One of the cut through lines that Labor has been reciting this year has been “ensuring prosperity beyond the resources boom”. There’s obviously a degree of political spin in it, but there’s also some truth. State Labor governments, particularly Victoria and Queensland, have picked up the innovation ball and run with it, while the best the Commonwealth government can do is to promise that in the opinion of the Dear (Co)Leader and Duumvir $weetie, the Subprime Minister, the resources boom will run forever. There’s a fair bit of deliberate or wilfully ignorant forgetting here that the resources sector is only a very small one in terms of employment, and that its benefits are very unequally distributed, though that sort of surfaced with the narrative of a “two speed economy” we heard a while back.
While the Coalition pans Rudd’s industry policy ideas as some sort of “back to the socialist future” disaster, it seems to me to be axiomatic that we, as a nation, need to focus on ensuring that we do ensure that our assets are leveraged properly in order to ensure a secure future for all of us, and that we focus equally and concomitantly on value-adding where we can build a competitive advantage not dependent on the vagaries of commodity prices. In this light, it’s interesting to point to two posts from Nicholas Gruen, who was the key note speaker at Kevin Rudd’s manufacturing roundtable. I’d strongly recommend a read, and it’s also noteworthy that Nicholas’ ideas prompted this very interesting contribution from a Troppo reader. It’s a very creative synthesis of some leading ideas in the innovation and globalisation literatures, and it poses a real challenge for how we think about our economic and cultural futures (and has the enormous advantage of seeing the two as intertwined):
Thus what is needed is a change of thinking about the meaning of being Australia. The population, for instance, though it is highly dispersed geographically, is better thought of as a spatially distributed city – rather than nation. The vast land mass of Australia confuses Australians into thinking they constitute a nation, whereas they are at most a single city.
We need to reconceptualise our places of habitation around this idea and see ourselves a 1st rate C21st world leading virtual-city. Seeing ourselves in the old way is draining the country of its possibilities – and holding its population back to mediocrity.
Yay!
Bring back industry policy!!!
I’d rather trust the Cardigan wearers in Canberra to tell me where to invest my capital and make a good return, than make my own business decisions.
It has worked so well everywhere else it has been tried!
Perhaps they can tell us all how and where to invest our superannuation funds so that we have a small nest egg to look forward to in the future (having started with a big nest egg.)
Yeah, like Singapore.
Have a read of Nicholas’ posts before you reach for the free market nostrums, please.
And note the distinction between facilitative industry policy and “picking winners”. Federal investment in infrastructure and state investment in ports, rail, etc., already acts as a de facto industry policy to facilitate the competitiveness of the resources industry. Do you object to that on the grounds of “government interference in the market”? Let’s talk about the real world, please, and not just ideological slogans.
Mark, what on earth is that person actually saying? The distinction between a nation and a ’spatially distributed city’ seems particularly facile in an era of pervasive telecommunication (doesn’t the notion of ‘critical mass’ seem anachronistic to you?). Maybe there is some terminological confusion at work here. ‘Nation’ is hardly a geographic term. And yet the author seems to think that a city (even a ‘geographically dispersed’ one!) is incapable of being a nation. Why?
If the point is that Australia’s high degree of urbanisation gives us an excellent opportunity to productively invest in human capital, well that is a very verbose and (I’m sorry to say) academic way of stating the obvious.
Finally, I think to ‘reconceptualise’ Australia as merely a city would be a terrible mistake. Whether the author likes it or not, we have primary production sectors that generate wealth. These sectors are often highly innovative with great export potential. Those parts of our economy, and the people who live and work in the rural centres that sustain them, must be part of economic and social policy.
Cheers
BBB
I’d much prefer a substantial increase in education funding.
From kindergartens and through to technical colleges and adult education at a distance from the institutions.
Then people are equipped to pursue their own interests and realise the benefit of carefully considered infrastructure developments.
There is no way I’d like the rotten cronyism that is Singapore Inc being used as a tempalte for australian public investment.
