My apology if not, but I seem to recall someone commenting on developers relocating to different parts of Vancouver Island.
But I do know several people who have moved up island citing low salary, cost of living and family lifestyle for the move.
HN ate one of my earlier comments. So I'll try and rewrite it here from memory.
Developer salaries are very depressed here in Victoria. You will often see "Senior" positions from $70K, more for large places like Abebooks (Amazon). Those go unfilled for months at a time.
The friends I have that have moved upisland now earn > $140K by simply computing once a week to Vancouver for facetime.
A recent sucessful immigrant friend from europe said to me (paraphrasing) "Everyone here has a trust fund and spends all their time trying to screw each other over". This is absolutely true.
I know of one guy who had a modest exit, and now views programmers as labour - he treats them like shit and pays $30K for php/ruby developers. If you interviewed with him, he would make comments about outsourcing to india.
As Patio11 might say, a pathological employer. But the point to be made is that I'm not surprised by this behaviour - I've encountered it myself several times. This is Victoria in a nutshell. It simply is not ready to respect talent and pay it well in order to build thriving businesses and an ecosystem.
Sorry I'm so negative, but I'd like to see people succeed in the easiest fashion possible.
Perhaps we need more meetups to start building networks of people building things? Housing/office space will be cheap sooner now that the mortgage rules are changing.
I'd definitely be interested in some sort of meetup, if such a thing were going to happen...
Also, don't get me started on local angels (both Victoria and Vancouver)... :-(
You've hit the crux of it - sophistication. Or rather, having enough skill to recognize ones flaws and correct for them. This is something Victoria as a whole does not have.
We don't have enough skilled players in order to sustain an ecosystem at the level needed to attract and retain that top level talent.
Try looking for a senior python developer. That'll be tough. Now try looking for someone with machine learning, compiler design, mathematics or other hard but very useful skill. You just won't find them.
So the companies in Victoria are stuck working on shallower problems. Usually with many competitors and without an ability to build a moat. Which means the people skilled in those hard skills move away to find employment, or do remote work.
I thought it might have been spitfire who commented to that effect. But that was some months ago; I guess I could wade back through history.
I liked Victoria's ambiance when I visited, but the friend I was visiting there (already half a decade ago) commented repeatedly to the effect of it being/becoming a retirement community. With lots of well-off retirees to bid up prices.
Does the island really have enough going on elsewhere to create a general buzz?
Victoria is definitely doing more tech-wise that Campbell River or Courtenay, in that there are more tech companies, more startups, and more tech jobs. As with anywhere outside of a major hub, you're going to have to do a lot of leg work to find those jobs - and to find ones that pay well.
As you've mentioned lots of well off individuals bidding up prices and a very conservative, risk averse climate.
As for the island creating a buzz? I don't think so, not in the competing with SV or NYC sense. I could certainly see the island serving a niche ecosystem though.
In fact, if the media could get over itself I think they could have a big part to play in growing that sort of environment.