Silicon Beach Australia Google Group

Comment sought on data portability

elias.bizan...@gmail.com (Elias Bizannes) — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 02:48:07 UT

Hi everyone,

The US Federal Communications Commission has made a request for public
comment on opening up government data. It caught our eye today because it
directly references data portability and so we will be responding formally
on behalf of the DataPortability Project.

In the Silicon Beach lifeguard paper, there was a strong call made to have

How Did Israel Become "Start-Up Nation"?

m...@markburch.net (Mark Burch) — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 00:46:16 UT

[link]

Regards,
Mark Burch
m...@markburch.net
+61 438 259060

enterprise focused entrepreneurs

m...@markburch.net (Mark Burch) — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 02:57:04 UT

Hi Everyone,

I was wondering if anyone is aware of meet up events specifically for entrepreneurs in the enterprise space? 'Enterprise' means different things to different people but I mean for entrepreneurs who are selling software (technology) or services into larger enterprises (let's say 100 people and up).

Sydney Silicon Beach Drinks tonight - Anyone going?

ryanecr...@gmail.com (Ryan Cross) — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 02:16:43 UT

Is anyone going to the Silicon Beach Drinks tonight at the Grace Hotel?

Was disappointed I had to miss it last week when it sponsored.

Re: Where can I find a business mentor around Sydney area?

joshua.part...@gmail.com (Joshua Partogi) — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 00:07:58 UT

On Dec 4, 10:55 am, Geoff McQueen - Hiive Systems

Thanks Geoff,

I will look into that. The list of mentors in TechStars is also worth
mentioning too, there's some good names in there. :-o The mentors are
people that have built their startup from the ground up, not just
someone that has a degree but haven't been there before. I think it's

Realising our Broadband Future: Parramatta satellite event

paulwallb...@gmail.com (Paul Wallbank) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 22:17:35 UT

If you failed to get a seat at the Realising our Broadband Future
event to be held at UNSW on December 10 and 11, Parramatta City
Council will be hosting a half-day consultative forum on December 10.

This will include segments of the official video feed as well as
facilitated discussion aligned with the themes of the national

Marketing tips - great job being done by TheNextWebAU and Kim Heras

tbull...@googlemail.com (Tim Bull) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 17:59:08 UT

Props to Kim and the work he's doing with Next Web.

I won't spam the list with the link to our article (although if you
visit [link]) you'll find us at the top at least for
a little bit longer!

Kim was asking for start-ups interested in being covered and we put up
our hands. He was great to work with, we didn't even do a press

Conferences overseas - is there a list or specific suggestions?

google....@josephrenzi.com (Joseph Renzi) — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 02:52:40 UT

Conferences overseas - is there a list or specific suggestions?

I have been searching the web to try and find a good list of
conferences overseas - preferably major conferences that are very good
for web-based start-up companies etc.

Does anyone know of such a list, or can you recommend any specific

Apps4NSW competition open

paulwallb...@gmail.com (Paul Wallbank) — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 22:12:10 UT

Web developers, school students and members of the public are
encouraged to come up with innovative ways to help people use NSW
Government information and services with the ‘apps4nsw’ competition.

More than 400 government data sets are now available at [link]
including health, crime and road accident statistics, threatened

low cost PCs for customer deployments

mike...@yahoo.com (Mike Zimmerman) — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 21:04:35 UT

HI All,

We need to buy a few dozen servers/ PCs to use in customer deployments
over the next 12 months, and are looking for lower-cost alternatives
to Dell or HP. We need pretty basic performance specs but still
reliable equipment.

Has anyone else had experience sourcing something like this in Aus?

Melbourne Silicon Beach Drinks now weekly on Wednesdays - good work!

elias.bizan...@gmail.com (Elias Bizannes) — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 11:28:27 UT

Sent via the Facebook Group. Track things here as well:
[link]
-----

Casey Butler sent a message to the members of Melbourne Silicon Beach
Drinks.

--------------------

Hey everyone,

A few of us met up at the Little Creatures Brewery on Friday and it went

We're not the only ones who have issues with getting angel investment

phi...@mediaconnect.com.au (Phil Sim) — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 05:27:27 UT

This Techcrunch article discussses the issues that India is having
encouraging angel investment. All very familiar!

--
Phil Sim
Chief Executive Officer,
MediaConnect Australia Pty Ltd
[link]
phi...@mediaconnect.com.au
Ph: +61 2 9894 6277
Fax: +61 2 8246 6383
Mobile: 0413889940

Where can I find a business mentor around Sydney area?

joshua.part...@gmail.com (Joshua Partogi) — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 23:19:28 UT

Dear all,

Currently I'm moving forward step by step to grow my startup.
Currently it is still in its early stage and I am still the only
person in it for the time being. My background is technical and
there's a lot of things that I still need to learn like how to market
the product and win customers, make presentation and do pitching to

Public sphere 3

elias.bizan...@gmail.com (Elias Bizannes) — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 10:38:06 UT

Hi everyone,

Pia Waugh has consolidated the feedback from the public sphere forum , which
includes our Lifeguard paper. This is being handed over to the public sphere
3.

