
Russian Pres. Medvedev is looking to build "Silicon Valley" near Moscow - helwr
http://en.rian.ru/russia/20100215/157884654.html
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coffeemug
I'm a Russian (well, Ukrainian, but who cares) expat. I'm not a "big name",
but I did gain a lot of valuable experience in the thirteen years I've lived
in the U.S. No amount of financial incentives would convince me to start a
business in Russia, even if they hand me a pile of no strings attached cash in
the airport.

You see, I _like_ being able to start a business, rent an office, pay bills,
pass inspections (car, fire safety, whatever), file my taxes, get through the
airport security, get a driver's license, go to a university, and send kids to
school (if I had kids) without having to bribe a single soul. I _like_ knowing
that nobody else around me has the opportunity to drive drunk without fear of
repercussions because they can give a cop $50 and drive on.

I _like_ walking on the street, getting on a bus, and riding a subway without
fear of being beaten or killed because someone doesn't like my ethnicity. Ok,
so I'm a white male, but I also like that other people around me have the
opportunity to do the same. I'm not even talking about being treated decently,
I'm talking about basic safety. Black people in Russia are doomed to standing
by tanning salons with a sign "I got my tan here" (yeah, this is real).

I'm not even talking about making any significant amount money. Heaven forbid
you make money in Russia. Well, first of all, without having connections in
the government, you can't. But even if you do establish such connections, good
luck dealing with their IRS, the KGB that wants a piece of the pie (ok, so
they renamed it, but it's all the same people), and the corrupt-beyond-belief
court system.

I _like_ grabbing coffee with rich people who want to meet me purely because
they're happy to give advice, who didn't start out their career in organized
crime, and who don't need three body guards and an armored SUV just to get
around.

Boy, does this article touch a nerve. I know a ton of smart, driven, capable
Russians who _love_ their country and who want to change the world while
living there. But they're all here, in the U.S., because back there they're
doomed to a life of corruption they refuse to deal with. The idea of offering
them financial incentive to go back is frankly insulting. They don't need
financial incentive. They just need an opportunity to make an _honest_ living.
The rest, they'll do on their own.

~~~
1gor
Well, as a Canadian living in Russia for the past 13 years I have the
following to say about the US...

Seriously, the parent post is so full of old clichés, it's not even funny. I
lived outside of Russia for the past 20 years and I've moved back half a year
ago, and I'm not even located in Moscow now. I live in a large industrial city
in Ural region.

Russia has changed a lot in past 10 years and 90% of what I see in my daily
private and business life is not much different from what I'm accustomed to in
the UK. Some things are positively better (for example communal services are
great though I can judge by my apartment block only).

Let me say something about bribes and corruption. I never gave a single bribe
in my life in Russia then or now, with a possible exception of a small fine to
a traffic cop paid on the spot in cash (to save myself time going to a nearby
bank).

I know there are people who pay bribes, but plenty of businesspeople don't.
Those businesspeople who don't pay bribes CAN be successful and quite often
are. And those who do quite often get caught together with corrupt officials.
The key point is -- today corruption is much less than it was in the 90s and
it's falling year by year.

The image of organised crime driving around with armed body guards in SUVs is
total bullshit nowadays. Most of SUVs you see on the streets in my city is
driven by beautiful blond girls with artificial sun tan on their way to a gym.

I am walking the streets at night (admittedly, not in the depressed areas)
without fear of being mugged, since the last fight I saw in this city was when
bouncers kicked some rich guy out of a club for being too drunk.

The key is to look at the dynamics. Russia is getting better, cleaner,
wealthier. Lawlessness that happened in the 90s is quickly being replaced by
the rule of law. It's not perfect, but the progress is amazing.

When author of the parent post implies that somebody (like me) cannot make an
_honest_ living in Russia today, I take it quite personally. The irony is --
he is not Russian, he has not lived in Russia for years, his friends are
emigrant Russians -- but he has a long list of clichés that earn upvotes on
HN.

~~~
DenisM
So did you live outside of Russia for last 20 years or inside Russia for last
13 years?

