The book or the review of the book.

Where do you get off with platitudes like "NoCal" is the heart of the tech industry in America. Really? All the people in Boston, Austin, RTP, Albany, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Birmingham would like a word with you sir. I live in the #1 area for per capita post graduate degrees in the US and I can assure you it's nowhere near NoCal. It's also nowhere as near expensive to live in either.

People don't simultaneously flock to cities and also not move because they're not tied to place. I can move to any place on earth I can afford to live in, tomorrow and it wouldn't matter in the least for my livelihood. I am not bound by location or timezone. But that doesn't mean that Capetown is the same thing as San Diego. That doesn't mean I don't care if I live in Detroit vs Boca Raton. And it doesn't mean that my family won't care or won't worry about those difference either.

On the other hand living requirements don't align with 'spikiness' or nubbiness as I call it. Nubbiness is the fact that in a flat world there are really only a small number of urban centers that drive the whole thing. Perhaps as few as a few hundred urban centers world wide. China for instance has more than a hundred cities of more than 1 million people each. But only one Hong Kong.

"David Brooks, then a conservative..."

What has Hanaham been smoking?

He don't need no stinkin' Richard Florida to tell him how to roll a joint a where to live.

"Nobody reads a book to decide where to live."

As a struggling creative person who has to pick her future place-of-residence very carefully, I will hereby declare this is one stupid-ass statement. If there are certain city features or government programs or even ideas as to what kind of place you are moving to, you _bet_ people want to read about that. And the less you are like a mainstream demographic, the more you try to get a sense of what a place is like before you spend hard-earned money to get there.

Relatedly, since when did David Brooks go liberal?

I may not pay $27 for it, but I would browse it in Borders (one of those "creative" ways I stay well-read and solvent) to see if it's worth taking seriously.

"Clearly we have not yet become a nation of Web designers, filmmakers and hair stylists..."

And thank god for it. The last thing we need is more graphic/fashion designers or marketing types who fancy themselves artistes. America is getting her ass kicked in the global economy because we're incapable of producing products with real value at competitive prices. A bunch of self-important lifestyle jobs aren't going to fix that.

Well, I guess I fall into Florida's class of folks, yet the article's author has a truly valid point: Why read a book when our "kind" are perfectly capable of discerning where we want to be --and the digital age allows us to set-up shop just about anywhere?

I lived in San Diego for a good stretch and now I'm in the MidWest, small town Michigan. My work allows me that freedom. I still have all my clients and all my international work. Reverse migration to come to the RustBelt? Fits me fine; 1500 square foot apartment in a historic 19th century colonial, utilities paid, $600/month. Yeah, I like it a lot, but that's me, y'know?

Opportunities come from unexpected places. Motivated people can find fortuity on their own and adopt what feels right for them.

I consider myself to be a bohemian boomer. Since escaping L.A. a year ago I've been searching, searching, searching for my "perfect" place to live.

I'm from a small town in northern Ohio and I still would like to make money doing high end cosmetic surgery related work. So Peyton Place won't cut it. I'm not down for the giant cities that tend to breed the type of clients I need (L.A., NYC, Miami, Atlanta, San Fran etc.).

I keep thinking there must be some really cool place with a wealthy client base, some great cosmetic surgeons, weather that will permit me to go outside (rain doesn't bother me..."I'm melting! I'm melting! Oh! What a world!!"), not too cold in the winter months (an occasional "snow" would be sweet...but please! not the Connecticut tundra I just barely survived), hot enough in the summer to grow some bitchin' French Carmello tomatoes...maybe a beautiful, clear natural lake to swim in from June-September.

I definitely need to be around intelligent people who don't think the war in Iraq is a necessary evil, or who think the death penalty makes sense, or who think spanking kids is a good idea. A liberal college town would be really neat. (You know, maybe take an occasional class...creative writing 101 or something...Ha!!!)

Let's see....a flat place to take long, leisurely, meandering bike rides....la-dee-da...especially the twilight ones...the magic hour.

Hiking is fun (so long as there are no lions and tigers and bears...oh my!) (One of the reasons L.A. wasn't cool for me...too many cougars in the Santa Monica mountains).

Within an hour of a major airport is a necessity.

My kids tell me, "You can't have it ALL!"

Well, I'm moving to The Hampton's a week from today. We'll see how that works out.

BTW, "Bohemian Manifesto: A Field Guide To Living On the Edge" by Laren Stover is a great read! Maybe that's where I should move. Edge City.

I've always found Florida's ideas interesting to read articles about, but I've never felt moved to read one of his actual books. Perhaps that's because his idea seems so obvious to me that I'm not the sort of person he's outreaching to - and that strikes me as perhaps the perceived problem with this book.

As an urbanite who moved to an arts town in the middle of nowhere 6 years ago (Boston to North Adams), his work has always had a big "duh" factor - my town is vastly populated with working creative types and bohemian-minded folks. The key I have found is that they are almost always a) already living to some extent by their creative work and b) mature. These two factors always seem to add up to one conclusion - they want space to work and a place that doesn't divert them needlessly from doing that work.

In contrast, I have found that younger people seem bound to urban areas, as are mature creative types whose central means of support are - as it is so bitterly stated - their "day jobs."

Florida's earlier work seemed to me to address this idea as its central point - the creative class revitalizing non-urban areas through a mass exodus that was already happening - and he was making strides, and bucks, by going to areas like mine and preaching the gospel as we already knew it. In fact, he did come to my area and do just that. And despite what the author says about artists not wanting to be a part of the establishment, I have found that every single artist who has come to my area to live wants to be an active member of a mainstream community, no matter how bohemian and rebellious they may be in regard to their personal lives and art.

And so this sort of self help book makes sense to me for those in the so-called creative class who have an inkling that this might be something that they may perhaps be a part of someday, maybe - the folks who aren't quite at that point where they can find that place to live, to qualify what they need, to figure out how to be a part of a community after living urban all these years. I think that's a small audience, but it's one that's out there, and if Florida wants to service them with practical advice, more power to him - few others are willing to do it.

There's nothing wrong with being a bohemian artist and exhibiting some practical planning. In fact, I would say that is the norm and it's sad that this review suggests otherwise.