Reboot 24 swept into San Francisco’s Marina District earlier this month. Covering the intersection of technology, media, politics, and culture, the conference aims to usher in a new reality that would “lay waste to incumbents.” Once the process starts, conference organizers claim, enterprises and building can begin in earnest. “Abundance” (a term often repeated during the two-day event) would then have its day in the City by the Bay.
San Francisco certainly requires a kickstart. It earned WalletHub’s 2024 award for the worst-run city in the United States. Now it’s caught in a doom loop as it struggles with one of the nation’s slowest post-pandemic economic recoveries. The financial district remains hollowed out, with workers still not returning to offices. In commercial districts such as Downtown and Union Square, scores of companies, retailers, bars, and restaurants have closed because of everything from high fees and taxes to the city’s now-infamous disordered street conditions.
Per the conference organizers, transforming San Francisco with a “boom loop” will require throwing open the doors to technology and bold, diverse opinions. Along with embracing a tech-centered future, the city needs to listen to fresh voices and find new leaders. To the shock and horror of the city’s entrenched activist class, conference organizers sought to bring conservatives into the fold. Among those on the conference agenda were Brendan Carr, senior Republican on the Federal Communications Commission; Reihan Salam, president of the Manhattan Institute; and two members of the Heritage Foundation, including Kara Frederick, the organization’s director of tech policy. The presence of representatives of Heritage, which developed the supposedly controversial Project 2025, was particularly infuriating to the activists.
Soon after the organizers announced the conference speakers, notices of a planned protest began circulating on social media platforms, urging like-minded individuals to show up at the location and express their outrage. San Francisco’s own Garry Tan, CEO of Y Combinator and a participant in the conference, was targeted, as well. Never mind that Tan is an outspoken Democrat and a political centrist. Fraternizing with the enemy is unacceptable.
It seems, though, that some of Reboot 24’s advertised “new reality” had already set in. The protest proved a bust, with almost no one showing up. Whatever disruption the activists hoped to create became an embarrassing parody of the before-times, when they could easily scare up a loud throng with calls to action.
Meantime, inside the venue, speakers discussed everything from advances in crypto currency to Silicon Valley’s shifting political landscape to the latest developments in artificial intelligence—including California state senator Scott Wiener’s controversial AI safety bill, SB 1047, which, if signed into law, could impede homegrown startups.
On the second day, Mike Solana, CMO of Founders Fund and editor-in-chief of Pirate Wires, interviewed Tan for the keynote. They covered the breadth of San Francisco’s governmental corruption, the regime of radical city supervisors, who barely skated into office by way of ranked-choice voting, and the hundreds of millions of dollars that the city is spending on top-heavy city departments and grants to hundreds of overlapping nonprofits with little, if anything, to show for it.
But Solana and Tan also highlighted causes for optimism. Voters recalled Chesa Boudin, the city’s left-wing district attorney, in 2022, an effort that Tan backed. Now, tech’s most talented individuals are beginning to gravitate to San Francisco again.
Unicorns (startups valued at over $1 billion) abound, said Tan, and the conviviality and excitement among people as they work in any of the city’s many cafes is unique to the area. He believes that billion-dollar companies may soon fill the currently empty office towers—if, that is, voters elect moderates for city offices. So far, centrist candidates seem to enjoy the most support among voters, with mayoral hopeful Mark Farrell taking a lead in the latest KRON4 poll.
Momentum for change is building as anti-business attitudes wane, though some city officials remain mired in the past. On August 13, Elon Musk shuttered X’s headquarters, located in the drug- and crime-saturated mid-Market neighborhood, for friendlier digs in Texas. “I share the perspective that most San Franciscans have, which is good riddance,” said City Attorney David Chiu.
Chiu’s view is not widely shared, however. Most residents found it bizarrely dismissive and out of touch. People really do want to live here, in one of the most beautiful cities in the United States. To do so, they need a steady influx of jobs and the thriving ecosystem formed by new, established, and growing firms.
To San Francisco and the world at large, Reboot 24 sent a strong message: people in tech are prepared to fight. For anyone choosing to stand in their way, the conference materials issue a warning: “Silicon Valley has woken up to politics, recognizes the stakes, and is playing to win.”
Photo by Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images