CNN's Money/Business 2.0 writes about the all too predictable Google acquisition:

Google's acquisition of Upstartle, the Silicon Valley-based provider of Writely, a Web-based word processor, is the surest sign yet that the company plans to take on Microsoft in the market for office-productivity software.

Writely is an Internet based word processor that is platform independent. It also allows online collaboration and document sharing. That said, Writely is an obvious product and could have easily been developed in South-Western Ontario - in fact, many local start ups are offering products with similar upside potential. Why do Silicon Valley start ups do so well? Partially it is what Business guru Michael Porter calls the cluster effect. More than that it is a culture of risk-taking that many of us regret to say is absent from the Toronto venture market.

It seems like the local VC community would prefer to be involved in Income Trusts with their nearly guaranteed stream of returns rather than in the "Venture" industry which involves risk. One of the reasons this site is called Gagglescape is that those of us who live or die by the availability of funding to make good ideas happen tend to follow the pack when it comes to looking for investment opportunities. That's the nature of this business but, like Malcom Gladwell argues in his book Tipping Point, their has to be some original catalyst that begins the trend.

What we need more of are people, companies, institutions, or governments who are willing to up their risk-taking quotient. That means 95 out of 100 ventures may fail. We have a tendency in Canada to stigmatize those who fail as somehow doomed to always failing rather than seeing them as involved in a process of experimentation and learning. Without failure we cannot move forward.

How many local opportunities sit waiting for their chance? Why do quality Canadian offerings like Flickr have to go south to get any support? Where are our risk-takers?