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snitko
Surkov is one of those smart guys in Kremlin administration. But the plan to
build a silicon valley in Moscow is just ridiculous. As well as other
government plans on innovations. There are at least two reasons for that:

First and most important is that innovations exist not just because government
wants it. At least until the government is the client (and I suppose that's
not what they're going to be in this case). Innovations is a result of public
and individuals needs, a competition of prices and efficiency (and other
things). And it also takes a certain infrastructure for them to work. Russia
lacks these things. Most people simply don't care about better quality of life
or at least are not willing to do anything about it. Then there's no
infrastructure: an example of that would be a broken national post system or
absolutely no financial and banking culture (very limited usage of credit
cards). I could name a lot of successful US startups that simply wouldn't work
in Russia for those reasons.

Second is corruption, of course. I can imagine it's slightly simpler for IT
business to stay out of it, but only until you're making a certain amount of
money. A common saying in Russian business is "Sit quiet and try not to
reflect the light".

The problem with all those plans of building something innovative is that
government should not initiate them at all. If they ever wanted to make any
difference, they would probably be trying to build a healthy environment for
businesses. Business does not need any help. What it needs is to eliminate
obstructions on its way.

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mdasen
The issue is that business succeeds in America because, generally speaking,
there are few barriers here and wonderful protections. In America, the idea
that the government would simply take something you made is abhorrent. Even
when things like eminent domain are called upon, there is compensation
provided (and compensation that can be challenged in courts). So businesses
and investors feel safe that what is their's is actually their's.

Likewise, there are few barriers. Censorship is near non-existant in America
and that's important for a lot of technology companies. Likewise, there are
few administrative hassles - especially compared to economies that thrive on
bribes.

There just isn't enough safety and security and too much hassle and you can't
just decide to build that. It takes time to change the culture around that.
And you have to prove that it's a durable stability. Many countries try to
lure in foreign businesses with tax credits and the promise of stability and
once profits are seen and businesses created, that stability is yanked away
and assets eroded. America just has a long history of defending property
rights in a way that actions over the past decade speak differently of Russia.

And, with that in mind, money going into Russia will demand much more
favorable terms (since there's more assumed risk). The more favorable the
terms, the worse a deal it is for Russia and the more incentive there is to
yank the deal later on. Remember, politicians have maybe 20 years or so. They
want their results quick. They often don't care about creating stability and
responsibility that will leave their country in an advantageous position while
the current voters vote them out of office.

What Russia really needs is a commitment to the rule of law and the
enforcement of that law whether it's in the government's interest (or anyone's
interest) or not. That's what really attracts money and prosperity - when the
rules are just and enforced fairly against all parties.

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rjurney
There was an ISP in the first floor of my building in Moscow, and you got
broadband delivered by ethernet run up the stairwells. There was a sign in the
stairwell offering a reward for turning in whoever kept cutting the ethernet
wires. The gang of thugs that lived in the stairwell, would - in between using
the stairs as a urinal and conducting brutal robberies - slash these wires
regularly.

The ISP couldn't really call the police, because freedom in Moscow is
equivalent to avoiding the police, and they were a shoestring operation
without enough for bribes. Not that the police would investigate even if you
bribed them, they'd more like pick a few scapegoats and beat them up or
torture them.

So my internet went out frequently. They fixed it as fast as they could. It
wasn't bad internet considering.

I can't imagine running a business in that environment.

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vishaldpatel
Back when I was in university doing my undergrad (only 4 years ago), in the
two years that I spent in that particular university - out of all the people
that I talked to, only one of them was actively looking to start a company or
do something. It was a Russian foreign exchange student in his 1st year. He
had already started and succeeded in business back in Mother Russia and was
using his hard earned cash to now get an undergrad as an international
student.

The Russians are intelligent, smart, and resourceful - they have all the
qualities needed for entrepreneurship and it will take very little effort on
the part of the Russian government to create an environment to attract them.

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Slashed
Yesterday, I came back from Russia. Though this wasn't my first time there.
The first thing you notice there, is that there's plenty of illegal
competition. In one of the biggest shopping centers in Moscow, there is a shop
just a side of an authorized Apple reseller that tries to sell you an _iPhone_
(which is actually a chinese TVPhone).

Apart from this, I really do think that Russia needs its own Silicon Valley
with VCs and Incubators from U.S. There are many talented people with
innovative ideas and products.

Speaking of corruption level and unsafe environment, I don't think that India
is better, but nevertheless they have their own SV with well-established VCs
from the States.

~~~
rjurney
India is perfectly safe. There is also a vibrant technology economy already in
place in many cities - albeit service based. This is a very different
circumstance than Russia.

~~~
Slashed
Is this really true? I may be wrong, but from what I've heard - India is
perfectly safe in a few cities.

