jortiz81

Indeed, the core contribution (section 1.2) is the cool part.

It's interesting to see that Contiki is taking the lead in this space, since it was once going toe-to-toe with another open source OS for wireless embedded networked devices, TinyOS. TinyOS had a large following in the research community and I believe it was used in several commercial sensor network deployments by Dust Networks and Arch Rock and at least one other Korean startup company -- that i believe is still using it in their deployments.

Adam Dunkel has done a nice job of pulling Contiki from the obscure research community and into the commercial space and is riding the "internet of things" wave right now. We'll see if it lasts. I'm not familiar with what developments have taken place on their OS since maybe 2010 or so.

Many people in the US, when asked about Colombia, think of negative things; drugs, etc. Also, down in Colombia, the Caribbean coast was often looked down upon by those from the capital -- seen mainly as uneducated people with strange customs and a different way of talking. Gabriel Garcia Marquez uplifted not only the image of Colombia world-wide, but also the image and culture of the Caribbean coast. I am proud that my family is from that region and he made me proud to tell the world that I am Colombian. May he rest in Peace.

Also, I think this quote (from an article in NPR) sums up why he's so admired in Latin America:

"Garcia Marquez is speaking about all the people who are marginal to history, who have not had a voice. He gives a voice to all those who died. He gives a voice to all those who are not born yet. He gives a voice to Latin America."

I mean, none of these are truly fair comparisons. There's no question that there are many things Sf will be better at because of its size and there's other things New York can offer because of its size. But that's what this whole thread is about, comparing the two cities regardless of the root causes for their differences. For example, sf has better quality food in general, since the weather is more forgiving and farms and wineries are quite close. Still, there's no question that the food in sf is of higher quality on average.

It is statistically diverse, but like most other places, each ethnic group lives in a bubble separate from the other, mostly. The density of NYC forces deep interaction between communities -- much deeper than simply judging diversity based on the different restaurants you see or the languages you might hear at the mall everyone goes to. Here's a good article about the kind of thing that's common in NYC and nowhere else: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/05/nyregion/05jackson.html

NYC cuts across race, class, and country of origin in its diversity -- in a way SF doesn't. The neighborhoods are also much more integrated largely because of the density of the city. For example, it's not uncommon to find public housing units embedded between luxury condos. The kids of both communities attend the same local school (usually up until high school), a few blocks away. That means, integrated social gathering and hang out. You can see this at local parks where everyone gets together to play sports. This impacts how you grow up and experience/understand/become sensitive to race and class differences.

The introduction to this article really captures this well: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/05/nyregion/05jackson.html

I'm a native New Yorker but lived in the SF Bay Area for 9 years. I agree with this assessment. The quality for the price in generally better in the Bay Area, since a lot of the food is local and super fresh. That said, the diversity of cuisines in NYC in much, much broader than SF. For example, in SF you can find Salvadorian and Mexican food quite easily, but New York has food from all parts of Latin America. The same can be said about other regional cuisines; the selection provides a "finer granularity" of choices for that region.

I get the same impression. I have worked at startups in SF/SV and recently relocated to NYC. Even if you look at job posts in both cities/areas. The SF tech scene is much more vibrant, the startups cover a broader range of sectors and interesting problems, and VC money is easier to find, i think, in SF than in NYC. NYC is definitely 2nd, but it's still quite a ways away from the SF/SV area. I also observe that there are riskier startups in SF/SV than NYC and as a CS researcher, I think the SF/SV area has much more interesting positions and opportunities. For example, Nanosatisfi is launching mini satellites into orbit. I don't think you'd find something like that in NYC.