The New York Instances cannot determine whether or not San Francisco is dying or not

You may not want to remember January of this year, an incredible low point in a young year 2021. But in the hellish landscape of the COVID-19 pandemic and the aftermath of the January 6th Capitol riot, the New York Times published a story about Tech freaks fleeing San Francisco for the greener, sunnier pastures of Miami, Austin, Puerto Rico, and other parts of the world outside the Bay Area and the state.

This article, titled “You Can’t Get Out of the Bay Area Fast Enough,” signaled a turning point in technology’s relationship with the city. Other places had less taxes, less crime, more space for less money – and as writer Nellie Bowles pointed out, they were not despised by their neighbors. (That said, if you talked to some longtime residents of these new tech hotspots, that firsthand opinion could change quickly.) They could work remotely and get their way financially, even if they accepted a cut in salaries.

The Times article wasn’t the editorial of San Francisco’s tech exodus, but it was certainly the most prominent national account of the phenomenon. It drew strong opinions from the creators and creators of San Francisco Twitter – techie or not. In doing so, the Times set the tone for much of San Francisco’s tech experts. (Something that is not alien to us on this side either.)

So it’s strange to see the newspaper turn around almost six months to the day its first story of San Francisco’s suffering was published without even mentioning its previous story and itself as part of the panic Involving an SF exodus was perhaps an exaggeration.

On Thursday they published an article that serves almost as an expanded addendum to their own coverage: “Tech Workers Swore Off the Bay Area. Now they’re coming back. “

In it, the Times sings a different tune than the Swan Song of San Francisco in early 2021. Now the allure of big city life in the bay is too strong despite all the complicated reservations.

Perhaps with new information in tow – namely, U.S. Postal Service’s address change dates revealing that those who left San Francisco mostly ended up in other parts of the Bay Area or the state – the Times wanted after their previous spicy doomsaying. But the least they could have done would be to explicitly refer to their own comprehensive January coverage.

There is a pointed reference to exaggerated “Exodus headlines” without mentioning their own. There’s not even a follow-up to the previously interviewed people, the various app founders and investors who flatly denounced the Bay Area.

After all, the story of the California Exodus is certainly more nuanced than it would be in either piece. Lots of people are gone forever, sure. But despite the Bay Area’s myriad of warts and ailments, so many more remained nearby. Some companies even doubled their stay and moved to San Francisco instead of fleeing entirely. For many tech, San Francisco was less about crime and homelessness than it was about how tech adoption left the locals behind.

The Times quoted a co-founder of an investment firm as saying that the graduates “were pretty noisy about leaving the Bay Area,” but perhaps less so for those who have crawled back. It ultimately feels like they pulled a similar trick.