
Silicon Valley's Keystone Problem: A Monoculture of Thought - Gimpei
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/02/technology/silicon-valleys-keystone-problem-a-monoculture-of-thought.html
======
ng12
> engineering-and-data-obsessed monoculture

Gee, a company who's business is data is obsessed with engineering and data?
Color me shocked.

Snark aside, technology is hard. If you've worked in consulting for any amount
of time you've probably realized that outside of a few pockets (SF, NYC,
Austin, etc) most of the world is really, really bad at technology. Many of
the biggest, most important institutions in the world really have no idea what
they're doing. The biggest problem in my mind is that technical know-how is
not distributed evenly. I don't know why that is, but I don't think diversity
has very much to do with it.

~~~
jacquesm
> If you've worked in consulting for any amount of time you've probably
> realized that outside of a few pockets (SF, NYC, Austin, etc) most of the
> world is really, really bad at technology.

You mean outside of Tokyo, Calgary, Tampere (points if you can locate it on a
map without names), Geneva, the Ruhr area, Milan, Shenzen and a thousand other
places?

The 'world' is a lot larger than the USA and there are many places where
people are _really_ good at technology.

They may not be able to address a large unified market and they may not have
access to enormous amounts of dumb money to chase the latest social media fads
but that doesn't mean you need to ignore their existence, unless it was your
idea to underscore the point of the article.

~~~
chrisco255
I mean, even in other countries, there tends to be one or two cities that are
major tech hubs and the rest of the country is not. I don't know that this is
necessarily a bad thing or just a normal thing. There are many industries or
specialties that are concentrated in certain areas (or have been
historically), like autos in Detroit (although that's changing), finance in
NY, movies & fashion in LA, etc.

~~~
xaranke
LA is not a fashion capital:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fashion_capital](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fashion_capital).

~~~
jharger
Is it not #14 on the 2017 list given there? (Was #4 on the 2016 list)

~~~
xaranke
> The cities considered the global "Big Four" fashion capitals of the 21st
> century are Milan, London, New York and Paris.

It does have fashion, but it's not the biggest by any stretch.

------
jseliger
_Broadly, Ms. Powell suggests that many of Silicon Valley’s problems can be
laid at the feet of an engineering-and-data-obsessed monoculture that invites
little input from people outside the bubble._

Zoning has a lot to do with this: [https://www.livablecity.org/rethinking-
rh](https://www.livablecity.org/rethinking-rh). Zoning lets cities
dramatically restrict the supply of housing, thus favoring incumbent owners;
by now, the only people who will move to SF / SV are those who want to start a
startup (or "play the startup lottery" if you prefer a different set of
emotional valences). The city almost can't help become a monoculture, because
everyone else has been priced out.

Unfortunately, Farhad Manjoo, the author, does not seem good at attending to
alternate hypotheses: [https://jakeseliger.com/2015/07/03/why-you-really-cant-
trust...](https://jakeseliger.com/2015/07/03/why-you-really-cant-trust-the-
media-claire-cain-miller-and-farhad-manjoo-get-things-wrong-in-the-new-york-
times).

~~~
bilbo0s
I don't know man?

Everyone's been priced WAY out of Manhattan too, but I don't know that I would
call it a "monoculture". (Tribeca/Greenwich Village area is very different
than the Upper East Side for instance. Very different cultures. But only
0.0001% of Americans could ever really afford to live in either place.)

That's why I'm not sure that the affordability of housing is what's causing
the monoculture?

In fact, I'd wager that with greater affordability in SF, the only thing you
would really buy yourself is MORE monoculture. I don't think there is a
massive wave of NON-tech people waiting to move into SF.

~~~
jseliger
Reasonable points.

The NYC comparison is useful because there are some similar dynamics going on.
That said, some rents have been falling for a while:
[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-12/pick-a-
ne...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-12/pick-a-new-york-
city-borough-rents-are-falling-there-and-fast) or
[http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/12/13/rents_are_fal...](http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/12/13/rents_are_falling_in_new_york_city_is_this_a_crash.html),
as NYC's supply response, while inadequate, has still been better than SF's.

In addition, living without a car in NYC is common and normal, while cars cost
$8,500/year TCO on average: [https://www.aaa.com/autorepair/articles/what-
does-it-cost-to...](https://www.aaa.com/autorepair/articles/what-does-it-cost-
to-own-and-operate-a-car), and, while SF / SV is making some progress in the
mass-transit area, it's still much harder to be without a car.

And NYC's absolute market rent levels appear to be lower than SF's.

