One of my regular bookmarks is the a site I call "Heif 2" in my bookmarks. My chum Scott Heiferman keeps a phat Fotolog page (and has for years - a feat in itself), but also keeps a page primarily devoted to links and writing. I find myself visiting the text more often than the photos, (this even though I was turned on to digital photography by Scott, and the stuff I have done was basically because I liked what he was doing.) His current entry is right up my alley and I feel compelled to have a go at it.
I just saw his entry concerning the question of Silicon Alley having a chip on its shoulder because of their perception that they play second fiddle to Silicon Valley - which they do. Naturally, one has to put this entire thing in context in that any heads up comparison between the economic engines of NorCal and NYC cannot refer to the entirety of the economy, but rather solely to those portions of the economies in which there is overlap. There are plenty of differences between the two (NorCal has an agricultural economy, for example), but - more importantly I think - is that of scale.
Why didn't NYC produce a Google? A YouTube? A Facebook? I am not convinced that it is a question of who is more creative or more entrepreneurial. Both areas started the digital era with a heritage of creativity head and shoulders above just about every locale in America, if not the planet. I have lived in both places, and I love both places, in large part because of this history. When I was younger, I felt a large relief in both places because I finally was meeting the kinds of people I thought of as "cool people". I lived in an area that had one of the highest concentrations of people over the age of 80 in the US through my high school years, and after working their for awhile after college, I was desperate to get out of that and into places exactly like NYC was at the time, and exactly like NorCal was at the time.
Yeah, you can find cool people anywhere if you try, but both NYC and NorCal have higher concentrations of them, and both places afforded me a way of life in which I was able to immerse myself in the energy and the culture that I so longed to be a part of. Again, I found this in other places - many of my close friends were made in Iowa City - and it was there in the middle of Iowa that I first met people who I thought really were free in their thinking and valued it in others. Interestingly enough though, I now think places like Iowa City suffer from the same affliction that is at the heart of Silicon Alley's problem.
If you choose a creative endeavor in life and live in a place like Iowa City, frequently you will find that you need to leave in order to keep growing. In essence, the perception is that you need to move on to move up. The notion of staying put, organically growing things as far as they will go, and remaining content with what you can put together is one that most people would see as underachieving. Yeah, it's nice, but it is an underachievement of sorts. You need to move yourself up to "the big leagues" if you really want to "succeed" and "live up to your potential". I see the same thing in NYC, and I think that attitude is particularly toxic for the New Economy entrepreneur.
To be in NYC and working for a startup comes with no baggage per se, but almost always, it seems as if the expectation is that one only works at a start-up for as long as it takes to get some experience, grow your title, shake enough hands, AND THEN, you are supposed to cash it in and "move up" to the big leagues! Its kinda the same with starting your own interactive business; but instead of using the job as a springboard into a job with a big name/old school corporate Alpha, you are supposed to sell your company and yourself to some old guard concern, and then ride it out as long as you have to. My point is that Silicon Alley exists in the shadow of the old guard, and that has a terrible impact on the thinking of the people who want to keep the New Economy "new". In NYC, the idea of "movin' on up" is so ingrained in the culture that there is almost a stigma attached the idea of NOT cashing in and landing a "sweet gig". Even for those freer of spirit and more rugged in their individuality, the temptation to leave the young company for an old after a few years is perpetual - and oooooh it can be tempting (I freely admit to being one who is not quite creative enough to run my own show - and I need health insurance dammit!) The NYC Old Guard's "Me-Too-ism" in the internet age has been something one could set their watch by it (this in spite of the fact that the Amazons, Yahoos, eBays, Googles, YouTubes, Netflix', Facebooks, MySpaces, etc. of the world face much greater competition from startups than they do old slut versions of their business.)
Worse for the entrepreneurial types are the hordes of people in the labor pool who never wanted to work for a startup, and only do so because they see it as their stint in the "minor leagues" on their way to the bigs. These people don't even have questions like "Why didn't NYC produce a Google?" on their radar. These are the people who greet such questions with answers like "WTF?"
