I’ve spent a bit of time in Australia. When I compared the caliber of people who worked in tech and venture to those in mining and law enforcement, it was night and day. There’s a TON of smart people at companies like Woodside, and lots of smart people at the Australian Federal Police (to the extent where the US and other countries rely on them for help in tricky technical situations). The tech and VC crowd seemed to get off on the size of a funding round, or how tight they were with the founders of Atlassian, or if they knew some guy from America with a “successful exit,” or other complete nonsense.
With a dynamic like that, the law enforcement people are always going to point to the tech and venture people and say to politicians, “are you going to take orders from these clowns, or are you going to listen to us?” And now that you’ve got the climate activists antagonizing the mining companies, who are responsible for a very significant percentage of the economy, you’ve got two extremely savvy and powerful groups working together.
If Australian tech people want their government to take them seriously, they’re going to have to act in a manner that is as professional as those at the AFP, and they’re going to have to hit people with an economic hammer that can match the force of mining. Yes, it’s not fair that things are this difficult, but that’s life.
I'm Australian. Your argument seems to be "If only the tech sector in Australia had some smart people". That's nice but I don't think that's what is going on.
Most of the general public is apathetic to this kind of thing. They just don't get worked up like Americans do about freedom. Especially in the middle of an epidemic (covid19 is now out of control in the two biggest cities).
We have a conservative government at the moment. They're interested in power for the sake of it and very much against transparency. They're certainly not going to listen to anyone's opinions about it - they'll just do it and wear what they know will be a negligible hit they take in the polls.
I think you greatly overestimate how “worked up” Americans get. In reality, there is an enormous amount of lobbying and horse-trading that goes on behind the scenes whenever Washington wants to do anything that touches the tech and telecom sectors. Tech and telecom are seen as areas that drive tremendous economic value and national power, so they have the ability to bend things to go their way.
Australia is quite the opposite. The tech industry is a bit like a spoiled, privileged trust fund kid who shows up to the family holding company’s board meetings in flip-flops and a t-shirt and makes a lot of demands. I’m pretty sure the tech/VC industries take more from the government, in the form of mining revenue-funded tax and incentive credits and fast-track high-net-worth immigration residence schemes that require parking money in VC funds, than they contribute back to the Treasury. In fact, I would posit that the state of Western Australia’s share of mining-related tax revenue this past fiscal year was greater than all of the taxes paid by all of Australia’s tech companies combined. (I could be wrong, but it sure feels like I’d be proven correct.)
And on the side of law enforcement and ASIO, well, public sector employees and unions have a LOT of political power. If you think union members are going to vote in favor of policies endorsed by tech plutocrats than those being pushed by their counterparts at other unions... It’s time to go talk to a couple union bosses and see what they think of your ideas. It really doesn’t help the tech crowd that half of them are obsessed with union-busting pseudo-libertarian nonsense, in a country where these organizations still hold a lot of kingmaking power.
Australia’s tech industry just doesn’t have the leverage, either politically or financially, to pursue its agenda. I would flip what you said and turn it back on you, and the other commenters; it seems like all of you are applying American ways of looking at this to a country that has very different dynamics. Trying to import American-style “activism” to make your point isn’t going to get much done there, mate. What plays well on Twitter won’t work in Canberra.
It's interesting to see how, in America, tech is seen as a gateway to prosperity and something worth investing in, while in Australia it's described as a pit for subsidies.
I guess the number one customer for Australian natural resource has incentives to make sure the country stays dependent on said natural resource exports for it's prosperity. Keeps them docile...
You have an unstated assumption: that the best people in tech are attracted to startups and venture capital. In Australia that's not true. Australia is not America and you've drawn incorrect conclusions due to your incorrect assumption.
> And now that you’ve got the climate activists antagonizing the mining companies, who are responsible for a very significant percentage of the economy, you’ve got two extremely savvy and powerful groups working together.
I wonder which country is the number one customer of these companies.
Atlassian founders are the wrong place to look for tech and VC mentorship.
Every company here has a values round copying them and doing things that atlassian does.
I believe tech and VC ecosystem will improve once they become bigger. There are companies like okzellar, shippit which do not have that atlassian bias.
With a dynamic like that, the law enforcement people are always going to point to the tech and venture people and say to politicians, “are you going to take orders from these clowns, or are you going to listen to us?” And now that you’ve got the climate activists antagonizing the mining companies, who are responsible for a very significant percentage of the economy, you’ve got two extremely savvy and powerful groups working together.
If Australian tech people want their government to take them seriously, they’re going to have to act in a manner that is as professional as those at the AFP, and they’re going to have to hit people with an economic hammer that can match the force of mining. Yes, it’s not fair that things are this difficult, but that’s life.