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My favorite quote is this: But let's be honest - Silicon Valley is often a parody of itself, and it has lost some of the things that made it great. Where Silic

My favorite quote is this: But let's be honest - Silicon Valley is often a parody of itself, and it has lost some of the things that made it great. Where Silicon Valley was once heavily subsidized to be a place of technical innovation, it is now an expensive but well-funded hub focused on business execution. There's nothing inherently wrong with that - good technology deserves good execution, and investors deserve to make money - but it is hard not to wonder what could have been. What if Silicon Valley stopped employing some of the world's greatest minds to make us click ads, and instead served a higher calling?

crazy_woo 10y ago
This is such high fallutin BS. Innovation is driven by demand. Yes - creating click ads is not as satisfying as [insert sexy innovation from developing countries here] but it pays the bills. How about we quit telling people what they should be doing with their lives. Our erstwhile OP is working on data problems - not exactly nobel peace prize winning stuff. The hypocrisy is astounding...
- david927 10y ago
  Don't take it personally; he's not saying you're wrong to make a living. He clearly says he understands that the companies of Silicon Valley want to make money -- there's no judgement about that. But the author is also clear about the distinction: there's technical innovation, planting seeds, and business execution, harvesting the fruit. Planting seeds is expensive but you get paid back (hopefully) when it bears fruit. Xerox PARC created technical innovation, and Apple and Microsoft made billions harvesting its fruit. The author is simply bringing up what others, like Alan Kay of PARC, bring up regularly: that we are running out of fruit and no one is working on investing in planting trees. Silicon Valley of the 70's was not about anything demand-driven. True innovation is too far ahead that people don't know yet that they will want it. Silicon Valley at that time made true technical innovation. Since then it's become all about business execution of making money off of that innovation, and yes that's very demand-driven. Again, there is nothing wrong with that. But at the same time, you should be able to understand if he (and others) might be disappointed by that turn.

crazy_woo 10y ago

This is such high fallutin BS. Innovation is driven by demand. Yes - creating click ads is not as satisfying as [insert sexy innovation from developing countries here] but it pays the bills. How about we quit telling people what they should be doing with their lives. Our erstwhile OP is working on data problems - not exactly nobel peace prize winning stuff. The hypocrisy is astounding...

david927 10y ago
Don't take it personally; he's not saying you're wrong to make a living. He clearly says he understands that the companies of Silicon Valley want to make money -- there's no judgement about that. But the author is also clear about the distinction: there's technical innovation, planting seeds, and business execution, harvesting the fruit. Planting seeds is expensive but you get paid back (hopefully) when it bears fruit. Xerox PARC created technical innovation, and Apple and Microsoft made billions harvesting its fruit. The author is simply bringing up what others, like Alan Kay of PARC, bring up regularly: that we are running out of fruit and no one is working on investing in planting trees. Silicon Valley of the 70's was not about anything demand-driven. True innovation is too far ahead that people don't know yet that they will want it. Silicon Valley at that time made true technical innovation. Since then it's become all about business execution of making money off of that innovation, and yes that's very demand-driven. Again, there is nothing wrong with that. But at the same time, you should be able to understand if he (and others) might be disappointed by that turn.