Wow, that's definitely a step in the right direction. Valve has been picking up reverse-engineers (to work on VAC) for years and I've always thought about applying, but didn't want to live in WA. While I also don't particularly want to live in SF, it definitely makes it far more tempting. Very interesting.
I wonder what their objective is by opening up a new studio in SF. If you look at their [employee handbook](<a href="http://newcdn.flamehaus.com/Valve_Handbook_LowRes.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://newcdn.flamehaus.com/Valve_Handbook_LowRes.pdf</a>), you'll immediately see that their corporate culture is the complete antithesis of most other game companies. It's not that I don't think that they'll be able to find people ( loads of people in the bay area would probably love working there), but that they're probably better off hiring from MS than from EA.
Neat, would love to invite some Valve people over to talk at Kiva, management here have been pretty receptive to some of the ideas of how Valve works.<p>I kind of wonder if they are actually moving to San Francisco, the "San Francisco Peninsula" thing makes it sound like they are going to have an office in South San Francisco or Redwood City or something.