America's Leading Metros for Venture Capital | Hacker News Reader

America's Leading Metros for Venture Capital

theatlanticcities.com

15 pointsmuzz14 comments

When people here (in SF) say "Silicon Valley" most of the time they mean everything from San Francisco to San Jose. I you're going to Mountain View, etc., you usually say "down the peninsula" or sometimes "the valley".

People don't say "south bay" anymore?

south bay stops somewhere between mtv and cupertino on the peninsula side.

It's mostly because young engineers do not like lifestyle of urban areas. Startups understood the situation and open their office in downtown San Francisco to attract club-going young engineers.

The irony (and not in the hipster sense) is that Hating Suburbia is about as suburban as it gets.

Don't get me wrong: I really find sprawl distasteful and think Americans drive too much and walk/bike too little (for their health as well as the environment). I'm a snob and I'll admit it. I don't know that I'll be in New York or San Francisco forever (Austin seems pretty neat, so that may be where I put down roots in a few years; Seattle is a strong possibility) but I'm never moving to a place that involves a 30+ minute commute. I'm not joining the Driving Dead.

I like cities and having a good job usually involves being near one. That said, I like trees and lakes and animals (I grew up with foxes, bears and bobcats on the property, so there). If suburbia is how a person achieves that, then good for it. Not all "suburbs" are horrible, environment-raping places. (The Buda Hills are suburb-like and amazing.) The evil is traffic congestion and over-driving due to outdated norms about physical presence amid middle-class mediocrity and conformity, in addition to large houses required by people favoring quantity of possessions over quality. It has nothing to do with whether one's postal address is a notable city versus a no-name bedroom community.

Just be aware that Austin has some very nasty traffic and Seattle's real estate is out of control for reasons similar to SF albeit less severe.

(Still working on the fashion thing out in the Yay)

Austin's traffic is avoidable if you live and work in central Austin, which you can do for half of what you'd pay to live in the Mission.

Yeah, Seattle's real estate market has really heated up just in the last year or so, like a 20% gain. Mostly because MSFT, AMZN, and GOOG have created so many new jobs here, and there's been almost no new home construction since 2007.

Still, like a quarter of the houses on the market are short sales though.

That's actually really bothers me about people talking about how there's "so much to do" in SF and NYC relative to where I am (Mountain View).

They really just mean bars and clubs. Yawn.

I prefer dirt bikes, mudding, and bonfires.

Sounds like you're from my home town of Bakersfield!

Ohio

Different strokes for different folks - but you're painting with an awfully wide brush. I'm a staunch urbanite who doesn't go to clubs, nor do I spend my evenings getting hammered at trendy lounges or whatever the stereotype-du-jour of urban dwellers is nowadays.

And I'm not an exception. The stereotype you're looking for is but a tiny subset of the population. If everyone you know prefers city life because of clubs and bars, it may be time to expand the circles a bit.

Where does one have a bonfire in Mountain View?

You don't. I'm not especially happy here either, it's just a serviceable alternative to living in SF until I can escape.

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