The "this time it's different" case is: there isn't a specific competitor trying to "pull" frontier away. The US is *pushing* it away.
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So paradoxically, fact that the answer to "who is the challenger?" (China? Germany?) is not obvious makes the threat more severe, not less.
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I think the challenger is obviously China & the next frontier is bio/neuro
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China is growing right environs rapidly, but from low base, so I'm doubtful. I don't think frontiers are defined by industries
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I'm thinking of frontier as all the social change that happens when tech changes the underlying infrastructure of society & culture
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but maybe that's not what you meant by product-market fit
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I'm thinking more of the "air of excitement" and general culture of "this is where the action is" aspect of PMF
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what kind of action? Compare 1910 Vienna to 1910 Detroit. Both had a lot going on. Which is the frontier?
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I'd say Detroit actually. Science can be much more distributed than tech and industry. Cars were a platform enabler in 1910
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And remember, a lot of the famous Viennese mathematicians etc ended up moving to the US

