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"The organic way to do it is to establish a first-rate university in a place where rich people want to live." Obviously not the case. We can just go down the l
by yef 18y ago
"The organic way to do it is to establish a first-rate university in a place where rich people want to live."
Obviously not the case. We can just go down the list of top universities and look at the ones that are in desirable places that aren't Silicon Valley. We can even have a laugh at all the names people came up with, like Silicon Alley, Silicon Hills, etc.
One very important reason is that the tech talent in the top tech hubs is old-growth, and recycles between all the different tech companies. And it's huge. Funding 1,000 startups for just 5 years still seems very, very small compared to the existing ecosystem in Silicon Valley, let alone the logistics of finding enough of them, vetting, competing with other funds, etc.
- pg 18y agoI did go down that list. See the second section of http://www.paulgraham.com/siliconvalley.html http://www.paulgraham.com/siliconvalley.html .
- yef 18y agoRight, that's exactly my point. None of those places can really compare with the size and power of Silicon Valley. The fact that there's only one Silicon Valley is proof enough. The rest are smaller tech hubs. So there must be some other factor working in favor of Silicon Valley.
- billswift 18y agoThe most likely is also the most obvious - Silicon Valley has had longer to grow.
- yef 18y agoWrong again. Harvard and MIT were founded in 1636 and 1861. Stanford and UC Berkeley were founded in 1885 and 1868. The Boston area saw much of its population growth occur in the 19th century. The Bay Area saw much of its growth in the 20th. So, the Boston area has had more time with its universities, rich people, and population base to develop. Yet Silicon Valley developed faster and came to be the bigger innovation center. Again, I suggest there's something else at work besides the presence of top-flight universities, rich people, and time. What is interesting is that New England was a major force in innovation during the second half of the 19th century, helping to drive the industrialization of the US. So, whatever factor that brought innovation to the Bay Area had to have been strong enough to unseat the existing innovation centers.