At the end of the day, to be in NYC and ask yourself "How do I get to the top?", your answer is quite likely to involve figuring out how to be "let in" to the top. If you work in a new field, particularly in one that is disruptive to an old field, the odds are that you will eventually find the old guard looking for a way to pull you in (if you can't beat 'em, subsume 'em!) This is a part of a process that is long built into the DNA of professional life in The Big Apple. On the other hand, I believe the dynamic of NorCal and Silicon Valley is quite different. To be in "The Valley" and ask yourself how to get to the top, I think the culture is such that the answer is far more likely to be "I will become the top."
This isn't to say there isn't anyone to sell out to (and I don't mean "sell out" in the pejorative) in NorCal. There is, however, for the purposes of what Scott is talking about, I think there is a large, qualitative difference between selling yourself (as employee or CEO & Founder) to Google than Time Warner. If you are a true believer in the interactive economy, and your hopes are that this thing of ours continues to sprout and grow like crazy, being immersed in a milieu of like minds makes a large difference. In this context, I truly think that the notion of "making it" in Silicon Valley is much more a process of being self-made than it is in NYC. The notion of remaining indie, stand-alone, and entrepreneurial fits the culture of Silicon Valley much more than it does in NYC - even below 14th Street. I don't believe it is a coincidence. There is much more to it than I am able to explain, but as someone who loves both places dearly and could easily be happy in either, I can't say that the differences are just happenstance. The two places do share much - most of it good - but they don't really share every dynamic. California still thinks of itself as new and a part of a frontier of sorts - if you are going to make it, you are far more likely to have to literally create it. NYC sees itself in time, and places a premium on that which is old, long-established, and (as Boy George said - in a much different context), that time makes them feel like they've got something real. And indeed, for the most part, they do have something real. What they lack is the perspective which would allow them to see that they don't have the only things that are real. Moreover, I think they are less likely to see their own homegrown stuff as legit unless it eventually is somehow integrated into the existing order of things. Without the steely gaze of the suits, it is like you don't exist. That is just not the way things feel out here in the wild wild west.
In closing, I absolutely must strenuously object to Scott's idea that Michael Bloomberg is the type of role model NYC needs if the are to become more entrepreneurial and useful to people. I lived in Daddy Bloomberg's NYC, and if anything, he is single-handedly destroying the last vestiges of "Indie" NYC. Bloomie seems to live for no other purpose but to make NYC safe for the return of white suburbanites. The NYC I saw when I moved there already had lost much, but in the last few years, Bloomie has done anything he can to make the city amenable to the mundane. The loss of places like CBGBs and Tonic are the obvious, but it is much worse than that. It is worse even than the arrival of Applebees and Olive Garden. To be in that city during the 2004 elections when that man sold out his own citizens to turn NYC and the WTC site into the personal playground of the evil people who would be working to re-elect George Bush was all I needed to see to know what he is about. Then to see my neighborhood in Brooklyn sold out so that a Target, a basketball stadium (right above the LIRR - so none of those coming in from the game need to even step outside), and more whitey condos can go up was stomach turning.
Think of it this way...NYC was left for dead 25-30 years ago. The exact type of free-thinking, free-spirited, and (to some degree) entrepreneurial people who create a culture of creativity took a chance on the city, did the hard work of bringing it back from the brink of collapse, and made it a very wonderful and desirable place to be were extirpated WHOLESALE from the city under Daddy Bloomberg. All the equity built into places like my old neighborhood was skimmed off the top and handed to nasty developers. These people didn't want to put their stadium their 20 years ago. That neighborhood revived itself and the people who made it a place worth being again were booted out in favor of the Wall Street Condo Toadies and other corporate sluts. The people who made it worthwhile again did the work, and Bloomie took the preference and handed it over to TGIFridays. That is what that man is about. His notion of progress and development is to see large corporations and established concerns move in and run things. This is the exact opposite of the kind of spirit that sees revolutionary ideas sprout and grow. NYC is still special, but so many iconic and wonderful places and things have been lost under that man. You can't find a bigger corporate crew slut than Daddy Bloomberg. I think he could rightly be called America's #1 Flava-Killa. I will sew a cape and tights identifying him as such if he will wear them! Scott my man, you don't want men like him in charge of any sort of progressive paradigm shift...you want him in charge of making sure that no person in America is more than 5 minutes away from riblets, mozz sticks, and a wait staff who will sing you Happy Birthday in unison as you eat them.