With our involvement in the creation of transLucidonline, the simple website publishing system for small- to medium-sized companies, through our UK entity Pantha Software, we discovered a little the start-up scene in Sydney. And discovered that there were many more Web2.0 start-ups than we ever imagined, the term 'silicon beach' a very fitting term for this beautiful strip of land we live and work in.

Whereas in Silicon Valley it feels that the same errors as in the first web 1.0 bubble are repeated (buzz, buzz, buzzzzzwords galore, geeky-sounding company names, skyrocketing valuations, ...), the hype ever growing and insiders starting to worry that it's all a little bit of history repeating, i got the feeling from talking to some startups here that things seemed a little bit more grounded overall. Being far away from the Microsofts and Googles of this world and "alone" on a large island can be good when you are trying to build something of lasting value, where long-term goals can have higher priority than short-term return.

Just my 2 cents. Certainly, our office location is not the worst.