I wonder if it's time for AWS to open a development office in a more startup-oriented city (i.e. SF). It might help them attract and retain more talent.
A.) Amazon isn't a startup.
B.) A lot of Bay Area companies (Zynga, Facebook, Salesforce) are opening Seattle offices to take advantage of the Amazon and Microsoft talent pools.
C.) They already have a Bay Area office. http://public.a2z.com/index.html I believe some core SimpleDB guys (Jim Larson) were based out of there.
