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Austin, Texas has transformed itself from a sleepy government and university town into a high-tech Mecca in the space of about 15 years. Cities from all over the world are studying what's called the "Austin Model" in the hope they, too, can cash in on the new innovation economy.

	In Austin, nearly 2,000 high-tech firms employ about 20 percent of the workforce. Some of the big names include Dell Computer, Motorola, and IBM.

Benson: It's a vibrant, unusual, different, new community built around high tech. It's really exciting. But when I compare it to 1979, gosh, you could live in town and be a 10-minute walk to wilderness, swimmin' holes and this, that, and the other; that's all gone because of the development.

Gibson: Technology wasn't thought about much in this state. It was agriculture, oil, ranching, "Dallas" the TV show, "Giant" the movie, all those things pretty well captured the ethics, the goals, what people believed in in this state. But George saw some potential here.

Powers: Just to have them here with a corporate presence for a town that hadn't had a lot of that historically was a tremendous shot in the arm and permitted us to tell that story over and over again to other people, even in California, to say, "If 3M thinks we're good, you ought to come check us out."

	How much growth is too much? Ray Benson of Asleep at the Wheel says Austin is at a crossroads.

Powers: I spent over a decade out in the Silicon Valley chasing Silicon smokestacks, if you will. We don't have to do that anymore. We have more of a self-generating economy. People are starting their own companies. They're spinning off, saying "I wanna do this over here, I wanna start something."

Van Zandt: Being able to take good ideas to people who are looking almost exclusively for Austin opportunities is great. They want to invest in Austin, they want to keep the success of Austin rolling. And so they look exclusively for opportunities here. That is absolutely huge. We would not have been able to raise funding in the time frame we did if we would have had to go exclusively to the Bay Area for money.

Zandan: God, I think some folks would like to say that this was planned. I am in the camp of saying this wasn't planned. This was fortune.

Zandan: Generally, most of the year Austin is a wonderful place to be outside. We have 300 days of sunshine here. When you're recruiting people to town, whether it's from the northeast or north, they come down here in the middle of winter, they can hang out in shorts, go to outdoor concerts. It's pretty attractive.

Plavidal: The laid-back atmosphere that Austin used to have has really changed. Things are a little more yuppie, a little bit more, I don't know if you want to call it materialistic. There's just more of an emphasis on dressing up and fancy restaurants. Money seems to be more of an issue in Austin these days.

Graham: In my circle of friends and musicians, I know of three people who've just pulled up stakes and left because they could no longer afford the rent, you know, that sort of economic brinkmanship that goes along with being a live musician, it didn't really work that well in an economy that takes so much cash to get by.

Benson: It's either got a bright future or it's gonna have a bad time of it. There's a lot of people, a lot of change, and how we manage this change and growth is going to be the answer to that question. I would hope we have a good bunch of folks here able to handle it.

Austinites say their success can't be copied exactly, but they advise other cities to capitalize on existing strengths. For the Twin Cities, that might mean growing technology businesses on the foundation of agriculture, graphic arts, advertising and medical devices. But those less thrilled with the Austin's transformation warn other cities, "Be careful, you may get you're asking for."