The norwegian oil fund would be a preferable model and perhaps better suited to capturing some of the income from the resources boom.
Re Mr Gruens ideas – I am susupicious that the focus on manufacturing is not unrelated to some political party’s desire to build a voter base. Freeing capital , changing and equalising tax rates , ensuring software development isn’t impeded by copyright are all sound ideas.
Says the guy who just came up with: “the Dear (Co)Leader and Duumvir $weetie, the Subprime Minister…” Perhaps not ideological, but hardly the words of someone committed to rational debate free from slogan or shibboleth.
BBB
BBB, I think that, to be fair to the author of that post, he doesn’t neglect the aspect of primary production. I don’t think he’s trying to reinscribe an urban/rural-regional distinction but transcend it and to get us to think about what our scale is on the world market, and to overcome regional rivalries in order to maximise our capital (understood in all its dimensions) and thus our competitiveness. To me, the key point is:
boredinhk, I’ve let Nick Gruen know about this thread so perhaps he’ll be along to comment on his policy ideas.
Fair cop, I spose, BBB, but I really do get angry when I think about the wasted opportunities of the Howard years in terms of where we could be economically and culturally. I’m sure you wouldn’t expect me not to be!
And more broadly, rational and passionate or opinionated debate aren’t incompatible. I’m not sure we’d gain anything if I crossed those monikers out and wrote “Mr Howard and Mr Costello”…
Mark, what do you actually envision people doing in this virtua-city-conomy? Because if it boils down to finding new ways of marketing luxury goods, count me out.
dk.au, please note that I’m not the author of the post I’m quoting, and don’t necessarily endorse all of it, so I’m not going to defend it line by line. Rather I thought there were some interesting ideas in there to stimulate some discussion.
Mark – I don’t know why I didn’t put a comment in on Singapore – I was going to and then dismissed it because I thought the lefties would go into a flat spin and then there it is in all its’ glory – Singapore! That beacon of leftist industrial planning.
As for missed opportunities by the Howard Govermnent – FFS the State Governemnts, which have most of the responsibility for education and infrastructure and have the river of gold from the GST are the ones who have dropped the ball. Jesus.H.Christ in a handbasket – just have a look at the efforts of Victoria on the Murray-Darling proposals – highly constructive!. An even better example is the inept handling by the Queensland Government of the Bowen Baion rail network and Dalrymple Bay Coal loading facility – their inability to make timely, strategic, commercial decisions is why there are those pictures of 70 plus coal ships sitting off the coast.
But – ignore all that – Howard is responsible, no one else. I am suprised you haven’t blamed Bush, too.
Mark, we are on the same page re: wasted opportunities, but I suspect our respective policy prescriptions would differ!
On this bit, though: “to overcome regional rivalries in order to maximise our capital.” I wonder whether the strong innovation policies of the Victorian and Queensland governments, which you cite with apparent approval, are really the product of regional rivalries and the remnants of ‘competitive federalism’ (which, to my mind, is not quite dead, in spite of the efforts of successive Federal Governments).
BBB
In Queensland, certainly, BBB, they’re both in some respects, but in others it does make sense for the Queensland government to focus on transforming both economic and educational opportunities. That’s more of an imperative both because of the factors you identify and the Commonwealth government’s policy laziness.
What, no mention of Scandinavia? No rhapsodising about stump-jump ploughs and the wine cask?
There is a lot that government can do not only in terms of getting things happening but also just getting out of the damn way, and if you talk to people who’ve succeeded against the odds they can help improve the odds of those yet to come. Ian Frazer’s comments about the timid local pharmaceutical industry and bumbling local healthcare sector regarding his discoveries about cervical cancer are particularly telling – all the more so that no politician has really responded to them.
At worst, political policy statements on innovation can be as anodyne as this. This earns them critiques like this, or else they get ignored.
