Not sure about cachet... SF might have more of it in sense of having more "here a famous 60's musician shot acid" landmarks and movie references, but as far as things to do today that don't involve networking with scooter-riding techbros (stepping over the heroin-shooting homeless optional) even Austin so far seems to be ahead. And given how bad traffic on 101 is, I can drive to either Dallas or Houston, which have pretty good museums in not that much more time it takes to get to SF from the corner of San Jose where I lived.
Granted, my definition of culture isn't everyone's cup of tea either. But what's wrong with winter?! After a couple of years I found it very irritating that when I wake up and look in the window, I have no idea if it is June or January.
When somebody was trying to recruit me there, looking at the offering range and housing prices, I could fly myself to the French Laundry pretty regularly, and still come out ahead.
There's nothing wrong in living in SV, as long as you like it. Or liking it. It is wrong to try to make it out as if it were the best place fro everybody; or even everybody in "computers". It's quite demonstrably not, just like it's not quite that engine of innovation, especially world-changing innovation it used to be.
You also seem to be conflating companies (sure, it is easier to start a company in a place where you can get finding for almost anything, no matter how harebrained it is) and innovations. The way I see it, Web was an innovation (not from SV). A first browser that a normal person could use and would want to use was an innovation (flyover country). Showing that the Internet could be safely and reliably used for commerce (at least for a time)? Not SV either. These were world-changing innovations. Stripe or AirBnB? Not so much.
I have family in Denver, it has a lot going for it, but none of Denver, Minneapolis nor Austin can be said to have 'far more culture' than SF.
I think the Bay has become overpriced for what you get, personally, but places with more cultural cachet in the US are NYC, LA, Chicago, and maybe Boston and Philly. If you don't like winter, it's Cali or nothing.