San Francisco Poaching Tech Talent From Silicon Valley

jfruh writes "Silicon Valley, including San Jose and the chain of suburbs running north from it along the San Francisco Peninsula, has long been the epicenter of the tech business and startup scene. San Francisco itself, just a few miles to the north, has always been in the Valley's orbit — but now, more and more, the center of gravity is shifting to San Francisco, and the move seems to be hitting a tipping point. The reason: the young talent companies want to attract would rather live in a hip city than in suburban sprawl, and don't want to commute 45 minutes to work."

Comments

the business has changed, too

[Anonymous Coward]

Issues of sprawl and crappy commutes notwithstanding, the people developing cool apps for smartphones want to live in SF because they are hipsters. These are not the same kinds of folks that "made" silicon valley. They were far nerdier, more interested in hardware, chip design, etc -- basically infrastructure stuff and they were NOT hip. They weren't quite as drawn to SF.

SF also has girls.

I still think the Peninsula and South Bay are far superior if you like outdoor activities: running, hiking, climbing, biking.

Psh. I like the old farts better than the new kids.

Re:the business has changed, too

[fiannaFailMan]

The gay city, right?

Right. There's still a better male:female ratio in SF than in "Man Jose". Subtract the gay guys from that and it gets even better. Trust me on this. For every girl that walks into a Silicon Valley bar there's at least ten guys with her. Your odds are much better in the city.

Can we stop using the term 'poaching'?

[dkleinsc]

The problem I have with the term is that it suggests that there's something morally wrong with offering somebody more salary / benefits / perks to change jobs, or with that somebody choosing to make the move to greener pastures.

Employment is a 2-way street: My boss can choose to fire me at any time, I can choose to quit and do something else at any time. I understand that many employers would not like employees to be able to do that, but they can, and that's because they're your employees rather than your slaves.