The issue is that the stakes, at work, are just too damn high for all that. When Silicon Valley became the center of innovation (1950s to 1970s) there were so

The issue is that the stakes, at work, are just too damn high for all that. When Silicon Valley became the center of innovation (1950s to 1970s) there were so many "cushy" government jobs that people didn't fear getting fired-- it was like being in Maryland today with a TS clearance-- and housing was incredibly cheap. (It wasn't the government contractors themselves that made SV shine. It was competition with them on autonomy. Companies had to provide extremely interesting work, and that made for better companies. That's why Silicon Valley made so much of itself.) People in Northern California in 1970 could take a playful attitude to work because they knew nothing bad would happen to them. I think the Boomers are taking that easy work life to them with the grave. You could be on acid at Woodstock in August 1969, protege to the CEO of a major company in January 1970, and a CEO yourself by 1978. If you worked 50 hours per week, you were considered extremely dedicated and would climb the ladder rapidly. When there was tolerance for that kind of slack-- you wouldn't become unhireable if not Director-level by 40-- there was more room for creativity. That's gone now. Silicon Valley, with the mean-spirited and psychotic age-discrimination culture that the VCs brought in, is probably the worst. You can't fix this problem just by fixing single companies' work environments. No matter how "creative" the work environment is, people are naturally cliquish (i.e. there's always a threat of social rejection, no matter how open and unstructured the environment, and too little structure can make cliquishness worse) and the only way people can be at ease is in the context of a larger environment where losing one job doesn't ruin one's life. In the Valley, thanks to absurd housing prices and the good-ole-boy reputation economy the VCs have set up, it often does. As you can tell, I'm pretty horrified by the transformation of the Valley. It used to embrace genuine weirdness and true disruption. Now it's just so fucking conventional. It has the conformity and image-management needs of traditional finance, but 1/10 of the upside. At least banks pay well and promote internally.