The New Global Start-Up Cities - Richard Florida

[Habfanman]

6 starts up in Montreal vs. 34 in Toronto!!!

 

If you're so concerned about it then why don't you do something about it? Like get off your fucking ass and create your own startup. Your useless whining and complaining on the internet isn't accomplishing anything.

[Habfanman]

mark_ac

 

What's a starts up? Calm down. Your pulse is racing, your pressure is way up, and you are obsessive. Do you know how many startups fail within a coupla years? It is like the restaurant business, many fail miserably in no time flat. I would rather invest in a big old company, a successful old codger with a history of smooth sailing and undenied profitability, independent of government largesse like Air Canada for example. That is where success lies.

 

He probably never heard of a startup or knew what one was before the article was posted!

 

I certainly agree that we could use more entrepreneurial spirit in MTL but I wouldn't take anything written by blowhard Richard Florida very seriously. His 'Creative Class' schtick is getting tired. He thinks everybody should be designing apps while painting murals on the walls of their converted lofts and eating organic cupcakes with ground unicorn horn icing on top.

 

From the comments section of the article:

 

Erik Bruvold • 8 hours ago

 

"We ALL need to take anything coming out of Florida's shop and published on this site with a HUGE grain of salt. I took a look at the underlying dataset he referenced. It is populated in an open source fashion. So one bias that is there is that start ups with better PR (that know about the source) are going to be overrepresented. Secondly, just a quick browse through the source suggested that what it spits back as start ups are far from scrubbed (I saw university institutes and 20 year old VC firms come back, while at the same time scores of start ups I personally am aware of didn't appear).

 

Is the geography of start ups very interesting? Absolutely. But let this (along with a ton of stuff Florida posts) be a lesson to us all - the analysis is usually only as good as the dataset and sometimes the urge to "get something posted" trumps trying to do good (or really even half way decent) social science."

[acpnc]

I'm tired of Montreal being outclassed by it's peers. At least somebody here has the balls to stand up for the city. I can't be the only one here that hopes Montreal could return to it's former glory.

 

First, if you are that concerned, why don't you start with your own start up? Second, in order for Montréal to return to it's former glory, you would have to recreate our former hub at YUL, the way it was before AC transfered everything over to Toronto. Either we go back to the entire former picture or we don't.

 

Past is past, and Montréal did not have to wait for you to recreate itself. And the city does it quite well, as far as I'm concerned. The real problem is more in your negative mind and your distorded peception. Your ego is so huge that you're convinced that only you have all the answers. Get a life!

 

Montréal will go it's own way, and a lot of skillfull people are already taking good care of it's future, which has really restarted to blossom beautifully. Nobody, nor any city, can be number one in everything, and it would be a pure waste of time and energy to try to achieve that illusion. We can be the best in everything we do, but we have to choose our battles. After all we are only humans.

 

So relax and let go. And if you can't? Well, think seriously to transfert to Toronto, where there is no political, economical nor language problems, no PQ to occupy your mind and where everything is a rose garden.

[montréaliste]

You don't need to be so condescending. I'm tired of Montreal being outclassed by it's peers. At least somebody here has the balls to stand up for the city. I can't be the only one here that hopes Montreal could return to it's former glory.

 

If you come out with trolling sentences like this one; it's no wonder you get what's coming to you mark:

 

 

I thought things were going well in Montreal? Where are the cheerleaders on this forum?

 

IluvMtl; Richard Florida n'est pas un fan de Montréal, c'est un "media whore" qui profite en livrant un côté rose des villes qu'il visite. Rappelle-toi l'épisode du «gourou français» Clotaire Rapaille à Québec que Labeaume avait engagé pour lui sussurer des mots doux à propos de sa ville. Bref, Labeaume a compris qu'il n'avait pas à se fier à l'opinion d'un illuminé pour se rendre à l'évidence que Québec avait une image de marque.

[yulymx]

Welcome to Startupfest 2013!

 

For the third year in a row, the International Startup Festival is bringing together aspiring founders, groundbreaking innovators, and veteran entrepreneurs from around the world. Happening July 10th-13th in Montreal, it’s the global startup community’s chance to share thoughts, do business and have a blast!

