Hollow San Francisco

Here's how it goes: Creative people -- not web designers or software developers, but artists, musicians, activists, writers, and other colorful types -- tend not to make much money. As this city becomes less and less affordable, those people leave. And when those people leave, whom will the city's entertainment events target? The people who can afford to stay: Young, well-off tech workers or high-income young couples, whose tastes and lifestyles are cushier, more conservative, less driven by purely creative aims, and, often -- if only in comparison with the people they've replaced -- dull.

These bougies-in-training will want events to practice their conspicuous consumption, whether on food, booze, music, or all at the same time. And they'll get it at events like Noisette. This kind of high-minded consumerism -- fun as it is -- will become the norm, even more than it already has. So while it was once a respite for low-income creatives and real deviants, who would pay $5 or $10 to go a show or a party (at the Eagle Tavern, or Annie's Social Club, or Kimo's, remember those?), swill cheap whiskey, and watch something freaky and loud until early in the morning, San Francisco will slowly become one big pork-belly party, an amusement park for well-off residents to discover some new consumer good to become picky over, or for bridge-and-tunnel types to visit on the weekend, go to an overpriced club, and meet a hookup. Big concerts will draw kids from the 'burbs paying $50 or more a head. They'll never believe they could be rich enough to actually live here.

The freaks and creatives won't go too far -- they'll go to Oakland, where there's much more space, at much lower cost. The kinds of reckless energy that powered San Francisco music from the '60s through the '90s will trickle away, as much of it has already. And the city will be worse for it.