I moved from Multimedia Gulch in San Francisco to Berlin in January. The software business is strong in Berlin. It's just as hard to keep good programmers on board as it is in the Valley. I have a 768/128 ADSL line at home, which was not hard to get, although Deutsche Telekom botched the installation and left me without any phone service at all for a week. Cost of living is much lower than the Bay area, but so are salaries. You can get around Berlin just fine without a car--there's an excellent train system here. If you like classical music, Berlin is tops, and a million people are invading my neighborhood next month for the techno-music Love Parade. You can travel to anywhere in Europe from here on the train, although it isn't cheap. On the down side, the weather sucks, and you just can't get a good burrito anywhere. Simply buying things can be an ordeal, because shop hours are short and customer service is not a high priority. Most educated people speak English pretty well, which is good because I haven't learned much German. My social life would be a lot better if I did.
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I moved from Multimedia Gulch in San Francisco to Berlin in January. The software business is strong in Berlin. It's just as hard to keep good programmers on board as it is in the Valley. I have a 768/128 ADSL line at home, which was not hard to get, although Deutsche Telekom botched the installation and left me without any phone service at all for a week. Cost of living is much lower than the Bay area, but so are salaries. You can get around Berlin just fine without a car--there's an excellent train system here. If you like classical music, Berlin is tops, and a million people are invading my neighborhood next month for the techno-music Love Parade. You can travel to anywhere in Europe from here on the train, although it isn't cheap. On the down side, the weather sucks, and you just can't get a good burrito anywhere. Simply buying things can be an ordeal, because shop hours are short and customer service is not a high priority. Most educated people speak English pretty well, which is good because I haven't learned much German. My social life would be a lot better if I did.