the future is coming

Foursquare’s Christmas Party Was One Big, Boozy Pat on the Back

Unlike Wall Street, there ain’t no shame in being a tech start-up in New York City right now. And Tuesday night’s office party for 36 Cooper Square (home to Foursquare, Curbed, and Hard Candy Shell) was a capstone to a banner year, but one they could actually be proud of. The joint holiday “shit show” in the words of Foursquare co-founder Dennis Crowley, who (*gasp*) broke with the social-media jeans-and-T-shirt uniform to put on a dapper gray Don Draper number, was hosted in an underground space with an alleyway for an entrance and culminated in late-night tacos for the Foursquare co-founders at Oaxaca down the block. According to Guest of Guest, the “new media companies in an old media building” (oh, hey there, Village Voice) secured 36 Cooper’s standing as “the hottest place to work in Manhattan.” Sounds like the plan to keep the city’s best and brightest “off the Street” (i.e. Wall Street) is working.

Silicon Valley is certainly optimistic about the potential inherent in the new wave of social media. But New York City has something else to celebrate this year: its official debut as a tech hub. Crowley has already been dubbed the New King of Social Media, but it’s his start-up’s high profile that’s helped draw more venture capitalists and angel investors to the city and lend some sex appeal to the phrase “I work for a social media start-up.” In a year when the city’s major industries either continued to flounder (media) or raked in billions much to the public’s disgust (Wall Street), tech is its wide-eyed, scrappier nerdy little brother who just got cool.

Sure, there are some bubble-shaped clouds on the horizon, but let the overeager investors driving up prices worry about that. In the meantime, you know you’ve arrived when the idol worshippers come a’ tweeting:

36 Cooper Street Is the Hottest Place to Work In Manhattan [Guest of a Guest]

Foursquare’s Christmas Party Was One Big, Boozy Pat on the Back