Forget Silicon Valley vs. Everyone
April 29, 2010
Why driving innovation in Southern California — and the rest of the nation — is important.
I’ve seen, over the years, a certain provincialism and bias apparent in some folks in the technology blog world, who seem to think the only innovation comes from Silicon Valley. I’m not going to rehash the arguments, but, needless to say, it’s something which seems to come up regularly (it seems there’s some perennial argument of Silicon Valley vs. New York, Silicon Valley vs. Seattle, Silicon Valley vs. Insert-Your-Region-Here). It pains me to see the leading lights and inspiration of America’s startups put down those bright, young entrepreneurial folks who might happen to be located outside Silicon Valley– and tell them they should just quit because they’ll never win over Silicon Valley, or should quit and just come to Silicon Valley where “people are smarter” or where “people work harder”.
I’d argue that all of those debates are really overshadowing a bigger issue we face, as a country, which is how we keep a culture of innovation and entrepreneurism going across the United States, as a whole. While we while our hours away on Facebook, go job hopping hoping for a quick buck, watching YouTube videos, and Twittering away, there’s a host of bright, enterprising, and entrepreneurial young folks in China, India, and elsewhere who aren’t spending their school days texting each other, work hours browsing social networking sites, and who are soundly flogging us in key skills like math and science, and who are hungry for a better standard of living.
Why this is important, is because–not just in a self-centered, Southern California sort of way, but in a big, the-nation-is-counting-on-us way–the high tech industry is the way to self determination for us as a nation.
Spurring innovation centers — like Southern California — throughout the nation is important for this nation’s competitiveness, our future, and the future of our children. It’s not just “how much can I make on those options,” it’s not “how much can I grab from that IPO,” or “how can I get rich, rich rich!” — it’s “how many jobs can I create”? How many families can I support? How can I create an environment which is better, for all of us, and for the nation as a whole? How can I improve the living standards and quality of life for everyone in my community?
I think there’s a growing realization that there’s a huge hunger in the rest of the world — China, India, and elsewhere, in particular — to gain the same kind of living standards and relative wealth we have here in the United States. That hunger is reflected in a global ambition and drive — not unlike the entrepreneurial drive–which shows up in longer school hours, a dedication to the math and sciences, a willingness to sacrifice more, to get an education, and to do as much as you can to succeed in the world. The issue isn’t Silicon Valley vs. the rest of the U.S.–it’s the future of high technology in the United States, as a whole, versus the rest of the world. Rather than the self-interested, greedy arguments by folks interested in putting down entrepreneurs and startups who don’t happen to be located in Silicon Valley, we ought to be propagating the spirit of entrepreneurship and the culture of startups, here in Southern California – but also, throughout our whole country.
