There are two things that are core to Silicon Valley's success: natural
crapness and alumni networks.

If it was purely capital and talent, then there is no reason why New York
couldn't beat the Valley. In fact, New York will never beat the valley
because it has too much capital and too much talent: a developer would
rather a $100k/year job at a big bank creating market algorithms over a 50k
startup with no guarantee or prestige (yet).

Sydney has a horrible urban plan, and Melbourne as a city is much better.
But Sydney never needed to care about its urban planning, because of it's
natural beauty. This in turn has shaped the character of the city. The
environment of a place makes a huge impact on the culture of a city.

Silicon Valley - if you look at San Jose where it really started - is an
absolute hole. Walking the streets leaves you uninspired. There are no great
views to distract you. And there was no geographic advantage which could
have given it the opportunity to be a major town due to its proximity to
other markets (like New York, Chicago in the American empire -  or the
medieval equivilant of NYC: Constantinople).

So like the Israeli's did, the success there was when humans created
something through hard work. And they could focus on technology (pure human
innovation), because they couldn't rely on anything else.

To my second point about alumni networks: the way the Valley works was
described to me as it being like a big company. Everyone knows each other
and are working in different divisions. They share advice, hold parties -
but at the same time they do their own thing. When one of these "divisions"
needs help, they can pull in resources from friends. If you look at the real
success stories of the Valley - not the high profile social media
celebrities who talk but don't build much, but the entrepreneurs that out of
no where get a $600m exit - you notice it's the same people and they all
know each other. People that have worked together before from ten years ago,
doing it again.

The silicon chip factories kick started these alumni networks (and hence the
valley's success): people got to know each other, and people that were
wealthy would invest in each other.

So to your question now, how could this work:
- the isolation will give a sense of focus. If I am in Sydney trying to do a
startup as a 25 year old, I am distracted by the awesome social scene here,
wasting my money and time (well depending on whether you judge success in
life as generating financial gains over experiencing it). If I am in the
middle of nowhere, I've got nothing better to do but build something
amazing.
- the geographic proximity will create a strong sense of community. These
alumni networks I am talking about - membership is earned through
collaboration and share experiences. Living with someone and working on a
not-for-profit idea creates the same relationship bonding as colleagues at a
company. The most important outcome of the startup camps is that it's
creating shared experiences and alumni networks. Forget the businesses that
emerge from them - watch the relationships that get formed which
subsequently lead to something more serious later down the track.

Perhaps this could be the evolution of the startup camps: lock a bunch of
university students in a regional town for three months, and tell them to
come back only when they have a product they are able to sell.

In terms of export industries, it doesn't really matter what it is. But pick
one specifically, and only allow people wanting to operate in that field to
live together. Personally, I think "silicon beach" needs some build and flip
companies to boot up our country - and info-tech is the best option for that
due to the markets maturity. Not because I don't want to see sustainable
businesses in Australia, but to build the ecosystem, we need veterans who
have got experience and made some money along the way.

Elias Bizannes
Heard my news?
http://eliasbizannes.com/blog/2009/06/bye-sydney-hi-san-francisco/

On Sun, Jun 28, 2009 at 2:14 PM, rgh....@gmail.com <rgh....@gmail.com>wrote: