Scobleizer - Latest Comments in Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Robert Scoble — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 13:00:21 -0000

Philj: I've been to Paris three times now. Thanks for noticing.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

philj — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 03:09:15 -0000

You haven't been all over the world: you do not mention Paris, France. Let's talk, I can organize something for you there.
For sure this would not change your global view, just would give some additional items. There is not just Web3 event here ;)
Deal?
(From Phil O L I V E T)
And you're right, Israel is a very productive land in technologies... and maybe unique place in some specific domain.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Mark — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 06:53:38 -0000

Congrats! you are the first person to use the words Israel and Respect in the same sentence.

I would not piss on it if it were on fire.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Nicholas Marx — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 06:45:36 -0000

"China will be very important, yes. But they don’t have the entrepreneurial attitude that Israel has."

What on Earth makes you say this? The Chinese bave been building business all around the world for hundreds of years - long before Israel's 1948 founding. On what grounds do you say they are not as entreprenuerial as Israel? I've been to both countries, and China is just as entrenuerial as anywhere else.

The reason China won't be a Silicon Valley is not going to be on account of entreprenuerial spirit. The correct reason is just as Paul Graham mentions - IT'S A POLICE STATE!

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Christopher Coulter — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 21:46:01 -0000

Follow-up...

A good enough product, and you can not only expect but DEMAND people come to you. Not saying that's always a wise move, but it's an option. Make the best product, escape expensive California, head to Utah or Nevada, clear low overhead, market to the players, and have a branch office in the centers, if such is needed.

Hubs do birth products, and sometimes the only way to be noticed, is to be there and compete in those waters, come what may. But just because you are 'there' doesn't automatically mean you are 'all that'. Most of what's 'there' is half gimmickry.

And hubs change all the time, and they spread out, LA is no longer king of all, nor is Palo Alto. Not seeing where the map is expanding, can be fatal.

So yes, you can't expect everything to come to you, nor should you, but yet sometimes you can. And sometimes you need to be there, other times it's a waste, other sometimes you can go hybrid, being in a few or all places at once. It's all complicated, absurd and illogical, human behavior being what it is, it won't ever fit into neat little boxes.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Neuromancer — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 12:16:05 -0000

yeh I remeber a comment that the guys from sand hill road dont like to drive more than 20 miles of so to visit a company.

but CA and MAs have the infrastructure dont forget that SV grew out of the masive space and defence industrys - its intersting though the both MA and CA have more employee friedly laws

still at last you have a VC culture in the uk teh dominant role model is the failed barow boy "sirallen" and his motley crew of "property developers"

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Christopher Coulter — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 10:33:57 -0000

Expecting people to come to you is a losing strategy.

That statement is not overall always true, as it depends on whom you are dealing with, though some won't sniff unless you are on Wilshire or in the Bay Area area (true enough), but you will get the usual copycat-churn that way. And it is also a losing strategy expecting everyone to just handfeed/worship you (Blogger, Sand Hill or New Line style). Sometimes the best things are the things you hunt for, finding the real hidden talents. Investigative reporting can pay dividends. The VC/Dev Exec that discovers the "killer app" that no one else has a lock on, wins that much bigger. A good enough quality product with a good enough market demand, and people do end up coming to you.

Geography makes not the Great American Script nor the Great American Software. John Hughes operated from Illinois, and true, he went to people, but he always HQ'ed in the Midwest. And most of the (even still) current comedy vets came from Second City alumni. And the entire INDIE Sundance scene is a testament that there is actual life beyond LA, they didn't play the Studio dance tunes. Plus EVERYONE in in Vancouver these days anyways, forget LA and the high prices, defecting to Canada is the old (but still new) trend.

Expecting everything to come to you works BOTH ways you know. You only applied that formula in one direction.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

monkeyleader — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 01:11:00 -0000

Oh and your point about getting "your" attention ... it sounds like Fast Company need a local employee in Israel now ....

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

monkeyleader — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 01:07:57 -0000

Hey Robert - so I always raised this as an issue for your PodTech shows - very US centric, what about the cool stuff happening in other parts of the world.

I realise it's impossible to travell to these places, so you need local contacts.

Think about how the news is done today - more often than not there will be a chief reporter local in most regions.

Nige

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

bj manzini — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 19:00:07 -0000

feldman is right. you're fairly clueless. if you can get over your fawning (or is it hero worship) over arrington, maybe you'd be worth listening to. doubt it. the fact that you're only now waking up to the depth of israel's high-tech prowess speaks volumes about your appalling ignorance. this story's been profiled indepth on wired, cnet, the wall street journal, business week, forbes...ugh, must i go on?

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Eze Vidra — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 12:57:46 -0000

Robert,

I agree with you. The further companies are from silicon valley, the less respect they get from the 'technorati' - the bloggers, the press, the VC community, even though their innovation is in many cases extraordinary.

That's exactly why I started the VC CAFE (http://www.vccafe.com)in 2005 - to give visibility to early stage Israeli startups and venture capital deal flow in Israel.

VC Cafe has been featured by the WSJ and ranked as one of the top 100 vc blogs.

Following a successful Israeli startup roundtable in March, We're having a local gathering here in San Francisco.

Join Israeli entrepreneurs, VCs, bloggers, investors and members of the press on May 2nd in the financial
district in San Francisco.

