
Why Living in a City Makes You More Innovative - shnacker
http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/ideas/2013/06/why-living-in-a-city-makes-you-more-innovative/
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kstrauser
"...in certain very specific areas." I grew up near quite rural areas and a
certain level of mechanical innovation was expected. You need to use the power
take-off on a tractor to run an irrigation pump temporarily until you can buy
a new one? Break out the welder. The snow plow broke beyond reasonable repair?
Break out the welder.

For further evidence, watch any TV show making fun of rednecks. You'll
typically see things like an excavator used to create a waterfall for everyone
to swim through, or someone fastening a lawn chair to a beefed-up, self-
propelled push lawnmower to make a riding mower.

City life very well might increase innovation in certain fields. I'd posit
that country life increases innovation just as much, but in different areas.

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alwaysinshade
> City life very well might increase innovation in certain fields. I'd posit
> that country life increases innovation just as much, but in different areas.

Innovative people are everywhere - the benefit that cities offer is that for
every unit of space you have a greater number of people, thus you're likely to
find a few intelligent, like-minded people condensed into a smaller area. They
become easier to find an collaborate with. To use a metaphor: you have a
better chance of picking up in a bar if there are 50 members of the opposite
sex than 5.

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shpxnvz
But not if the number of same-sex competitors increases by the same amount.

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ActVen
This type of research is interesting and valuable. However, I can't help but
wonder how much has changed over the last 15 years. The fact that you and I
are discussing this article on websites like HN seems to be a great example of
technology overcoming some of the barriers of location. A motivated person can
easily find ways to interact and form ties. Maybe the impact of geographic
location is higher among those less motivated.

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recursive
Oh look, a fluffy article about how living in a city makes you more
innovative. On a website primarily used by city dwellers that pride themselves
on being innovative.

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_pius
_On a website primarily used by city dwellers ...._

How do you know that?

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recursive
Because San Francisco is a city.

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qwerta
I have City associated mostly with high cost of living and lower life
standard. In City I would probably spend 60+ hours/week in office and on
commute just to break even.

Outside of City a can have big house for my family, spend 3+ hours/day on my
hobbies. And even make enough savings for 1 year runway for my startup :-)

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dominotw
What about the environment? What about thousands of people getting killed by
our government to acquire energy sources to fuel your house in the burbs?

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qwerta
You are barking at wrong person. I live in Ireland and drive 15 years old car.
Also I doubt that large cities are powered by sunshine and rainbow.

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dominotw
I am 'barking' at the person who chooses to live in the burbs. I dont care
where you live or what car you drive. Has nothing to do with you.

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qwerta
I still do not get how is large house at suburb related to environment.

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dagw
Living in a large house in the suburbs has a far greater environmental impact
than living in an apartment in a city by basically any metric you care to
measure.

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rsl7
except that cities are incredible, giant islands of heat.

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lampe3
i would never say that living in a city or outside a city would make someone
more or less innovative.

You deal with different problems in and outside cities. I think a mix of both
is the best you can get to get more Innovative!

When i Study i live in a 2+Million City but when i don't study i life in a
village with 50+ people.

You really cant compare them both...

It's like people trying to say which programming language by benchmarks... yes
go is faster then ruby in some stuff but does this only makes go better?
nobody can say because it is a matter of problems to solve and taste of the
human that will write the code.

just my 2 cents

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ianstallings
I'm a country boy at heart, was born in coal-country appalachians. But I live
in Brooklyn now and it's great for my love of software. Everyone here is a go-
getter and it inspires me. I have met so many others I can work with on side
projects, it becomes quite impossible to ignore everyone and it drives you
forward. I've seen many idle conversations lead to great things simply through
circumstance.

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ochekurishvili
Nope. Solitude is "the #1 habit of highly creative people".
[http://zenhabits.net/creative-habit/](http://zenhabits.net/creative-habit/)

Big cities are full of noise and distractions.

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_delirium
Attempting to refute an article about a scientific study by linking to a
collection of quotes from Felicia Day and Franz Kafka doesn't seem like a very
solid methodology...

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davidf18
It also depends on the type of inhabitants in the city. Pre-war Vienna,
Budapest, and Berlin were particularly innovative. Today Berlin is the most
innovative city in Germany.

In the US, New York City/Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn near Manhattan are
particularly innovative, again because of the type of inhabitants it attracts.
San Francisco, SV, LA, Austin, Seattle, are all innovative in different ways.

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aristidb
Do you have evidence that Berlin is the most innovative city in Germany, or
did you just derive this stunning conclusion from your gut feeling?

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tarr11
Correlation does not imply causation.

Relevant XKCDs:

[http://xkcd.com/552/](http://xkcd.com/552/)
[http://xkcd.com/852/](http://xkcd.com/852/)
[http://xkcd.com/1138/](http://xkcd.com/1138/)

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rza
Paul Graham wrote on this same subject
([http://paulgraham.com/cities.html](http://paulgraham.com/cities.html)). A
bit more anecdotal, but convincing nonetheless.

