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Wow, you did time at the North Avenue Trade School as well? Small world. I've worked a little with local VC and they typically seem like they have money to pu
by crusso 13y ago
Wow, you did time at the North Avenue Trade School as well? Small world.
I've worked a little with local VC and they typically seem like they have money to put in but very few vehicles for getting information on where to put it. The startup communication channels aren't there yet, although you'd hope that GT would help to lead the way.
Atlanta is a great place for startups. I've been a part of several here. GT is a great source for new hires. I can't say that I've ever been disappointed with any of the dozen or so new-hire grads that I've worked with from there.
The airport is the busiest in the world and has direct flights to just about everywhere. The culture is a comfortable Southern-friendly mixed with a healthy amount of cultural diversity.
The weather isn't as hot and humid as Texas or Florida, but warm enough to avoid ever having to shovel snow off your driveway.
That said, there's nothing incredible about Atlanta. You'll never have the museum experience of New York, the historic experience of DC, the weather of California, the views of Colorado, or the food of Louisiana. It's got a whole lot of nice, not much bad, but nothing extreme either way.
- timtamboy63 13y agoFor sure. There's a great post by Stephen Fleming on the ATL startup scene, definitely addresses this - http://academicvc.com/2013/07/05/startups-for-grownups/ http://academicvc.com/2013/07/05/startups-for-grownups/.
- crusso 13y agoYeah, the article makes the exact point about housing prices that convinced me to move out of the Bay Area. Then again, it's hard to enjoy that acre of yard when mosquitos are biting the heck out of you. :)
- michaelochurch 13y agoI've spent 7 years in New York. Paying the absurd rents isn't that bad. You don't mind it in your 20s, because it's pretty easy to keep expenses low. I hate what it does to the culture, though. Startups need to direct all of their competitive energies toward the external struggle; they have to support each other and fight the world only. When you have engineers sabotaging each other because you need to make CTO before you can even think about starting a family, you get internal competition that destroys everything. Many of these New York startups are deeply dysfunctional and raise capital on account of founder connections (ex-bankers) rather than merit.
- tptacek 13y agoWho sets a career goal of "making CTO"? Why would anyone want to do that? CTO is what they call you right before they take your commit privileges away. The "journeyman" coders I meet all want to start their own companies. I've never met one that wanted to be a "CTO". In NYC, I have no trouble believing there are lots of devs who want to make MD before they buy a house or start a family or whatnot. But that's something very different than "CTO".
- rayiner 13y agoYup. Got my degree in AE, did a victory lap, and lived in Atlanta a couple more years before moving to Chicago.