"Quality of life" is inferior on any axis? Fort Lauderdale is the Yatch Capital of the World, the intercostal are a billionaire playground. Name any activity on the water from recreation, fishing, diving, to bio research...SV isn't on the map.

On the other extreme - absolutely free - I would take Fort Lauderdale Beach and the weather over anything SV has to offer. After all there was a move to totally relocate Hollywood movie industry from CA to South Florida. And parks? What measure does SV outperform? Everglades National Park is probably 4-5x larger than SV and it's in Fort Lauderdale's backyard.

Though South Florida doesn't get the tech press, we also have billion dollar startups. As far as schools, I went to a public high school (top 50 in the US) not even the best rated public school in my area, but my 4 brothers and I all have graduate degrees, fellow alumni include astronauts, countless professional athletes and even a tech founder by the name Jeff Bezos.

I won't touch culture, because it is much to loaded but there is no shortage of meuseums dedicated to arts and sciences. Come to Wynwood during Art Basel and you might leave thinking we have the most progressive city in the world artistically. Finally, I don't want to minimize the diversity of the SV demographics but it again doesn't compete with the diversity and actual cultural influence these various background have in South Florida.

>Name any activity on the water

Surfing. Significantly better in the bay area.

haha fair enough, we don't have the types of reefs as CA so our breaks are shady over 5-6 feet, and even our best surf in all of FL (3 hours north of Fort Lauderdale) isn't CA. Still it is the small surf of FL that produced Kelly Slater so at least we should fall on the same axis.

Seriously though Fort Lauderdale beach and Hollywood beach have great surf communities that have been around decades.

If you aren't aware, there is abundant outdoor activity including water recreation in the bay area. You seem to think we have to stay in the valley

Northern California is not even comparable to South Florida when it comes to boating, fishing, diving, swimming, beaches.

Florida is absolutely a garbage state (born and raised Floridian speaking) but there's no place in the US that is even in the discussion when it comes to water recreation-- MAYBE Hawaii.

No doubt, but OP is saying nothing in Fort Lauderdale (our "Salt Life") is on axis with SV, With a fair reading I didn't claim the same. Florida keys and Caribbean are Home to the 3rd and 4th largest reefs in the world, so at minimum we can agree it's on the same axis as SV's quality of water activity.

Florida reefs will be climbing that list soon!

Ft Lauderdale is absolutely not the Yacht capital of the world. Sydney? Auckland? Southampton? Garda? Croatia's rocketing up the charts too. Or maybe you mean things with engines in which case St Tropez, Monaco, some place called the Caribbean seems quite popular too.

Why don't you try Googling Yatch Capital of the World...it's not my given title. A lot of the Yatchs you see in those places that you mention will have been purchased at the International Fort Lauderdale Boat Show, the largest such show in the World, I go every year and to Miami's too.

Edit: to get an idea do a Google image search of Fort Lauderdale International Boat show. As to your quip about things with motors, South Florida is also home to the largest cruiseships in the world (>100,000 tonnage) that are dubbed floating cities.