[link]

Please read through the pages and make your improvements. It's exciting to
see the continued evolution of this discussion, into a productive dialogue

NSW Government RFI - Enterprise Software Solutions

james.del...@gmail.com (chieftech) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 22:07:01 UT

This NSW government RFI, due just before Christmas, might be of
interest to some of you. If you have a product for the enterprise
market, it could be worthwhile submitting a response. They say they
are interested in alternative business models, like SaaS and open
source.

"NSW Government, through the NSW Government Chief Information Office

New Office Furniture - Buy Bankrupt or New?

simonbur...@gmail.com (IPscape Simon) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:02:31 UT

IPscape is becoming very grown up and moving to our own 20 person
office. Has anyone any experience/advice on whether you buy new
furniture or spend time on graysonline for bankrupt furniture?

Notice: Syd SB Basketball - 7th Dec 09

dekraz...@gmail.com (dekrazee1) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 06:54:12 UT

G'day folks,

Sydneysiders, there'll be a basketball session on the 7th of Dec at
the Pyrmont courts (87-97 Harris St, Pyrmont).
For more details and to RSVP (so we have an idea of numbers) check out
the SB group: [link]

Silicon Beach Drinks + Bartap + Microsoft's "Blog Queen" Betsy Aoki

bart.jell...@tjoos.com (Bart Jellema) — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 02:54:30 UT

Hi Silicon Beachers,

Upcoming Silicon Beach drinks this friday are not to be missed. Betsy
Aoki is taking time out of her holiday in Australia to hang out with
Silicon Beach crowd and Microsoft is sponsoring the drinks :)

Bio: Perhaps best known in Australia as Microsoft's "Blog Queen,"
Betsy Aoki launched Microsoft’s corporate blogging efforts but she’s

Finding the Sweet Spot

innotect...@gmail.com (Matt Moore) — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 18:56:41 UT

Hello,

Some of you may have encountered Dave Pollard already - a passionate,
intense Canuk blogger who thinks way too much. I've just polished off
his book and I thinks it's fantastic. Let me know your thoughts (N.B.
I am not on commission for this).

[link]

Steve Blank Video on Justin.tv

geoff.mcqu...@hiivesystems.com (Geoff McQueen - Hiive Systems) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 22:07:43 UT

The Steve Blank session is now archived and online: [link]. It starts about 10 mins into the first segment, and there are the 6 segments in total.

The Lean Startup community (they call it a Circle) has a Google Group too. It is a pretty high quality list, reminds me a lot of Silicon Beach, but is focused on entrepreneurial approach and lessons instead of geography. An example of the sort of awesomeness that's coming through on the list: [link]

Hot Desking

rajuraji...@gmail.com (Rajiv) — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 21:36:14 UT

We have five desks, IP phones with VoIP, network
connections and Internet. Stunning boardroom that can be used as
well...
Prime location - walking distance to St Leonards train station.

$110/week each. Can provide further discounted rates if you need more
than
one....

Contact Maria Padisetti @ (02) 8197 9400 or Mob: 0425 235 307.

Lean Startup Meeting tomorrow morning (streamed live)

geoff.mcqu...@hiivesystems.com (Geoff McQueen - Hiive Systems) — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 02:21:14 UT

There's been a few references on the list to "Lean Startups", a concept promoted by Eric Ries, which he in turn credits in large part to Steve Blank, a serial entrepreneur and author of "The Four Steps to the Epiphany".

Steve is presenting at a meeting tomorrow night in San Fancisco, and they're going to broadcast it live on Justin.TV.

Connecting with the London Startup Community?

nick...@gmail.com (Nick HaC) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 21:44:55 UT

Hi Guys

Can anyone recommend ways to connect into the startup community in London?

Any events or groups or networks?

Thanks for any advice you can offer.