~~~
bilbo0s
> _And NYC 's absolute market rent levels appear to be lower than SF's...._

That's NYC, not Manhattan.

Manhattan is _worse_ than SF, (and _certainly_ worse than any other place in
SV). And yet, it's not a monoculture. That's the point I'm making. It strongly
suggests that the issue in SF is less about affordable housing, and more about
the fact that SF/SV is simply popular with a certain type of person.

~~~
jseliger
This data:
[https://farm1.staticflickr.com/915/28341255697_1dbd87422e_o....](https://farm1.staticflickr.com/915/28341255697_1dbd87422e_o.jpg)
claims median rent in SF is $450/mo more in SF than Manhattan.

Zillow rent index: [https://www.zillow.com/san-francisco-ca/home-
values/](https://www.zillow.com/san-francisco-ca/home-values/) has SF at
$4100/month. And it has Manhattan: [https://www.zillow.com/manhattan-ny/home-
values/](https://www.zillow.com/manhattan-ny/home-values/) at $3879.

And, as noted in the original post, in Manhattan it is very easy and typical
to live without a car; in SF, less so, further increasing the cost disparity.

It is wise to cite your sources prior to posting.

------
olivermarks
'In short, Silicon Valley’s problem is sameness, stupid — and in Ms. Powell’s
telling, we are not going to get a better, more responsible tech industry
until we get a more intellectually diverse one.'

Can't argue with that. Pretty concerned about the impact of the tsunami of
Chinese venture money that is going to take this thinking globally, I suspect
SV is still kinder and gentler than the rest despite shortcomings...
[https://www.ft.com/content/71ad7cda-6ef4-11e8-92d3-6c13e5c92...](https://www.ft.com/content/71ad7cda-6ef4-11e8-92d3-6c13e5c92914)
SoftBank: inside the ‘Wild West’ $100bn fund shaking up the tech world (The
Vision Fund is changing the rules for investing but will its whirlwind
decision-making lead to bad bets?)

~~~
skrebbel
I'm no expert, but you're calling SoftBank money Chinese - aren't they a
Japanese firm mostly funded by Saudi oil money?

~~~
olivermarks
Yes you're right - I typed Chinese meaning Japanese

------
40acres
From the outside (Portland, OR) looking in, it seems like SV not only has a
diversity of race issue (which I DO believe can drive different thoughts, look
at a map of where most black Americans live -- spoiler alert: it's the south,
I wonder how many folks in SV grew up in the south) but also a diversity of
industry problem.

I grew up in New York, which has a pretty big tech sector, but also has
fashion, finance, publishing as major industries as well. There are folks who
work for the big tech companies in New York who have also worked on Wall
Street and I think that helps to prevent monoculture from growing out of
control.

~~~
mr_tristan
Kind of funny that the Portlander mentions racial diversity. Portland remains
one of the whitest cities in the US. ([https://priceonomics.com/how-diverse-
is-your-city/](https://priceonomics.com/how-diverse-is-your-city/)) (NOTE: I'm
also a Portland-er.)

The bay area actually is one of the _most_ diverse in the country, which does
include San Jose: [https://www.kqed.org/news/10435390/bay-area-cities-among-
mos...](https://www.kqed.org/news/10435390/bay-area-cities-among-most-diverse-
in-u-s)

The issue isn't racial _diversity_, it's racial _inequality_: the economic
gains made in the Bay Area aren't including everyone across the racial
spectrum. ([https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-urgency-to-achieve-
an...](https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-urgency-to-achieve-an-inclusive-
economy-in-the-bay-area/))

(I do agree about the commercial diversity argument though, but that's mostly
my own anecdotal experience.)

~~~
40acres
Totally agree about Portland, I'm aiming my critique more at the institutions
that make up "silicon valley" rather than California as a whole though. Maybe
that wasn't clear.

------
gaahrdner
The first time I visited Mountain View, I was absolutely blown away by the
"sameness" of the people living there. Racially, it is much more diverse than
my hometown of Austin, but I could never escape the feeling, after talking to
random people, that I was stuck in a scene from "The Stepford Wives."

