I find it kind of odd that there are all these comments claiming the article glosses over nuance and therefore its conclusion is baseless when the counterpoints have even less data.

Everyone seems to agree successful companies have started in SV and outside of SV, and that there’s a lopsided distribution. No one has spent much time on whether the location is the cause of or just correlated with success. I get that this is hard to determine, but maybe people should speak in less absolutes? The article is one persons decision making process, explained for the benefit of others. I don’t think it’s claiming to be The One Truth.

Disclaimer: I worked for the author in Philly previously.