Nick

Scrum & Lean Leadership SIG Event on 26th November - Melbourne, Australia

geoffrey.peter.bu...@gmail.com (GeoffBurns) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 11:14:30 UT

Topic 1:

Milestone Retrospectives

While small retrospectives are simple to run, milestone retrospectives
need more planning both to discover information and create action
plans, etc. This interactive session will demonstrate some of the
activities used to run a milestone retrospective.
This session has been well received by agile groups in Melbourne and

Re: Is Australia a viable market?

joshua.part...@gmail.com (Joshua Partogi) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 06:09:52 UT

Hi Patrick,

Thanks very much for sharing. You've listed some great points that I
have to consider. How is the consumption of technology for that 20M
people? Are people willing to spend some money for technology that
will help them? Has technology become primary needs here? Some country
has large population, but the market can not afford or not willing to

Non Competes

sri.pan...@gmail.com (Sriram Panyam) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:02:23 UT

Hi All,

Need to pick your brains here. What is you view on non-competes. Not so
much on their ethics but in terms of practicality. ie if you HAVE to sign
one, what is the maximum youd limit it to and how would you negotiate this?

Few scenarios I am thinking are:

1. Have been in the one industry for years so "any" period is extremely

Australian Entrepreneurs Live on Sydney Radio at 5pm TODAY

ryanecr...@gmail.com (Ryan Cross) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 03:45:04 UT

For anyone interested, there will be a couple Austrlian Entrepreneurs
speaking on Eastside Radio at 5pm today. [link]

They will be discussing their experience in the US and how it relates
to the startup-scene in Australia. There will also be some discussion
of global entrepreneurship week events.

Austrade briefings on Korean ICT opportunities

paulwallb...@gmail.com (Paul Wallbank) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 01:56:46 UT

Austrade are conducting a series of briefings on ICT opportunities in
Korea featuring presentations from Austrade's Seoul-based ICT
Specialist and Australian ICT companies with experience in the Korean
market.

The sessions are free. Details and registration are available at
[link]

Fwd: Common traits of A-Players

m...@enikos.com (Mike Nicholls) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:19:31 UT

Hi Guys

Thought you might be interested in this from a Auren Hoffman, a serial
entrepreneur in the US.

If you want more detailed tips on hiring A graders and understanding why B/C
graders cost you money, Dymocks has a book called Top Grading, it will help
you to understand most of your hiring screwups in the past and help avoid

Optus Application Store

kschua2...@gmail.com (Khee Seng) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 03:19:33 UT

Just read in the news that Optus had launched their own application
store.

Does submit my application to the Optus Application Store?

Screen Business – Global Trends, Innovation and Opportunities.

paulwallb...@gmail.com (Paul Wallbank) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 02:58:31 UT

SCREEN BUSINESS – GLOBAL TRENDS, INNOVATION AND OPPORTUNITIES
How to keep up with digital change in the film and television
industries in Australia
A special event by world-renowned creative industry expert John
Howkins brought to you by the Creative Industries Innovation Centre,
in partnership with the Australian Film, Television and Radio School.

suggestions for good office phone guy?

mike...@yahoo.com (Mike Zimmerman) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 02:25:52 UT

Hi I need to install/ configure a PBX phone system in my office. Only
5 handsets, so really don't want to pay a bucket load for the work.

Any suggestions out there for people to use?

Office is in Rushcutters Bay in Sydney.

thanks,

Mike
BuildingIQ

Startup BarCamp this Sat

ryanecr...@gmail.com (Ryan Cross) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 02:29:42 UT

Hey Everyone,
David Soul and I have organized a Startup-themed Barcamp for this
Saturday at the ATP. We've organized some great speakers such as:
Mike Cannon-Brookes - Atlassian
Mick Liubinskas - Pollenizer
Brian Menzies - Vast Solar
Bart Jellema - Tjoos
Kate Carruthers
and you!
In true BarCamp style, attendance = participation so, bring ideas to share.

Was: New business models to protect inventiveness

dimka.koz...@gmail.com (Dmitri) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 13:43:00 UT

Hi,

Here is a general question I would like to ask after reading the
discussion on "protecting inventiveness":

How is it possible for a small business to protect their ideas? Under
a small business I mean a really small one: two guys in a garage or
so.

I wish I was wrong but I think that this is not possible. A small

silicon beach drinks sydney

d...@pretaweb.com (Dylan Jay) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 03:24:50 UT

I'll be there if anyone is unsure if anyone else will be there.
I've just recently returned from the Plone conference in Budapest and
the python conference in NZ so anyone who feels like discussing that
Christchurch can get 150 enthusiastic geeks doing cool things with
python to give up their weekend and how embarrassing no one in AU has

Melbourne drinks 27th Nov 6pm Transport Hotel

drewb3...@hotmail.com (Andrew Bucknell) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 01:37:46 UT

I love watching the buzz on this list around the Sydney Friday night
drinks. Being in Melbourne, I've often thought it would be great to
have a similar thing happening here. Last week I attended a Google
Technology Users Group meeting in Melbourne and had a great time
talking with a bunch of passionate developers. I would also like to

Microsoft is the most inventive company in the world!

sri.pan...@gmail.com (Sriram Panyam) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 23:50:00 UT