~~~
gaius
If everyone is a 20-something graduate of the same handful of universities
then of course there will be a monoculture.

~~~
cimmanom
OK, that's a descriptive explanation. That doesn't mean it should be
normative.

------
tomc1985
Silicon Valley culture could use a large dose of empathy. For such a customer-
focused industry, folks' unwillingness to 'walk a mile in their shoes' is eye-
opening

~~~
whamlastxmas
Everyone could use a large dose of empathy. Either you're a Nazi fascist or a
spineless socialist. Everyone is so quick to dehumanize each other and have
zero tolerance for thoughts outside their circle. This isn't unique to SV, but
it's definitely more apparent there.

------
gwbas1c
> If you have a hierarchy where engineers are at the very top and the people
> who are interfacing with the outside world are a couple rungs below that,
> you really miss something when those people don’t have an equal voice at the
> table.

As an engineer, I've always found that I'm quite far from the top rung, and
that my voice is frequently not the loudest at the table.

What may give the illusion that my voice is strong is that I only support
ideas that I know I can build or are practical.

I find that the people who make complaints like that are usually the people
who don't realize that their voices are just as equal as mine at the table.
They just need to work on their credibility in order to make their voice
stronger.

Edit: Credibility often comes from knowing what ideas to support, and when to
stop pushing an idea. The term "idea person" comes to mind here.

~~~
commandlinefan
That was an especially grating accusation coming from the “director of public
relations” who probably had a private office, an assistant, a parking spot,
and meaningful equity. Unlike anybody who knows how computers actually work.

~~~
gwbas1c
In all honesty, without context it's hard to know if it's a credible argument
or just sour grapes.

------
solidsnack9000
_Ms. Powell smartly recognizes a truth that many in the industry elide: A lack
of diversity is not just one of several issues for Silicon Valley to fix, but
is instead the keystone problem — the source of much else that ails tech, from
its recklessly expansionist zeal to the ways its brightest companies keep
stepping in problems of their own making._

This article is working from a presumption that companies should be subject to
a standard of political representation; and if they aren’t then they don’t —
and can’t — function. Where did this idea come from, I wonder?

It seems at odds both with recent history (many non-representative companies
have done a lot of good) and it seems to not admit of any distinction between
business institutions and political ones. Even if Google had broader
representation of identity-related protected classes, it would not be a
representative sample of the US or the world when considering things like
education or other life history factors.

What kind of diversity is the author talking about, and what relationship does
it have to any legitimate standard of representativeness?

------
ChuckMcM
Wow, that was not well researched.

I suppose if they had titled it Google's Keystone problem it wouldn't have
gotten as many clicks./cynicism

Lets take the article though for what it purports to be, a review of Medium's
first online book, which happens to be a piece of fiction that pilloried
Google's culture because the author felt unheard at a company driven by
engineering.

It isn't a surprise that voices go unheard in companies (large and small). If
I had to guess, I would say the most common refrain I have heard from any
employee who quit their job, it was "I tried to tell them what they were doing
was wrong but nobody would listen, now look at where they are."

Does that point to any deep regional insights? No. Does it point out that
people running companies are human and have blind spots? Well, yeah it does
but that isn't exactly startling news.

My suggestion for folks reading the book and this comment are to take away one
thing; "Learning how to communicate with the corporate hive mind is an
excellent skill to cultivate." and the more practical corollary, "You can't
tell someone anything they are unwilling to hear."

You just can't. Get over it. I have had the experience of telling the CEO of a
startup that their blind spot was hiding a train coming at them, and that it
would take down the company. They couldn't hear it, they rejected my analysis
as fanciful and guesswork. And when the company was destroyed by that very
train wreck? They were mad at me! Not the situation, not their inability to
hear what they needed to hear. No the messenger was the problem, not the
situation.

