First and foremost I really want to acknowledge the great tone, reflective nature, and clear chronicle of spending talent, time, and effort to build up Localeur

First and foremost I really want to acknowledge the great tone, reflective nature, and clear chronicle of spending talent, time, and effort to build up Localeur into a going concern. I think the piece does an excellent job describing to an outsider the personal challenges of both tech and the cultural considerations that come along with being a Black founder. The apparently repetitive 'dismissiveness' from within the tech community (re: location) is tough to read but certainly strikes a chord. My experience with Austin as a city and with its own culture really soured me on the place, in that I discovered the "Live Music Capital of the World!" to be self-congratualtory hype that wasn't true (e.g. New Orleans can toast Austin any night of the week, full stop). I've watched as 'up and coming' cool-factor-wow stuff like SXSW lost most all of its local roots. I saw tons and tons of well-to-do people moving into Austin, driving costs up and creative types out. I saw a town where there's a seemingly endless glut of up and coming talent by way of the University; a glut that depressed wages and made companies comfortable offering no-benefit wage-slave work just to work as a sub-contractor in a "cool" place like AMD. I saw a town that desperately wanted to be cool and had long ago forgotten what it looks like outside of a smart-phone screen. My point is that I hope the best for the founder to use his experience wisely, to look toward SV with the same skepticism that has been developed after all those years in Austin, and be careful. Don't let reputations fool you - Austin thinks its such a great music town, but it only takes a quick minute to realize that Leon Bridges, St. Vincent, Justus, and a load of other up and coming artists do their thing in Dallas/Fort Worth/Denton, not Austin. It might not seem a clear correlative to many, but I honestly do believe support for creative industries and taking risks on new business efforts are quite analogous - so be wise and prioritize which matters more, coolness or success.