 

 

http://startupfestival.com/en/

[MtlMan]

Mtl is well in top class of many economic sectors, like video games, aerospace, pharmaceuticals, etc. Forget the whining mark. He's a sorry ass with an obsessive compulsive mind focussed on whta's wrong in Mtl. Just because Mtl is a "leftist" city, in his mind. He'll be happy only when a Rob Ford conservative is elected here (he's gonna say no, now, because of all the shit happening in Tor, but 2 years ago, he certainly cheered him and probably claiming the jerk was a genius...).

 

Forget mark. Forget, forget. He's just pathetic.

[acpnc]

Competition should be seen as a challenge, not an issue in itself. But why should I waste my time trying to explain this to you, you,re not listening, just voicing.

 

Les égos se nourrissent et se renforcent par la controverse, ce que tu fais sur absolument tous les fils de discussions. Je n'aime pas toucher à la vie privée des gens, mais ton comportement est symptomatique d'un grand malaise intérieur. Tu devrais alors t'occuper davantage de ta personne et non des problèmes hypothétiques de Montréal, que tu cherches à démontrer sans grand succès, puisqu'ils sont en réalité davantage des réflexions de ton mental.

 

Je n'entrerai donc plus dans ton jeu. Désolé mais tu dois être très frustré dans ta vie. Je plains ton entourage, car au travail et dans ta vie privée, ça doit être invivable.

[AFS]

I’m a relative newbie here and I don’t post much, but I read a lot. I find this forum great for respectful debate but I must say this particular thread has really taken a turn. I can see why some people get turned off by marc_ac’s approach as it can be negative, but the mean and insulting responses by some towards him are more unpleasant in my mind. I feel like there is room for debate without personal insults.

I happen to think Montreal is doing quite well in a lot of areas, and I know many people personally (probably hundreds) that I come into contact through my work that have moved here from elsewhere in Canada and the world to work in our star industries. However, to deny that overall wealth here is lower than it should be, or could be is just blindness. With regards to entrepreneurship, we should be more ambitious. How this can be accomplished is through better collaborations between universities and private companies, something that is done very well in a lot of US cities, but much less well in Canada. Is this because our universities are so underfunded? Quite likely if you ask me. But proper investment can lead to huge windfalls. This is quote is about Stanford University, where I was before Montreal: (Wikipedia)

“Faculty and alumni have founded many prominent companies including Google, Hewlett-Packard, Nike, Sun Microsystems, and Yahoo!, and companies founded by Stanford alumni generate more than $2.7 trillion in annual revenue, equivalent to the 10th-largest economy in the world”

Some of the companies are still located in the city they were founded. Google is a few minutes from the campus is Palo Alto. This could happen in Montreal too, considering the size of our university population.

A final quote, from Jean-Guy Desjardins from Fiera Capital of Montreal. “When he’s asked why Montreal hasn’t really taken off as a financial centre, he’s blunt. “There is not enough ambition, not enough entrepreneurship.” (from the Gazette, May 23rd)

I hope the debates can continue without insults. I appreciate all the points of view I read here. Cheers.

Modifié 5 juin 2013 par AFS
typo

[Habfanman]

You don't need to be so condescending. I'm tired of Montreal being outclassed by it's peers. At least somebody here has the balls to stand up for the city. I can't be the only one here that hopes Montreal could return to it's former glory.

 

Ah yes, big internet balls! The bravery of an anonymous online serial-complainer! Bravo. Such immense courage surely deserves a medal! You are a true hero.

[MartinMtl]

Thanks AFS. Some people just want better for Montreal - and the state of mediocrity in the city is insane at times.

 

The latest startup ranking showing Toronto 6:1 on Montreal for start-up's. We are somehow content with this.

 

Absolutely no one said they were happy about that. But you are the only one who makes it sound as if it's the end of the world. Since the election the PQ, you seem completely traumatized and you lost your sense of nuance. Montreal can't be number one in Canada in every domain, it's insane to wish that. But the way you paint it, it likes this town is regressing into a third world backwater hole. Montreal is booming. Not as much as we all wish, maybe not as much as Toronto or Calgary, but still.