What I learned was that you can't tell someone something they don't want to
hear, and if you force them to hear it and are correct, they can end up hating
you for it. It is better to ask gently if they are open to alternate views and
if they are not, just stop. Let them learn these lessons in their own way and
be supportive of them once they fall down and are working their way back up.

There is a theme in "Bad Blood" where they start falsifying their test results
because they believe that they are close to having things working and they
just need a bit more time. I am sure more than one person said, "Wait, this
isn't the right way to deal with this." But to hear that, you had to accept
that maybe the whole test with only a drop of blood was not a practical idea.
And to hear _that_ , you had to consider the idea that the whole idea was not
going to work. Net result, ignore the 'haters' and move on.

~~~
Kalium
> It isn't a surprise that voices go unheard in companies (large and small).
> If I had to guess, I would say the most common refrain I have heard from any
> employee who quit their job, it was "I tried to tell them what they were
> doing was wrong but nobody would listen, now look at where they are."

I'm always struck by how readily people equate "heard and understood" with
"agreed with".

It's very possible that a person can be heard, listened to, understood, and
then the actions they want not be taken. Just because a person is _heard_ is
not the same as that person being _agreed with_.

My advice for people is to take on board the difficult lesson that someone
failing to do as you wish isn't the same as them refusing to listen to you.
That your wishes or warnings are not acted upon is not the same as them
falling on deaf ears.

~~~
ChuckMcM
I don't disagree, people contextualize the conversation with relation to
themselves, but it is a bit more nuanced than that.

This in particular is incomplete: _It 's very possible that a person can be
heard, listened to, understood, and then the actions they want not be taken.
Just because a person is heard is not the same as that person being agreed
with._

Is half the answer but the important bits it leaves unstated. To _hear_
someone, you should be able to paraphrase their argument such that they agree
that you're phrasing, is just as accurate as their original phrasing. And
_then_ you have to be able to share your decision process with respect to
their argument so that they can see how you reached your choice of directions.

If you do that, whether or not you choose make the change they suggest, they
will feel heard by you. Conversely if you can't do that, they have no basis
for believing you understood what they said and so they won't feel heard.

~~~
Kalium
You're right! The ability to understand, contextualize, and restate someone's
point cogently and clearly back to them will leave them feeling they have been
heard and understood.

It's possible that my life experience might suggest that this sense of feeling
listened to sometimes dissipates when it is not followed by the actions they
would have you undertake. The ability to articulate why you have made this
choice contrary to their wishes is, as you so correctly point out, critically
important for having the other person understand.

More completely, it _can_ be very helpful in leaving another person feeling
heard and understood when you choose not to do as they desire you to. It may
be possible that not all people are so understanding as to accept that someone
who heard and understood them might genuinely come to a different conclusion,
even with a clear understanding of their points and lucid explanations of
reasoning processes.

It may also be worth considering how these techniques can, in some scenarios,
interact with complex human systems. The techniques you wisely describe can be
_incredibly effective_ on a personal level! Yet, they perhaps can function
less well when subject to an intermediating system. In such a scenario, some
people might opt to interpret people choosing not to act as they suggest as a
failure to hear and understand their points. In an organization, giving each
individual the personal attention and explanation required to satisfy them and
help them feel listened to can very easily become time-prohibitive.

You're absolutely, completely, 100% right. It's just perhaps possible that
there might be some further room for subtlety.

~~~
ChuckMcM
> It's just perhaps possible that there might be some further room for
> subtlety.

Always, it is humans we're talking about after all.

------
pinewurst
This refers to an awful "novel" IMHO - I read a few chapters before I started
to cut myself. I'm confident that if the author didn't have a magic Google
resume entry, it wouldn't have been published, much less hyped in the NYT as a
Great Statement.

