Silicon Valley

After having been based in Palo Alto since inception, I am considering moving the headquarters of Trendero.com to San Francisco.  This is based on a few observations I’ve made over the last two years about Silicon Valley:

-It seems most content-based startups prefer to be in San Francisco, whereas technology-based startups prefer to be in the Valley.  This is likely the result of the different options for hiring in the two areas, but being a content-based startup (and having a strong preference for San Francisco anyway), the move should be a good fit.

-Silicon Valley feels a bit like an echo chamber.  Has anyone else noticed that the same folks are at all of the conferences and parties?  And that they all seem to want to talk only to each other?  It’s just starting to feel a bit too cliquey.  We are a startup focused on gaining a global user base, and while it is no doubt an advantage to be buddies with the blogging gatekeepers who live in the area, they aren’t actually our target user.

-It’s counter-intuitive, but finding a good engineer in the Valley is difficult.  Despite being well-known as the best place to be for engineers, all evidence is that there is a serious supply problem in Palo Alto.  This doesn’t exactly argue for San Francisco, either, since the problem is likely to exist there as well; however, for recruiting from outside of the area, especially recruiting young engineers interested in content-based startups, having an office in San Francisco is actually a much better sell than having an office in Palo Alto.  Young people want to be in cities.  Perhaps this explains the rapid growth in the New York startup scene…

Thoughts?  Agree/disagree?