Startup & Silicon Valley News, Culture

Find out the answer on the eternal question “How to pitch to Dave McClure?” and even more from the super angel investor and founder of the business incubator 500 Startups.

So, you have a dream about doing a startup and the Valley is calling. Let's look at some pros and cons.

A reliable supporter of Democratic candidates in recent years, the tech industry seems to be making a right turn.

Interns in tech can start as early as high school--and become richer than their parents.

Despite the expensive cost of living, there’s just no where else in the world that can compete with the history and potential of Silicon Valley.

It's not a surprise to anyone who has seen the numbers at other tech companies, but Facebook's release of employee demographic data has provided more stark evidence that Silicon Valley has a diversity problem. Tech companies are disproportionately made up of white or Asian men. Their senior leadership skews white—and again, male. And technology staffs are mostly men, almost exclusively white and Asian....

We have 10,000 square feet of prime co-working space in the heart of San Francisco’s startup district. We’re offering desks at only $299 per month for the entire summer (June, July & August).

Why so much less than other coworking spaces in San Francisco? Because our space is new and we want to fill it up. But come fast, as soon as it’s halfway full, the price will go up!

For the past few years, the unemployment rate in the US has been decreasing. Today’s unemployment rate of 6.5% is over 3.3% points lower than just four years ago. With this economic growth, businesses today must be strategic in how they retain and hire top talent.

Today employees are in the driver’s seat. As tech blogger, John Boitnott said in his recent SAP article, “2014 is well positioned to be the year the economy shifts away from an employer-driven market and starts conceding to the demands of a newly revitalized, employee-driven market.”

Employees are now looking for more than a salary — they are factoring in all of the employee perks associated with a position. To gain a better understanding of this current landscape, we took a moment with Mr. Boitnott to dive deeper:

The communal spirit of the 60’s has returned to SF, but with a modern twist. Software engineers, founders and tech workers alike are now flocking to giant, Victorian mansions that promise peace, love and open source API integration to help you live more collaboratively.I’m greeted with several long, loving hugs upon entering one such communal living space known as The Lair – a seven-bedroom mansion nestled just on the edge of San Francisco’s Lower Haight neighborhood. We then gather around an old dining room table, breathing out “Yummmmmmm” (instead of “Om”) before partaking in the shared nightly meal.

Walkable suburbs and center city companies are dominating the tech scene.

After Facebook assumed the former Sun Microsystems complex in Palo Alto in 2011, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg set out to find an architect capable of handling a grand design for its main main headquarters building. [...] with the building slated for completion next year, Facebook provided these new, exclusive images to Business Insider of what the world can expect from Gehry's latest design: At more than 435,000 square feet, spread across 22 acres, the new building dips and rises from 45 to 73 feet. Here's Why Instagram's Demographics Are So Attractive To BrandsWe Went To Twitter And Facebook And It's Impossible To Decide Which Place We'd Rather WorkZuckerberg: I Just Called Obama To Say How Mad I Am About The NSAWhatsApp Says Android Malware Is To Blame For Exposing Your Private ChatsFacebook Video Ads Will Be Released TodaySEE ALSO: 

Half of HBS's class of 2014 flocked to one of two cities.

Location is usually the defining factor in pricing a home. Being close to shops, restaurants, nightlife and public transit all add value. San Francisco sellers can now add proximity to a tech shutt...

When Curse CEO Hubert Thieblot told his employees last year that he was moving the company's San Francisco headquarters to Huntsville, Alabama last year, they..

The first step is knowing you have a problem. Even if you think you don't, it could come back to haunt you.

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Your startup is your baby, so it makes sense that you "baby" it--but often when you do that in business, it becomes micromanaging. Even experienced managers can suffer from this tendency, so don't beat yourself up if this is your first time managing people and you find yourself slipping into these bad habits. Just like anything else, the first step is recognizing that you have a problem. The good news is that being a good manager can't be "mastered" and it's a lifelong learning process you can begin at any time.

There's a problem with Silicon Valley and the subcultures that imitate it. It's a design bug woven into people's identities and sense of self-worth. Influential and otherwise very smart people will deny till their last breath that it even exists. But I believe it does and should be fixed before it gets any worse. Since...

Follow these three tips to dial in your startup’s pitch and help grow your business into the next billion-dollar enterprise.

Uber Technologies, Lyft and Sidecar have collectively sent a letter to San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, asking him to intervene in a standoff between the companies and San Francisco International Airport Director John Martin.

Amid a change in what it means to be middle class in Silicon Valley, the region has been named the seventh least-affordable residential real estate market in the country for middle-income residents.

Remember The Unicorn Club of startups that secured an esteemed $1 billion valuation? Might as well be The Garbage Club now, full of trifling companies with worth the kind of coin one chucks out the window from the backseat of an Uber. Why, in the past 24 hours alone, Pinterest and Uber reportedly increased their valuations by a collective $8.7 billion.

The thousands of tech workers flooding into SF and the effect their money has had on the cost of living here has been an increasingly explosive issue. There have been protests from local activists and even a weird bar fight involving Google Glass. Journalists from the East Coast like to come out here now and opine about how the city itself is being changed irrevocably; that it "doesn't know what to do with" its newfound cash. Over the weekend, Kevin Rose was the latest object of ridicule. That kind of came out of nowhere for me, and didn't seem quite appropriate.

John Boitnott from CircleClick chats about being an advisor to a startup and how you can help emerging companies become successful.