------
httpz
Everyone loves to talk about the problems Silicon Valley has but I honestly
want to know what harm is Silicon Valley causing to the world? It's not like
it caused a global financial crisis like Wall Street. Yes, there are the whole
privacy issues with companies who's main business is selling ads but that's
the nature of their business. If Silicon Valley was more diverse or if those
companies were located in a different city, would there be any difference?

~~~
Aloha
It's less about what problems Silicon Valley is causing the world, and more,
that problems that Silicon Valley cant solve because of its own ideological
limitations.

Though I'd suggest that Social Media is causing some very real problems - but
I don't see an easy answer that doesn't involve changing the fundamental
constructs of social media.

~~~
tareqak
Could you please detail specific examples of what these ideological
limitations are?

I see different kinds of limitations that are driven by blindly chasing
profit, attempting externalize everything that doesn't affect the bottom line,
and insistent refusal to accept even partial responsibility for creating tools
when said tools are misused until public opinion is overwhelming against them.
I don't think that the limitations that I listed are ideological though.

~~~
tomatotomato37
I guess one example would be the ideological push for dense urbanization. It
makes sense from the perspective of a city jammed between mountains or packed
on an island, but not so much for a prairie city that could survive quite well
with low density development if it’s competent enough at managing its sprawl.

~~~
ummonk
Odd. I've definitely noticed this ideological push, but it has always felt
somewhat external to me; it feels like it is mostly pushed by transplants,
especially temporary transplants to SF, who think everyone should live in
dense walkable cities.

FWIW I do think SF and the peninsula need dense urbanization, but this is due
to the geography of the bay and the fact that demand seems to be
overwhelmingly outstripping supply, and I'd rather increase density than rip
up the green space along the peninsula. I don't think this is necessary for
most cities though, or even necessary around San Jose for that matter (since
it has less narrow growth constraints due to geography). I get the impression
the majority of locals / immigrants in the Bay Area who support denser
urbanization have a similar viewpoint, and don't consider it an ideological
necessity for the rest of the world.

------
mesozoic
It's so funny/interesting only a decade ago no one would listen to the
engineers and the business types would just screw up everything and do
whatever they want. Now the engineers built billion/trillion dollar companies
and those types are crying that they've lost the power. Sometimes trying to
regain it through political games.

------
ravenstine
Oh, the irony. Silicon Valley is the way it is in large part because the media
keeps a close eye on everything that it does. Naturally, groups of people are
going to behave in whatever way allows them to best survive under prevailing
conditions. If the media, including NYT, hadn't spend the last 10+ years both
salivating over and strongly critiquing Silicon Valley, there wouldn't be so
much of a need for conformity.

