4 ms·

I live in NYC, and I often wonder what Silicon Valley is really like. Most of the news I read oh HN regarding it is very negative and cynical, but this article

I live in NYC, and I often wonder what Silicon Valley is really like. Most of the news I read oh HN regarding it is very negative and cynical, but this article seems to think it ain't so bad. It seems like certain neighborhoods are full of fairly wealthy tech guys, but that it's not all white dudes. Are women getting hired at the more progressive companies out there? Cause these articles make it seem like it's only men out there.

im_a_lawyer 13y ago
There are no women here. Rural India has a better gender ratio than Sillicon Valley.
- seanmcdirmid 13y ago
  How about compare to an oil town in Alaska? There are plenty of women around rural India (as far as I can tell!).
  - falsestprophet 13y ago
    Empirically, in some places in India proportionally fewer females are delivered. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex-selective_abortion#India http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex-selective_abortion#India
    - seanmcdirmid 13y ago
      That is just birth rate. In Alaska, everyone in these oil towns are migrants, and most are men. The migrant situation is more analogous to what is going on in SV then what is going on in India (people in SV aren't having sex-selection abortions!).
thecage411 13y ago
I just looked around my floor. 1 woman out of 27 people.
rhizome 13y ago
I live in NYC, and I often wonder what Silicon Valley is really like. To translate to NYC, the issues here are tantamount to having to account for New Jersey and Connecticut.
rayiner 13y ago
I spent part of a summer working in Menlo Park, after having lived in Chicago and New York. As far as I can tell, its a mixture of the worst parts of New York City and suburban DC (where I grew up). A highway is the major reference point. Nice restaurants are in strip malls. Its way more suburb-y than Westchester or Greenwich, and more disconnected from the central city. It is, however, very clean by virtue of religious power washing. What's most disturbing is the monoculture. I got a haircut and the hairdresser was talking about startups. Also, in New York you're likely to see kids in the same visual frame as bankers. In Silicon Valley, families seem segregated from the working age people in the characteristically suburban way.
Aloisius 13y ago
I live in NYC, and I often wonder what Silicon Valley is really like. Most of the news I read oh HN regarding it is very negative and cynical There are a shockingly large number of articles posting about how great Boulder, BC, NYC, Chicago, etc. are better than SV. Many of them are thinly veiled self-serving attempts to get more engineers in their area so that they won't feel so alone (ie, turn it into exactly the same environment as San Francisco where your average barrista is exceptionally familiar with the newest and greatest iPhone app and is friends with at least a half dozen founders or works part-time on his own project (s)he is attempting to launch). It seems like certain neighborhoods are full of fairly wealthy tech guys, but that it's not all white dudes. I know female founders, black founders, indian founders, asian founders, etc. There are around. Some are more prolific than others. The same goes for VCs, there is a large contingent of non-White people. Sadly VC is one of those areas that women are still the serious minority (though I know several of them.) It really just depends on who you surround yourself with. I will say that there are some sexist jerks who play favorites. Someone I was dating got brought into a well known Data Science company and was relegated to doing Social Media (because you know, women, communications) on top of her current job (she has an MFE). But I feel like there is a pretty strong informal movement to call out these kinds of assholes. Are women getting hired at the more progressive companies out there? Cause these articles make it seem like it's only men out there. There is a bit of a gender imbalance down he peninsula. It is more pronounced at certain tech companies than others. Up in San Francisco, you'll see far more gender diversity, but it still isn't near parity (on a larger demographic level though, San Francisco proper has a 50.9/49.1 split of genders). Certainly there are more companies up in SF that care about hiring women and many women-only or largely women-only startups do exists. From a sexuality standpoint, you can't get much better than San Francisco. I live in the Castro so I might be biased, but the LGBT community thrives here and I know plenty of gay founders and tech workers. I've worked with transmen and transwomen in several startups (though there is still background stigma against it still being worked out).

im_a_lawyer 13y ago

There are no women here. Rural India has a better gender ratio than Sillicon Valley.

seanmcdirmid 13y ago
How about compare to an oil town in Alaska? There are plenty of women around rural India (as far as I can tell!).
- falsestprophet 13y ago
  Empirically, in some places in India proportionally fewer females are delivered. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex-selective_abortion#India http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex-selective_abortion#India
  - seanmcdirmid 13y ago
    That is just birth rate. In Alaska, everyone in these oil towns are migrants, and most are men. The migrant situation is more analogous to what is going on in SV then what is going on in India (people in SV aren't having sex-selection abortions!).

thecage411 13y ago

I just looked around my floor. 1 woman out of 27 people.

rhizome 13y ago

I live in NYC, and I often wonder what Silicon Valley is really like. To translate to NYC, the issues here are tantamount to having to account for New Jersey and Connecticut.

rayiner 13y ago

I spent part of a summer working in Menlo Park, after having lived in Chicago and New York. As far as I can tell, its a mixture of the worst parts of New York City and suburban DC (where I grew up). A highway is the major reference point. Nice restaurants are in strip malls. Its way more suburb-y than Westchester or Greenwich, and more disconnected from the central city. It is, however, very clean by virtue of religious power washing. What's most disturbing is the monoculture. I got a haircut and the hairdresser was talking about startups. Also, in New York you're likely to see kids in the same visual frame as bankers. In Silicon Valley, families seem segregated from the working age people in the characteristically suburban way.

Aloisius 13y ago

I live in NYC, and I often wonder what Silicon Valley is really like. Most of the news I read oh HN regarding it is very negative and cynical There are a shockingly large number of articles posting about how great Boulder, BC, NYC, Chicago, etc. are better than SV. Many of them are thinly veiled self-serving attempts to get more engineers in their area so that they won't feel so alone (ie, turn it into exactly the same environment as San Francisco where your average barrista is exceptionally familiar with the newest and greatest iPhone app and is friends with at least a half dozen founders or works part-time on his own project (s)he is attempting to launch). It seems like certain neighborhoods are full of fairly wealthy tech guys, but that it's not all white dudes. I know female founders, black founders, indian founders, asian founders, etc. There are around. Some are more prolific than others. The same goes for VCs, there is a large contingent of non-White people. Sadly VC is one of those areas that women are still the serious minority (though I know several of them.) It really just depends on who you surround yourself with. I will say that there are some sexist jerks who play favorites. Someone I was dating got brought into a well known Data Science company and was relegated to doing Social Media (because you know, women, communications) on top of her current job (she has an MFE). But I feel like there is a pretty strong informal movement to call out these kinds of assholes. Are women getting hired at the more progressive companies out there? Cause these articles make it seem like it's only men out there. There is a bit of a gender imbalance down he peninsula. It is more pronounced at certain tech companies than others. Up in San Francisco, you'll see far more gender diversity, but it still isn't near parity (on a larger demographic level though, San Francisco proper has a 50.9/49.1 split of genders). Certainly there are more companies up in SF that care about hiring women and many women-only or largely women-only startups do exists. From a sexuality standpoint, you can't get much better than San Francisco. I live in the Castro so I might be biased, but the LGBT community thrives here and I know plenty of gay founders and tech workers. I've worked with transmen and transwomen in several startups (though there is still background stigma against it still being worked out).