[link]
They just patented the "sudo"!!
cheers
Sri

Global Entrepreneurship Week Calendar (Next Week)

ryanecr...@gmail.com (Ryan Cross) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 11:47:07 UT

Hey Guys,
I spent a little time tonight parsing the events calendar on the site
home page and imported it into google calendar here:
[link]
You can also import it from the ical source here:
[link]

Introducing Andrew Bucknell

drewb3...@hotmail.com (Andrew Bucknell) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 04:23:59 UT

I have been lurking on silicon beach for a little while and figure its
time I introduced myself. I am a software developer based in
Melbourne. I have been writing software professionally for 15 years.
Additionally, I have been working on PhD relating to personalization
and the semantic web from which I graduated last year. My interest in

New Canberra technology / startups / software business meetup.com group created

s...@oakfocus.net (SamH) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 05:55:52 UT

Hi,

Ive just created a new meetup.com group for people in Canberra
interested in technology / startups / software business.

[link]

If you're in Canberra and interested in meeting up to have a chat
about the online state-of-play and the future please sign up.

Vesting - any impact on raising angel? Know any good startup lawyer in Sydney? Thanks

hendro_wij...@hotmail.com (Hendro Wijaya) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 01:51:50 UT

Hi All,
I have questions with regards to legal issues.
Few things:
- We are now in a stage to register a company.
- Between founders, we have agreed on share of each party.
- At some point in future, we are looking to raise an angel round.
- To protect everyone, we would like to do it in 4 years vesting with 1 year cliff. We have agreed on this informally between founders in earlier days.

Introductions

silviapfeiff...@gmail.com (Silvia Pfeiffer) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 21:39:10 UT

Prompted by Geoff, here's my brief intro.
I'm a German living in Sydney for more than 10 years [1].
Previously, I was a research scientist at the CSIRO ICT Centre in Multimedia.
In 2006, Chris Gilbey, John Ferlito and I started Vquence [2], a video
technology startup in Sydney. We now have a social video metrics

New business models to protect inventiveness

drmichaelba...@gmail.com (1_Place) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 20:15:54 UT

Dear Silicon Beach

Reading the LifeGuard paper: [link]
& considering what can we do to help, we thought that we would seek
suggestions from Silicon Beach for ways to improve start up access to
legal and patent attorney services.

Our belief is that there are other obstacles that prevent starts up

Courting an Acquiring company - any tips?

nick...@gmail.com (Nick HaC) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:48:28 UT

Hi
It seems there are plenty of books on how to start a startup, how to
bag the elephant, how to succeed at sales etc etc
I have never seen any information on best processes for courting
potential acquiring companies and or the techniques best used to lure
in and close an acquisition on each the different profiles of

Is Australia a viable market?

joshua.part...@gmail.com (Joshua Partogi) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 09:49:34 UT

Hi all,
Based on your experience, how is the market condition in Australia? Is
Australia a viable market for technology startup company? With only 20
millions people in Australia, how is the technology acceptance here
compared to countries in North Americe or Europe?
Thank you very much sharing.

This Week in Startups

james.a.howa...@gmail.com (James Howarth) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 02:28:14 UT

Hey guys,
I've been checking out Jason Calacanis's new video show called "This Week in
Startups". It's one of the best around and is definitely worth watching.
He has a brilliant section called "Ask Jason" where startups can call in and
ask for his suggestions about their business. For those of you who don't

company background checking

m...@markburch.net (Mark Burch) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:19:15 UT

Hi,
What are the public resources available to look at the background and 'character' of a potential partner company?
I'm not really sure what I'm asking for here but I'd like to see things like previous litigation proceedings...current legal proceedings against the company and/or its directors. Does anyone know of any other types of public information I could look at that perhaps isn't in the google index?

Youtube embeds: what impact on page impressions

tagmot...@gmail.com (Tagmotion) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:31:16 UT

Does anyone have any statistics or case studies showing the impact of
embedding Youtube videos into a site, in terms of increased page
impressions?

Thanks,

Andrew.

Best way to transfer $AU to $USD

phil.montgom...@majura.com (PHIL.MONTGOMERY@MAJURA.COM) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 16:07:28 UT

Hi all

My business needs to transfer a large slab of $AU to $USD - has anyone
looked into the way to do this and get the best exchange rate? I have
heard it's best to do the conversion in Australia...

Phil

Seeking Sales & Alliance Manager

simonbur...@gmail.com (IPscape Simon) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 01:38:40 UT

The age old challenge! Seeking a good sales & alliance manager with a
track record of results and energy to manage explosive sales growth.
Must be Sydney based. I'm loathed to brief a search firm but can do if
necessary. Any advice, thoughts welcome.