Danny Newman (who built the PocketFuzz service that I recently profiled) tipped me off to Paul Graham‘s latest essay entitled “How to be Silicon Valley“. In that essay, Paul sites Portland and Boulder as the two places closest to reproducing the ingredients found in Silicon Valley (wealth and nerds).
Paul’s latest essay provides some insight into the reasons behind the startup phenomenon in Boulder that we’ve been discussing here.
It was also a local press profile of Danny that inspired me to write my post “Colorado needs Y Combinator“, and to tie it all together for you – Paul Graham is the man behind Y Combinator. Yes, it’s a small world indeed.
A few weeks ago, I emailed Y Combinator and asked if they would consider replicating their summer founders program here in Boulder. Paul didn’t respond, but Jessica from Y Combinator did. She told me that they wouldn’t consider reproducing their program because they draw candidates from all over the country. Y Combinator is a commercial enterprise, so that’s an understandable response.
Maybe Paul will see this post on a trackback and reconsider. Or maybe not. Oh well, guess we’ll have to just do it ourselves then. Who’s in?
Nice to see Boulder is just a good university away from being the next SV.
I am in but wait, I dont have buckets o money, I went to this supposed second tier university (but did undergrad in Austin so maybe I have half of that ingredient), and I am not a geek (at least in my eyes) so, I guess I am out.
Seriously, I think Boulder is ripe for SV goodness (but wait according to Dave Winer SV aint so hot – http://www.scripting.com/2006/05/24.html#whatPromptedThisPiece [good timing on this post too] ). CU is actually a top notch university. I received my masters in CS there and had some outstanding professors. Michael Main stands out as the best prof I have ever had. Recently, I have been working with Michael to bring my .NET User Group to the students (Michael has been instrumental in getting us lecture rooms and spreading the word to students).
Some other CU Computer Science professors of note & that I recall:
Jim Martin AI extraordinaire
Hal Gabow unbelievable algorithms genius
Richard Byrd a beautiful mind
Gary Nutt very nice guy and an OS
Tammy Sumner want to build software that is what the customer wants?
Evi Nemeth tough as nails and smart as a whip
Oliver McBryan world wide webworm
Boulder has the money, the nerds, and the university . I am anxiously awaiting the revolution.
-kevin
I think it was smart of Paul,Jessica, and the rest to keep Y-combinator focused on the two start-up meccas in America:Boston and SV. There are existing networks in these two areas that would take years to build anywhere else. You couldn’t easily grab lunch with any one of a hundred angels in Boulder like you can in Boston. As for universities, you have to remember Boston doesn’t just have one great university, but many. From boston it is only a short drive to other places with lots of rich tech guys and good universities. Last time I checked Kansas and Wyoming didn’t have either of these things. For me however, the biggest reasons I couldn’t run my startup from boulder would be the distraction of the 14’ers, a ton of good IPAs, and Illegal Pete’s.
-matt
There are hundreds of angels around Boulder. And while I agree that an entrepreneur cannot easily grab lunch with them, I think that’s the point. With the right connections, they’ll be having those lunches. That is a big part of the missing link – the network.
It was a pleasure to meet you today. I found this posting while checking out your blog. Paul Grahm is my favorite technologist, and his book “Hackers and Painters” is simply brillant. After reading many articles on Web 2.0, I thought his essay was the one that resonanted. Thanks also for your thoughts on angel investing; a timely subject for me!
-krista
I’m a big fan of Paul’s myself and I did enjoy that book as well. Thanks for the comment!