[rjurney]

It really is true. You can travel by train across India as a foreigner, everyone staring at you, and not have any problems. That doesn't mean common sense does not apply, but overall India is very safe - crime wise. You'd better look out for cars, though ;) There is corruption, but there is also a strong culture imposing limits. Its complicated, but I rarely feared for my safety in India. I frequently did so in Moscow - nazis, militsia, thugs, etc. etc.

As to everything being built from an idea - thats true. But its a question of whether that is the right idea for that place. No one can doubt that there is an abundance of brilliant hackers coming out of Moscow. But the 'silicon valley' model requires an abundance of social capital - and Moscow is incredibly impoverished in this area, despite being relatively wealthy, it has very, very little social capital.