Never Doubt San Francisco

Reflections from a city that reinvents itself every time.

I was 26 years old when I moved to San Francisco. I wish I could say I came here because I was chasing innovation but, alas, I was chasing a boy.

When I landed in North Beach, I felt like I landed in the coolest, most quaint city. Coming from New York, where everything and everybody moved fast, I found the laid-back style of the San Francisco Bay Area charming. I was awestruck by its beauty, and quickly fell in love with the landscape. I moved to the Bay Area for a lifestyle, not a career in tech. Little did I know, when I made the move in 1998, that I was relocating to the Tech Capital of the World, and that my first sales role in San Francisco would place me at the center of the .com boom, and the second major tech wave to reshape the Bay Area.

Success came fast for pretty much everyone back then. If you were in San Francisco, and you knew how to work, you thrived. Google, Salesforce, Yahoo!, and PayPal were all being founded during this time, as were companies like Pets.com, Webvan, and eToys, which unfortunately didn’t have such lucky outcomes. But regardless of what company you were in—boom or bust—the internet was taking shape, and we felt like we were on the forefront of everything important that was happening in business. You see, the San Francisco Bay Area is built for entrepreneurs, and if there is any part of you that wants to make your own way in the world, it is almost impossible to not be swept up in the optimism that is the underlying current of the region, and its culture.

San Francisco attracts thinkers, tinkerers, misfits, and visionaries. In the Bay, your background, history, or pedigree doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is your curiosity, your ambition, your work ethic, your optimism, and most of all, your love of tech, and how it can reshape our lives, and businesses, for the better.

The Resilience of the Bay

Fast forward to 2008, and San Francisco, like many cities, was impacted by the recession. But the city also insulated itself from major job loss, and only a minor dip in housing prices, because of the high-density of tech companies that continued to thrive and attract great talent to the area.

While other industries and cities struggled, social media was taking hold, and companies like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn were scaling. The time-period only reinforced San Francisco's unwavering ability to look beyond the moment, push boundaries, and drive innovation while others were paralyzed, concerned with what they didn’t have, as opposed to creating what could be.

Fifteen years into the Social Media Revolution, San Francisco faced another defining moment—this time in the form of the pandemic. Every industry shifted overnight, and as remote work took hold, San Francisco saw an unprecedented outflow of people and companies, which made people question if San Francisco would be able to hold onto top talent, and maintain its title as the Technology Capital of the World. Headlines declared the death of the city, while Austin, Miami, and other rising tech hubs implemented programs, enticing companies to move, and attracting top talent and investment. But what most people ignored is that the brightest minds in tech didn’t leave. Instead, they stayed. Quietly building, and preparing for the next tech tsunami, which took hold less than a year ago.

The Next Tech Tsunami

Here we are today, in 2025, with the AI revolution sweeping the world. The most visionary leaders in tech are living and working in the San Francisco Bay Area, building tools that will do our jobs faster, automate mundane tasks, and rethink how we interact with technology altogether. OpenAI, Anthropic, Perplexity, and a growing list of AI-native, San Francisco-based companies, are now responsible for how artificial intelligence interacts with humans, and how technology will reshape our future once again.

Why You Should Never Doubt San Francisco

In my job, I’m constantly on planes, attending events across the globe, and meeting with companies and candidates throughout the U.S. But San Francisco is home, and I am again lucky to be sitting at the epicenter of technology, awe-inspired and optimistic about what AI can bring to all of us.

As I travel to other cities, I’m often stunned by the lack of AI adoption—and how many skeptics I meet. In San Francisco, the executives I interact with don’t question the technology, they spend time thinking about how to implement it, and the challenges it can solve for in both business and society. The experience reminds me, again, how truly cutting-edge this region is—and why you can never discount this city’s ability to reshape, recreate, and reinvent itself. What people forget is that this city doesn’t follow trends. It invents them. San Francisco has always been first in technology, not just because of its founders and startups, but because of its refusal to be stagnant.

Last week, this video was released by Sam Altman and Jony Ive, sharing their visionary collaboration and putting most of us on the edge of our seats, trying to imagine what they’ll build together. Filmed in a San Francisco coffee shop, the video doesn’t just capture their unmatched vision for the future—it delivers a powerful message about this city: as quaint as we are, San Francisco’s power should never be doubted.

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WHAT TO READ:

Cool Grey City of Love is a deeply researched history, with in-depth reporting, showcasing an unparalleled portrait of San Francisco. If you have interest in learning about the history of San Francisco, with all of its fogged-in glory, this is a must-read.

WHO TO FOLLOW:

Daniel Lurie is the Mayor of San Francisco and a brilliant leader. I met him years ago when I when I was earlier in my career, when he was building Tipping Point. Very few people have the heartbeat for San Francisco, combining business, society, and foundational human rights, as Mayor Daniel Lurie. Follow him to learn about how San Francisco is being reinvented, once again.

START TO LISTEN:

All-In is an unfiltered, inside perspective on what’s really happening in tech—especially here in San Francisco. Hosted by four venture capitalists: Chamath Palihapitiya, Jason Calacanis, David Sacks, and David Friedberg, All-In discusses current events, market trends, political issues, and industry insights.