RSVP in the event page on Facebook:http://www.facebook.com/eve...

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Steve — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 12:15:36 -0000

@26. How does what Loren choose to do as satire relate to his opinion of you? Fred Thompson got elected Senator but had a career as an actor. George Clooney played Batman. Does that minimize his positions on Darfur? Your response is illogical.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Yuvi Panda — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 11:02:01 -0000

Now, when's the long-awaited visit to India coming? Perhaps you could come around July, when our Demo/TC50 style Proto.in and Headstart.in are going on :P

http://desistartups.wordpre...

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Kambiz Kamrani — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 03:49:22 -0000

To say that, "I've been all over the world" comes off as disgustingly pretentious which you may or may not care about. All over the world is not two cities in Asia, places in Europe and the US.

Furthermore, not a very astute commentary you're trying to make with this whole post. It is a no brainer that the locality you live in biases how much focus you give on a topic.

Kambiz

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Alan Weinkrantz — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 23:45:28 -0000

Hey Robert... dont forget what also makes Israel so unique is that much of its technology comes from spin-offs from the Army/AirForce/Navy. And much of their business training comes from....well, the Army/AirForce/Navy. And finally, there is a very good and very solid Venture Capital infrastructure which mirrors the U.S.

Have a great trip!

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Jeff Slobotski — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 23:22:01 -0000

Keep up the recordings on FastCompany TV---enjoy staying connected to you while your in Israel!

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Zach Katkin — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 22:40:59 -0000

I think you got something with the respect aspect. Just because we're not at MECCA doesn't mean we can't worship.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Tom Ilube — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 18:57:18 -0000

Co-incidentally I wrote (www.tomilube.blogspot.com)about this same issue from the perspective of a UK start-up CEO looking to launch in the USA, commenting on how "closed" the valley feels from here...except that I mentioned Scoble as an arch-insider - whoops!

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Steven — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:55:35 -0000

It seems even those areas that are known for tech in the US are somehow less because they aren't in Silicon Valley. Much like Scoble mentioning San Antonio, how about Austin and Silicon Gulch, the Raleigh-Durham Triangle, Urbana-Champaign and the NSCA (remember Mosaic and Marc Andreessen?), the area around MIT, Stanford and Cambridge, and even the area around the Sound with all of the companies orbiting MSFT. Even if it's just perception, not being in the Valley or transplanting to the Valley is a major disadvantage and you have to wonder what excellent stuff is being missed because the lack of funding.

Oh, and according to Wikipedia, Robert is visiting Silicon Wadi.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Julian Baldwin — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:53:59 -0000

Robert,

I think it's great you're traveling to different places and sharing an insightful perspective on those experiences.

And sharp job as managing director in your FastCompany videos. Hope you maintain the energy and continue sharing, it's appreciated by a lot of people.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

meritocracy — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:26:27 -0000

@Christopher Coulter

Um hello, location location location! Any respectable entrepreneur needs to be where the action is. Film -> Hollywood. Tech -> Silicon Valley. Finance -> NY, London. Fashion -> Paris. Nerds -> MIT. They are elite but not elitist and definitely not lazy. If you have something to prove, get your ass out there and prove it among the best. That is how you get respect. Remember Facebook moved from the Boston area, a tech hub, to an even bigger tech hub in Palo Alto. Expecting people to come to you is a losing strategy.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Mike Stopforth — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 16:51:03 -0000

Hey Robert

Met you very briefly at Mix08, though you were interviewing Chris Saad at the time so attention was sparing :)

South Africa, my home country is also producing some pretty cool tech startups. Sites like www.afrigator.com, www.blueworld.co.za, www.synthasite.com and more are just some examples of signs that even in the Southern-most tip of Africa we're pushing the boundaries of innovation on the Web. Though I do agree that we're less likely to get noticed because most of the online world doesn't know Africa exists :P

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

Greg Rollett — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 16:41:46 -0000

Scoble,

Very true. We are down in sunny Florida. Same climate as California, but without the shiny tech scene. We recently had FOWA down in Miami and I think it helped to open eyes of what is happening down in the 'dirty south.'

It's a tough flight out to San Fran for a quick visit with top bloggers and industry types as opposed to a walk down the block in Silly Valley.

Hopefully with the globalization that things like Twiiter, Pownce, Blogging and other means bring, we will be able to take our excitement and share it with the people that matter.

The real question is of the VC's. Start-ups down here should be able to connect with VC's from Florida and not be entirely dependent on a trip your way. I think it is happening but we have a long way to go to get the people with the money in our region confident on the effects of the web.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

sitecharts — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:58:23 -0000

@Christopher Coulter
Couldn't agree with you more. To some degree I don't think it is intentional but more along the lines of meeting people after work for drinks ... you just can't do that if you aren't in the same city.

I believe the problem for startups outside the US is market size.
Outside the US startups have a much harder time conquering a market of equal size to the US ... look at Europe. Those startups need to translate their service into X languages in order to reach the same number of people. Therefore it is so much easier to simply shoot for the US market ... and it is probably best/easiest to do that from within the US.
It's the same for film and tech: in the US silicon valley is simply THE place to be just as La for film/TV.

Re: Israel: a country too far from Mike Arrington’s house

pwb — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:50:38 -0000

Despite the echo chamber in the valley, it's still a far better place to start companies. Has much value been created in those other cities you mention?