Perhaps, I didn't get into any trouble in Russia(and I was not only in Moscow,
but in small 200km away from Moscow cities) because I'm white and speak fluent
Russian. Anyway, as the saying goes "A journey of a thousand miles begins with
a single step". Once, everything was built from just an idea.

~~~
plinkplonk
India's _cities_ are by and large safe (unless you are doing something really
weird/ in the sleazy parts - every city has its dangerous parts just like
every American city I know of). You do have the very occasional sensational
attack on foreigners which grabs the headlins.

I have friends from the USA, Sweden etc who have been living here for years
without getting into any trouble. The best way to decide such things is to
talk to someone you know who has already lived here.

And we don't quite have our "Silicon Valley" yet, though Bangalore has many
outsourcing companies and offshore development centres where large companies
in the USA or Europe offload work no one there wants to do. But yes, (as
rjurney points out) there are cities with very large populations of
programmers, Bangalore being the prototypical example.

~~~
rjurney
I lived both places. The average block in Moscow is like some shady alley in
Old Delhi at night ;)

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philk
Given Russia's somewhat shady rule of law I doubt the real Silicon Valley is
worried.

~~~
gacba
In Soviet Russia, Valley builds you.

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patio11
Making a Silicon Valley by fiat is pretty tough, even in a country where
coffeemug's perceptive comments about the rule of law do not apply. Japan has
at least a dozen places which wish they were Silicon Valley. I used to work at
one of them. It wasn't a failure -- it employs a few thousand people and you
are statistically certain to have used something containing something made
there -- but it also wasn't the "put our town on the international map" thing
the mucky mucks were hoping for.

I think PG had an article about that a few years ago. Yep, here we go.
<http://www.paulgraham.com/america.html> I translated that for internal
circulation among my bosses. It got... mixed reactions.

~~~
Estragon

      It got... mixed reactions.

To an outsider, it does look like another case of American exceptionalism.

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rjurney
I wonder if other city-states during the Renaissance sat around plotting, "How
can we have our own Florence?"

~~~
BearOfNH
Well, there was that SNL skit about the Sodom city council plotting how to
compete with the more successful Gomorrah. Sorry, can't find it on YouTube but
here's a .RAM file:

<http://cip.law.ucla.edu/ramfiles/i_love_sodom.ram>

(Bill Murray develops a pitch for "I Love Sodom", a riff on "I Love New York",
leading to a real-life lawsuit. SNL won.)

------
badave
I was under the impression that "Silicon Valleys" aren't planned to happen,
but that they just happen. It's a mixture of the people and tech happening.
It's a vibe. It's a culture. It's people.

I moved to the Valley a couple years ago there are many developers here who
are all enterprising, talented, entrepreneurial, and willing to try and fail.
It is something that simply doesn't exist where I'm from (Reno) because most
people there are more willing to simply work for whoever will hire them and
spend the rest of the time doing whatever they want (usually watching TV or
playing videogames).

Moral of the story: you can't really teach or wish for this kind of thing to
happen. You have to build a community willing to innovate and try and fail.

Also, those who succeed must get fabulously rich and a lot of prestige and
respect.

~~~
yardie
More or less, it wasn't planned. It did have early government input. Silicon
Valley was started by Stanford alumni, who got a lot of money from the DoD.
The first tenants were defense and aerospace companies, and this transitioned
to semiconductors and computers. The Silicon Valley we now know has taken 70
years to get here.

Basically, almost every government wants to incubate its own startup culture.
Because they now recognize how much influence they contribute to the country
and internationally. But it will take decades to know if their ideas have
taken root. There is no shortcut to these things and most politicians aren't
so patient.

------
codesnik
secret codename is "Kirpitch Walley", insider says.

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vaksel
it should be IN Moscow...near Sherementyevo. Only way for this to succeed.

~~~
sown
From what a Russian co-worker tells me, Moscow is the only really safe place
for any foreigner to really be.

~~~
jimmyjim
My brother-in-law says St. Petersburg is much safer than Moscow. (But even St.
Petersburg isn't safe enough -- he's a Jew, and eventually had to flee because
he was getting harassed very often. Basically, all of Russia is unsafe for
anyone non-Russian-looking. And _especially_ non-whites.

~~~
snitko
I confirm, Saint-Petersburg is okay, I live here. I think Moscow is actually
less safer, because it's bigger and it attracts a lot of different people from
unstable Russian republics. It's also waaaay more expensive.

