3 ms·

As somebody with no dog in this fight (I live in the south east), I'd tend to agree with the Boston take. Simply being in the orbit of MIT can have that effect

As somebody with no dog in this fight (I live in the south east), I'd tend to agree with the Boston take. Simply being in the orbit of MIT can have that effect, along with everything else you listed. The issue with NYC from a perception as a hub of any one thing is that it's just so big with so many different things going on that tech just seems like one of many things going on there simply because of all the people.

ghaff 4y ago
MIT is part of it but Massachusetts is also home to a large number of other research universities including BU, Northeastern, Harvard, the UMass system, etc. As you say, NYC (like Silicon Valley) has always been more concentrated in terms of technology focus.
- boringg 4y ago
  I'd agree with this. Boston area has a lot of high quality post secondary educations that feed business and talent. I would argue bay area has some of the same dynamics (Stanford, UCB & UCSF amongst others). Silicon Valley has a high degree of tech but also a fair bit of climate tech which shouldn't be discounted.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    Yeah, the Bay Area is probably the one other place in the US that has comparable higher-ed quantity and quality to the Boston area/Massachusetts. Other good institutions are scattered around of course but they're more diffuse. I think that there's a tendency on the part of a lot of people to view "tech" through the lens of web-related tech but obviously there's a lot more interesting/important work going on than just that--whether in the Boston area, Silicon Valley, or somewhere else.
    - thehappypm 4y ago
      The amount of top colleges in the Boston area is astounding. A school like Tufts (ranked #28 by US news) would be the crown jewel of almost every city in America, but it’s totally overshadowed in Boston. Especially if you include Massachusetts as a whole it’s absurd: MIT Harvard Tufts Williams Amherst Brandeis UMass Amherst Boston University Boston College Northeastern Wellesley Olin Babson Smith WPI

ghaff 4y ago

MIT is part of it but Massachusetts is also home to a large number of other research universities including BU, Northeastern, Harvard, the UMass system, etc. As you say, NYC (like Silicon Valley) has always been more concentrated in terms of technology focus.

boringg 4y ago
I'd agree with this. Boston area has a lot of high quality post secondary educations that feed business and talent. I would argue bay area has some of the same dynamics (Stanford, UCB & UCSF amongst others). Silicon Valley has a high degree of tech but also a fair bit of climate tech which shouldn't be discounted.
- ghaff 4y ago
  Yeah, the Bay Area is probably the one other place in the US that has comparable higher-ed quantity and quality to the Boston area/Massachusetts. Other good institutions are scattered around of course but they're more diffuse. I think that there's a tendency on the part of a lot of people to view "tech" through the lens of web-related tech but obviously there's a lot more interesting/important work going on than just that--whether in the Boston area, Silicon Valley, or somewhere else.
  - thehappypm 4y ago
    The amount of top colleges in the Boston area is astounding. A school like Tufts (ranked #28 by US news) would be the crown jewel of almost every city in America, but it’s totally overshadowed in Boston. Especially if you include Massachusetts as a whole it’s absurd: MIT Harvard Tufts Williams Amherst Brandeis UMass Amherst Boston University Boston College Northeastern Wellesley Olin Babson Smith WPI