How does Seattle's tech scene differ from San Francisco and Silicon Valley?

[Laura_Hall]

How big is the impact on the overall daily life in the city? Tech people everywhere, or just part of the larger community? Development of housing prices?

[John_Sechrest]

Certainly the impact of Tech can be felt in Seattle. On the Eastside there is a dominant feeling of Microsoft-ness. The corporate culture ooooozes out in many ways. You will likely have microsofties in meetings for any group you are part of. There are a ton of Tech companies, Google, Facebook, Amazon, not to mention smaller home grown ones. If you look at the Geekwire 200 list, you can see all the various startups in tech. I am sure that If I were 25 and single that the impact of tens of thousands of new tech programmer types wandering around for a date would make a significant difference. What does a male engineer do when they can't find a date? Write an app of course!!! We have 15 dating apps that I have tripped over at Startup weekends and other mentoring efforts.

However, Seattle is also a silo-ed community. The huge shipping and transport industry barely intersects with the Tech community. The large manufacturing companies are in different parts of town than the tech companies. The BioTech Cancer community is not the same group as the Javascript coders. There is a significant student population as well.

So you can find coffee shops where there is very little hint of Tech. On the other hand, there are corners where you would not expect it to pop up, and yet it is there. I think that the Bay area is far more impacted. Not a location at all that does not have tech impacts.

Housing prices are way way way less in Seattle than in the Bay Area, but they are raising at 10%-15% a year, so I am sure that is part of the Tech Impact.

[Jed_Murdock]

While there are definite similarities, especially with many Bay Area shops opening outposts up here, there's an overall cultural difference between the Pacific Northwest and California. The PNW is less concerned with appearance and money, and more concerned with living a meaningful life. This of course is my PNW prejudice showing. The Bay Area vibe is so over-the-top with the tech money that it feels overwhelming at times. Seattle certainly has tech money flowing, but it doesn't feel like it's the only thing happening. Like John mentioned above, Seattle is broken up into distinct neighborhoods, each with its own vibe. Some are more techie than others. South Lake Union for example has recently been transformed from sleepy industrial area to Amazon town with herds of nerds wearing badges talking about tech. But it's easy enough to avoid if you prefer. In SF it felt unavoidable. Housing is fastest rising in US but still at about 50% of SF.