though palo alto sucks for mexican food, the best places in SF are far, far above and beyond anything in boston -- anna's doesn't even care to compete. try el farolito or el castillito. my favorite in the boston area is tacos lupita, in somerville (it's where the people who work at anna's eat.)
Eww.. read Farolito's health score card and see if you still want to go back there.
Walk two blocks west to Papalote's - 24th and Valencia. IMHO, best (cheap) burritos in SF.
The point is that living costs are lower in Boston than Silicon Valley. I suspect that most hackers don't care about money directly, but they do care about not having to worry about whether they can pay rent.
Tell me about it. A Stanford buddy and I have been wrangling about how to deal with the sky-high rents that are currently pushing out to EPA. EPA used to be a halfway ok rent refuge.
Apparently one of the big apartment leasing companies there, Woodlawn Arms or something, that he leases from, has been facing legal action over some practices that involve shoving out older tenants so that they could reset the rents from ~700 to ~1100.
On the other hand, you're probably sitting outside in the sun eating a tasty burrito.