Just do a Google search and you'll find opinion pieces, as well as ones
published by the New York Times, about how Silicon Valley is misogynist,
racist, and homophobic. Why would it be any surprise that people in the
industry are paranoid of not being perceived as ultra liberal and diverse? A
strong monoculture is a survival mechanism from environmental pressure.

~~~
0xdeadbeefbabe
Hah, that explains why I get the impression that they've sworn fealty.

------
cmrdporcupine
Reminds me of this classic article from the 90s:
[http://www.imaginaryfutures.net/2007/04/17/the-
californian-i...](http://www.imaginaryfutures.net/2007/04/17/the-californian-
ideology-2/)

------
fmajid
Tech needs to accept accountability and transparency, but these jealous
attacks from old-media has-beens are no less tedious for being so
unpredictable.

------
curun1r
This kind of stuff annoys me to no end. I think everyone realizes that Silicon
Valley and the overall tech world has a diversity problem. There are aspects
of our society that systematically under-develop and discourage minorities and
women from following the path to becoming an engineer. It's a problem and it's
one that our entire society needs to address.

But do we have an "engineering-and-data-obsessed monoculture" problem? Hell
no! We've got a whiny, non-tech contingent that is frustrated that engineers
aren't willing to be high-level abstractions on top of computers problem,
which is only a problem for those people who are shut out of guiding the
direction of the tech industry by their lack of ability to actually do the
things the tech industry does. The notion that we'd magically arrive at better
decisions if we allowed more non-tech people to make those decisions is
ludicrous and insulting. There's no reason to think that without the benefit
of hindsight, those people would have made better decisions than were actually
made. It's the same specious thinking that leads non-tech "idea" people to
approach tech people and generously offer 5% of their sure-to-succeed company
in exchange for the mere trifle of actually building it.

Sorry, it doesn't work that way. Execution beats opinions every time. People
who are actually capable of doing the work don't give seats at the table just
because "diversity." There's no reason to allow a PR person, like the one
discussed in this article, to have outsized influence at a tech company.
Engineers seek out engineering-focused cultures because they want a greater
degree of autonomy in their work and they want to have a larger influence on
the success of their company. Changing that would just mean that the best
engineers would choose to work elsewhere, even starting their own companies if
need be. That's why we have engineering-focused cultures...because these
companies need people that can actually do the work. They've proven that it's
not hard to find the non-technical talent, so there's no need to put as much
emphasis on that when it comes to the culture and leadership of the company.

The one exception to that that proves the point is the current demand for
enterprise tech salespeople. We're reaching a point where that talent is in
just as high a demand as technical people. And to the companies that need
enterprise tech sales, the cultures are adapting to value those employees
alongside engineers. But when I read articles like this one from the NYT, it
just feels naive and entitled. If you want to be involved in determining the
direction of the tech industry, provide a reason and a value proposition based
in reality or your going to be ignored.

------
badcede
No way! That's the New York Times' keystone problem as well!

------
conceptpad
It is orthogonal to the Times article, but George Gilder's recent book "Life
After Google: The Fall of Big Data and the Rise of the Blockchain Economy" [1]
offers a valuable perspective. His recent interview at the Stanford Hoover
Institute [2] is compelling.

[1]
[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B072NYKG2G/](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B072NYKG2G/)
[2] [https://www.hoover.org/research/george-gilder-forget-
cloud-c...](https://www.hoover.org/research/george-gilder-forget-cloud-
computing-blockchain-future)

~~~
ucaetano
Cloud computing continues to boom, and blockchain continues to go nowhere. So
far, he's wrong.

~~~
village-idiot
Blockchain has got to be the biggest hype and no-show that I've seen since the
original AI winter.

------
SansoyeA
Sounds like Anahata could do with Includio! And so could Sillicon Valley if
there is a lot of truth behind the book. Looking forward to reading it!

------
bilbo0s
I think the comments here, at least the popular ones, kind of reinforce the
article's point about the existence of a monoculture. Or herd-like thinking.

Just a quick, back of the envelope, tally of the responses here shows a real
tendency to focus on, let's call them "familiar" subjects. Vast majority of
people are talking about left-right politics for instance. Or sex, race,
sexual orientation type things. Or inequality. (ie-Housing affordability.) But
none of these really contribute in any real way to the lack of diversity of
ideas present when brainstorming, say, new uses for nanotech.

We do have a monoculture of beliefs. Everyone believes, for instance, that
diversity only means political diversity. Or gender diversity. Or religious
diversity. Etc. And so, that becomes the center of our focus. But political
diversity, for example, is not even terribly valuable when brainstorming
solutions. Gather some Stanford/Berkeley grads along with some impoverished,
but clever Africans and Asians, and I'd bet you'd be able to hit on more
innovative solutions to more problems than you ever would with a room full of
political liberals and conservatives parroting their respective dogma.

Diversity of thought like that is difficult to achieve because, ironically, of
our belief that diversity of thought means diversity of political thought. Or
diversity of race. Or diversity of gender. Etc. (All of which are next to
useless. Especially since all of that diversity is coming from the same
overall culture and socioeconomic class in most cases.)

If you want the benefits that diversity of thought conveys, you can't look for
comfortable substitutes for it, like religion, race, politics, sexual
orientation, or gender. Going to find a religiously diverse team, which
inevitably thinks like you, or a politically diverse team, which is even worse
in terms of sameness, won't work. You have to go all the way. Not only should
their thoughts be diverse, the fundamental way they _think_ should be diverse
if that makes sense? (I once gave a presentation at Halliburton, and I can
tell you, having someone around who thought about logistics in terms of
donkeys was extremely helpful in terms of solution finding and problem
solving.) If you're not willing to go all the way with diversity of thought,
you're not going to get the benefits of diversity of thought.

You can hire more women, or conservatives, or muslims, or hispanics, but it
won't really get you anywhere. You need people who think fundamentally
differently than other team members. And you might even need people who think
fundamentally differently to even _identify_ people who think fundamentally
differently. You don't _FILL_ the team with those people, (you have to be able
to get work done), but you should make sure a few of them are at the table if
you want to reap those benefits.

