonder how the past 20 years have looked. (Not trying to be a smartass, interested in the #s)

It's worth noting that the term "meritocracy" was defined to be something quite different, and rather more interesting, than it's current usage:

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2001/jun/29/comment

Somewhat similar to the "American Dream".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Truslow_Adams#American_Dr...

"Can you get funding?"

I believe that was actually part of the argument: the necessity of looking the same for the venture capitalists pushes them away from meritocracy.

And software doesn't care whether or not you dropped out of Stanford or Harvard.

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