Science & Tech Quote by John Baldacci

Baldacci is trying to redraw the map of who gets to count as an entrepreneur, and it is a very politicianly move: broaden the tent, signal modernity, and attach a forward-looking economic story to sectors people already like. The list is doing quiet rhetorical work. By placing “arts, music, theatre, filmmaking” alongside “engineering, architecture and software design,” he collapses the old hierarchy that treats culture as soft and tech as serious. In his framing, they are all part of the same growth engine, equally legitimate targets for investment, policy, and civic pride.

The key phrase is “transitioned the modern-day version of the entrepreneur.” He isn’t arguing that entrepreneurs have changed so much as insisting we change our definition. Subtext: stop picturing the entrepreneur as a lone, hoodie-wearing disruptor or a factory owner; start picturing a designer, a filmmaker, a coder, an architect. That shift carries consequences for how a state or city markets itself, what it subsidizes, and how it justifies public spending on cultural institutions without calling it charity.

This also works as political branding. “Creative economy” is an optimistic compromise term: pro-market enough to reassure business constituencies, pro-culture enough to energize artists and young professionals, and vague enough to avoid hard questions about wages, precarity, and who actually captures the value when creativity becomes an “economy.” The quote sells a coalition, not just an idea.