Can Tech Save Small Town America?

theodp writes "Declaring that small town life no longer has to be separate from financial success thanks to technology, Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos told North Dakota state officials to take hope in people such as Napster's Shawn Fanning. Interesting remarks, considering that Fanning conceived Napster in small-town Boston and the jobs Amazon's brought to rural areas don't exactly scream financial success."

Comments

It's Communication

[Luke PiWalker]

New communication mediums (namely the internet) decreases contraints on small towns as far as their ability to collaborate with other like minded tech people and their ability to get information. A large percentage of tech discourse takes place on the internet, and with a computer and an internet connection any small town nobody can get all the information they need to begin a project of their own or join up to help another team. We're not talking just small town USA here, but small town anywhere. India, Africa, China, wherever. As long as you can log on to the internet, you're good to go. Welcome to the global economy.

Re:Bloomington, IN

[i_hate_robots]

Wow, I went to Bloomington once. I turned down a street and there it was: an URBAN OUTFITTERS! I thought to myself, wow, It's just like being in ... NEW YORK CITY! Except it was different. Nobody was pretentious at all. In fact, you would never even think that everyone in the town had an unrealistic view of themselves or the town they lived in.

I sure hope people move in droves to Bloomington Indiana. Frankly, Bloomington and everyone who lives there are more cultured and open minded than, well, anyone else in America!

I think that I might just quit my job, drop what I'm doing, and sign up for art school at IU. Oh, and I might even start a band and join the local music "scene!" Then I'll probably start 5 tech companies, and take full advantage of the forward thinking community and all of its resources.

Thank God for Bloomington Indiana - the NEW YORK CITY OF THE MIDWEST!!!

Re:Huh?

[TopShelf]

You forget, this is /. - if the article talks about big-business, then editorializing has to focus on exploitation and deceit. They figure only 1% will actually follow the links anyway!

Re:Why?

[heinousjay]

Let the rednecks feel like they still mean something. It doesn't hurt anybody, and they're too dumb to see what's coming to them anyway.