THE VIDEO SHELF · history of silicon valley
Secret History of Silicon Valley
Steve Blank's Computer History Museum lecture argues that Silicon Valley's roots lie in WWII radar and electronic warfare work, Stanford's Fred Terman and Cold War military funding rather than the semiconductor alone.
Why HN readers recommended it
HN commenters call it a favorite introduction to Valley history and cite it whenever government and military funding of tech comes up.
This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.
Video & recommendation details
- Creator / channel
- Computer History Museum
- Topic
- history of silicon valley
- Format
- lecture
- Level
- general
- HN recommenders in dataset
- 6
- HN mentions in dataset
- 20
- Recommendation years in dataset
- 2010–2026
These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.
From the original HN conversations
Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.
When I first moved here my favorite introduction to the valleys history was Steve Blanks The Secret History of Silicon Valley. It's well worth the hour [VIDEO]
lukejduncan on Hacker News · 2012-04
In The Birth Of Silicon Valley (timeline)You've gotta watch Steve Blank's "The Secret History of Silicon Valley". Goes back to its post-war roots in 40's and 50's. A real gem and quite surprising. [VIDEO]
cpr on Hacker News · 2014-01
In PayPal MafiaI see a lot of comments addressed to "this guy" referring to Steve Blank. Let's not forget he's been involved in silicon valley startups since the 70s, including founding semiconductor companies. While they're no hello world rails startup, he has a proven track record and …
jstrate on Hacker News · 2012-05
In 'The Golden Age of Silicon Valley Is Over, and We're Dancing on its Grave'
Summaries, classifications and recommendation records are from the HackerTube source dataset. Read about this library and its limitations.
