A few weeks ago, I was at an event celebrating the opening of Facebook’s office in Cambridge. They flew out several VPs to meet folks within the local startup community. They all gushed about the openness, depth and “pay it forward” culture that exists within Greater Boston. Were they trying to be nice? Maybe. But, who cares? They are right. The greater Boston startup scene — and Boston, in general — has so much to be thankful for.
Since it is almost Thanksgiving, I’ve put together a short list of Boston and/or Boston startup things I’m thankful for. You have the rest of winter to be negative, so bear with me here.
I’m thankful for the startup community’s openness. A friend of mine who recently moved back to California used to comment how it can be difficult to know people in Boston. The one exception to that was the people in the tech community. They are always willing to sit down, chat and have a drink.
- I’m thankful for when the T finally shows up.
- I’m thankful that Boston startups love and support our city. Days after the marathon bombing, an effort led by TUGG (who I am also thankful for) rallied the startup community and raised approximately $300,000 for the victims of that senseless tragedy.
- I’m thankful that it is almost socially acceptable to wear shorts when it is 50 degrees in November.
- I’m thankful for our engineers who have awesome beards. (I’m looking at you Sean Lindsay, Brad McLean, Pascal Rettig and almost every other male engineer I know.)
- I’m thankful for Toscanini’s and Ron’s, who collectively have the best ice cream in the world.
- I’m thankful that many of our startups are tackling big global problems and are trying to make the world a better place —companies like Ambri, NBD Nano, Retroficiency, Freight Farms and Ovuline. You guys rule.
- I’m thankful that even though our startups think big, it’s still an intimate community.
- I’m thankful the Red Sox no longer suck.
- I’m thankful for all of the biomedical startups and companies that are trying to cure diseases I can’t pronounce.
- I’m thankful that you can work at a startup and still raise a family in the city. (Cough, cough, I’m looking at you, San Fran.)
- I’m thankful that HubSpot is going to have a massive exit….someday. It will be good for the region.
- I’m thankful that we realize the startup scene in Boston isn’t perfect and that we need to get better.
- I’m thankful that we are actually getting better.
- I’m thankful for MassChallenge. It brings early-stage startups from around the world to Boston to help change the world.
- I’m thankful that intelligence is celebrated and admired by people within this city.
- I’m thankful that all of the people I forgot to mention in this article aren’t going to yell at me…I hope.
- I’m thankful commenters are going to add to this list.
- I’m thankful that you made it to the bottom of this article.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Allan Telio is the vice president and director of Startup Institute Boston. The round one deadline for SIB’s spring 2014 class is December 1st.
Featured Image via I’m Feelin’ Crafty