~~~
canadapups
I agree. You can force diversity in gender and race (eg. require 1 woman on
your board), but they can all still think the same.

When I asked a few tech friends about launching my business, it was this:
create a minimum viable product (MVP), apply to a start-up accelerator, get
funding, eat ramen, do things that scale, do things that don't scale, move
fast break things. That is "the way".

The instant my wife (business partner, computer illiterate, masters degree in
marketing) heard of the MVP idea, she went on a mini-rant: "huh? what?
Advertising is sooo expensive. No way are we spending all that money at launch
to bring in people to see a minimum product. When customers come to our
website, we'll have 5 seconds to hook them, so we better have all the features
right in their face. If they don't see what they like, they're never coming
back"...

Her perspective is so far from the tech scene that this happens repeatedly.
Tech guys repeat what they read in some blog which then boggles my wife's
mind.

In a different HN discussion regarding MBA degrees, it was stated a couple
times that you could just read 2 books and get the MBA curriculum. They don't
realize all the different perspectives that you get from business school
discussions. It's not about the hard skills. In business school we spent a lot
of time doing Harvard Business Cases and hearing from a diversity of opinions.

~~~
ummonk
I agree that the prevalent culture tends to result in poorly fleshed out
products, and your wife is right on this. I should note though, that
technically, such a product is not actually an MVP. If customers come to the
website and don't get hooked, it means it doesn't have enough features to be
Viable.

------
slvconserv
The New York Times is unable to write the truth here for fear of offending
their readers: The monoculture in Silicon Valley is that of hyper liberal
people. This is so obviously the case and they are going so far out of their
way here to not mention it one can only conclude that they are attempting to
mislead deliberately.

The reason the New York Times can’t say “Silicon Valley is completely 100%
liberal and that is a serious problem” is because most Liberal people
genuinely believe they are the disruptive punk rockers who are fighting
against the evil forces of darkness. In reality, being Liberal is highly
homogenous and unoriginal.

But if you write that down as the Times, you immediately become a target for
political attack. So they take the easy road here which is vaguely mentioning
some foggy, abstract term “monoculture.”

We know what monoculture means. It isn’t a conservative republican
monoculture.

I work in this industry, 90% of my coworkers and colleagues universally agree
and emphatically support diversity of all types. They talk about it all the
time, hold diversity workshops etc. nothing much has changed.

So get out of here with this fake monoculture Orwellian nonsense.

~~~
gcb0
some americans have really weird meanings for some words.

such as left to mean center-right, and liberal to mean companies employing
dozens of lobbyists trying to influence a very strong State.

oh! and "decadent" as a praise for chocolate. that is the worst.

~~~
stcredzero
_some americans have really weird meanings for some words._

 _such as left to mean center-right_

Political Compass put me at center-left. Some people in the Bay Area have
tried to call me a Republican. Differing Points of View can be weird. That's
what Diversity is all about.

~~~
hef19898
Come to Europe to get a different perpective. I would guess Bay Area liberals
would be placed somewhere slightly left / liberal of center over here. And
neo-cons in terms on capatalism. I can only guess what I would be called in
the US. Perspective is everything I guess.

~~~
stcredzero
The Political Compass test I took was European.

~~~
hef19898
Ok, that is strange. There is, it seems, more than one political axis. What
kind of test did you take? Now I'm curious to find out what I'm classified as.

~~~
stcredzero
_Ok, that is strange. There is, it seems, more than one political axis._

Nowadays, the authoritarian/anti-authoritarian axis is the most important one.

~~~
hef19898
There is nothing to say against that.

