Saturday Post: Silicon Valley's Liquid Amorality - Water Will Find Its Way -SVW. Posted by Tom Foremski - November 22, 2014 Ten years ago in mid 2004 I left the Financial Times and started publishing Silicon Valley Watcher.
Silicon Valley was starting to wake from a long downturn from the dotcom deflation and Google's August IPO was a good sign after several years of bad news. The culture of Silicon Valley was different then. The software engineering community was more radical than today, and far more socially conscious. The open source software movement was very strong among engineers and there was overall an anti-commercial attitude and a respect for protecting an open commons.
It shared much in spirit with the radical English groups from the mid-seventeeth century such as The Diggers, and also with the The Diggers of the 1960s in San Francisco, who ran free stores and served free food from their kitchens. The business bible of 2004 was The Cluetrain Manifesto and it came directly from that culture. ...People of EarthThe sky is open to the stars. Silicon Valley's culture of liquid amorality — water will find its way. Ten years ago in mid 2004 I left the Financial Times and started publishing Silicon Valley Watcher.
Silicon Valley was starting to wake from a long downturn from the dotcom deflation and Google's August IPO was a good sign after several years of bad news. The culture of Silicon Valley was different then. The software engineering community was more radical than today, and far more socially conscious. The open source software movement was very strong among engineers and there was overall an anti-commercial attitude and a respect for protecting an open commons.
It shared much in spirit with the radical English groups from the mid-seventeeth century such as The Diggers, and also with the The Diggers of the 1960s in San Francisco, who ran free stores and served free food from their kitchens. The business bible of 2004 was The Cluetrain Manifesto and it came directly from that culture. ...People of EarthThe sky is open to the stars. Veteran Silicon Valley Journalist Tom Foremski Joins Weber Shandwick's Mediaco. Tom Foremski — an early advocate for brand publishing — has joined Weber Shandwick’s content division Mediaco on a project basis.
Advice from Silicon Valley's longest serving CEO: 'Do the hard things first' A massive metal cast of a sailfish seems to soar out of the desk of Ray Zinn, Silicon Valley's longest serving CEO, founder of Micrel, a leading chip company that produces essential components for smartphones, consumer electronics and enterprise networks.
At 76, he's been running Micrel since its creation in 1978. In 2014 Micrel celebrates 20 years as a public company and a highly profitable one for its long-term shareholders. Original Ideas In Silicon Valley Are Like Bitcoins. Posted by Tom Foremski - January 31, 2014 I’ve started noticing some correlations between Bitcoins and original ideas in Silicon Valley, which are the necessary sparks of innovation.
Few new Bitcoins are being produced because miners have minted all the easy ones. Original ideas are increasingly rare in Silicon Valley because the easy innovations, such as selling music online, or shoes, have been taken. Original ideas come from original experiences, just as each Bitcoin is mined, by being the first to find a unique answer. Inside The Tech Cult: How Silicon Valley Companies Isolate Their Workers. Posted by Tom Foremski - January 21, 2014 San Francisco is rapidly polarizing against its tech workers as protests mount about shuttle bus use, and a huge rise in rents and evictions.
There would be less of a problem if tech workers were known in their communities but they aren’t. I know only one Google worker outside of my work circle and I have a large social circle of non-techies built over two decades. Here are the many ways Silicon Valley tech workers are deliberately kept isolated: - The tech workers are scooped up in shuttle buses early in the morning and dropped off late in the evening. . - During the day tens of thousands are inside guarded campus enclaves. . - Tech companies provide free food, hair cuts, dental appointments, gym, laundry, dry cleaning, even apartment cleaning.
Silicon Valley Ageism? Survey Shows Tech Workers Are Very Young -SVW. Posted by Tom Foremski - July 7, 2013 Quentin Hardy on the New York Times Bits column, reports that a survey of tech companies by Payscale, shows a very young median age compared with the overall US average age of 42.3 years.
There's a 16 year difference from the norm at some companies. Technology Workers Are Young (Really Young) - NYTimes.com Just six of the 32 companies it looked at had a median age greater than 35 years old. Eight of the companies, the study said, had median employee age of 30 or younger. PrivCo report: Silicon Valley remains far ahead of other tech centers. Silicon Valley reported 226 private company acquisitions in 2012, well ahead of New York, with 100 deals, and leagues ahead of any other US tech hub, reported PrivCo, which tracks such deals.
The Silicon Valley region, including the wider San Francisco Bay Area, recorded 226 private company sales in 2012, and next was New York, with a surprising 100 deals, which ousted Boston and its 62 deals. LA had 55, and Seattle's 43 deals narrowly beat Austin's 40 and Washington DC's 39. Silicon Valley companies dominated as the top acquirers in 2012, with Facebook tied with Google at 16 deals. Twitter and Cisco each bought 10 startups, Oracle made 9 deals, and Autodesk made 6. Chicago-based Groupon bought 12 companies, Microsoft 8, Dell 7, and Colorado's Zayo bought 6 startups, including the most valuable deal of the year — acquiring New York's AboveNet for $2.2 billion.
Here are more info and charts. 2013: The inevitable rise of corporate media and Silicon Valley's disruption of all media. When it comes to making industry predictions I always resolve not to make any, but as you can see, I have trouble keeping my new year's resolutions.
Two year's ago I made the same resolution and failed when I wrote: 2010 Prediction: The Media Tsunami Is Coming... The media is dead, long live the media. Collaborate vs. Collaborate. Watch American Experience Online. The Low Budget Silicon Valley Reality TV Show.. Think your commute’s a grind? They bike from SF to Google. Think your desk’s a mess? Chip design pioneer’s is worth a museum exhibit.
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