> But how much will that matter when there's a major quake, and Silicon Valley can't get to work for a month?
Well, putting everything in the Australian outback doesn't help that much, because there are good reasons why thousands of tech workers can't work there. This is essentially an argument against having any population centers in earthquake zones.
Indeed. In fact, it seems like the Pacific Northwest is a pretty solid choice, as is the Bay Area, although maybe the NY Times isn't properly weighting the relative risk of very bad earthquakes:
In the list of worst predictable natural disasters in the Continental US, it rates one above the expected earthquakes to the south, the result of two plates mostly sliding past each other: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Andreas_fault
Worse, in part because we aren't at all prepared for it (aside from I hope more serious buildings) would be a return of major earthquakes in mid-West: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Madrid_Seismic_Zone (something I pay attention to since that's on the other side of Missouri from me).
I forget one of them, and the worst, which few in the US would survive, and where being in Australia might not be a bad idea at all, would be a return of the Yellowstone Supervolcano: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowstone_Caldera
Supposedly that is why AWS located their infrastructure in Oregon, after starting in NoVa. They optimize for "lowest probability of disaster" before considering other options like cost (primarily power) and connectivity.
Well, putting everything in the Australian outback doesn't help that much, because there are good reasons why thousands of tech workers can't work there. This is essentially an argument against having any population centers in earthquake zones.