So according to Techcrunch, America is losing its infatuation with Silicon Valley.
I guess it was inevitable.
You see, I have a few famous friends. Not just internet-fame, but actual fame.
And they all have one thing in common: they all hate being famous.
As one of them so succinctly put it to me recently, “It just creates a lot of noise, both inside and outside. Makes it impossible to get any meaningful work done.”
To which I replied, yes, exactly. When anyone, or anywhere, or anything becomes “a thing”, it/they suddenly lose their magic.
I can think of lots of “things” that were new & amazing at one point, that aren’t so much nowadays.
Or if they are, they’ve gotten REALLY expensive and/or swamped with tourists and hangers-on, making it really hard for people with real lives and real needs to get anything truly valuable from it. For example:
Star Wars sequels.
Austin, Texas.
Wicker Park.
Notting Hill.
Hipster Cupcakes.
Craft beer.
Texas Barbecue.
SXSW.
Burning Man.
Blogging.
British advertising.
Venice Beach.
Venice, Italy.
French cinema.
New York’s West Village.
New York’s East Village.
Tribeca’s Odeon bar.
Writing screenplays.
Brooklyn.
And now yes, Silicon Valley as well, apparently.
So what happened to us, exactly?
It used to be hard to know what the next “thing” was.
Then the Internet came along, and made it far, far too easy.
To paraphrase Yogi Berra, nobody eats there anymore, it’s too crowded.
Our culture is Yogi-Berra’ing itself to death, taking your equally Yogi-Berr’d lifestyle down with it.
You thought your were blazing new trails. While the whole time all you were doing was waiting in line.
For brunch. In San Francisco.
So how’s it working for you…?