I love a bit of dichotomising in the afternoon. There’s not much that’s innovative about sprinkler systems on citrus trees in Mildura going full blast at noon on a 40-degree day where the water evaporates before it hits the leaves, let alone the roots. There’s plenty innovative about high-value refining and marketing, which can be but isn’t always done in cities. There are some medium-sized wineries and a Tasmanian dairy producer that spring to mind as examples of this, all done from places you can’t get to on a Vespa and which don’t regard themselves as “rivals” to cities.
With the economic rationalist in full power in Canberra (and to a lesser extent in states) industry policy and forward planning by government is a dirty word – the market will sort it out!! This was highlighted several years ago when the Director of ABARE (Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics) said when appearing before a Senate Inquiry on peak oil, and I quote at best I can recall it “…. if the price of oil goes higher then the market will bring forward alternatives – in the barnyard if the price of eggs goes high enough well even the roosters will be laying eggs….â€?
With that kind of approach it’s no wonder we are facing major national skills and infrastructure bottlenecks and environment and social impacts.
Is that really what they do? How long do the trees last without water in that kind of heat? There must be some serious entrepreneurial turnover in that industry…
Anyway, your comment that one of the best things that Governments can do for industry is just get out of the way is spot on. It’s difficult to come up with a better “industry policy” than cutting company tax, abolishing capital gains tax and reforming the tax system so that it coincides with consumption rather than income. Anything else is just tinkering at the margins for political purposes.
BBB
Not really. Government concessions and high capital costs dampen the cleansing fires of the market somewhat.
It’s not just cutting tax, BBB. Never mind “political purposes”, I’m more interested in innovative and problem-solving and wealth-creating purposes.
Again, refer to Frazer and Peter Doherty on the whole propensity of regulators to just block and faff when confronted with something they feel the need to regulate, but which can’t be regulated easily. To use an archaic example: when coffee machines were first introduced to Australia in the late 1940s there was a push to subject them to existing regulations on steam engines, to have baristas join the train drivers’ union etc. This puts a real dampener on profitability and innovation
As long as tax is at average-first-world levels it is largely beside the point. However, the rates and applicability of taxation is like anything else, a bit of innovation could go a long way in terms of generating direct and indirect benefits (the sort of thing that can’t be easily modelled even by keen libertarians).
Andrew E
There is an enormous amount of innovation proceeding in Australian agriculture & horticulture etc. City folk may not be aware of much of it… but these innovators are running farm businesses, and have no need to go spruiking. The take-up rate of useful software tools is good, have you heard of laser-levelling (we used to ‘plough a paddock’)? Stock breeding genetics, more efficient use of fertiliser inputs (down to tailoring fertiliser mixes for individual paddocks), reducing milking times, decision tools for investment choices…
Actually, I think it’s only the most spectacular idiocies (evaporative losses in Mildura is a quaint example), which ever hit the headlines. But in my view, that tells us more about JOURNALISTIC practices than about FARMING practices.
Drought, for example, is a complex matter; you’d never guess it from cliched images of sunburnt carcases or dusty paddocks.
cheerio,
chin up
Dairy Australia takes a levy from dairy farmers, proportional to their milk output. The producers are paying for innovations and are very critical of how their levy money is being spent, at the DA annual general meeting.
Handouts? Subsidies? Piffle!
Primary producers do generate wealth (which flows through rural communities) but equally they produce tucker and wool and are custodians of landscapes: Landcare is a bloody good start (and innovative) as a non-regulatory, subsidised, communitarian approach to assisting private landholders to improve their own environment.
Farmers know quite a bit about “reconceptualising (our) places of habitation”, though they might choke on those particular words. Piffle!
I had to laugh at BBB sneering at “tinkering around the edges” when referring to innovation.
I’ve long been interested in small-scale farming around the major cities – 90% of Sydney’s fruit and veg comes from within 120 km of Martin Place, I read somewhere. Yet when government bleats for the poor poor farmers, they get overlooked – and so do the innovators – in favour of business operators who can’t/won’t plan for the sort of downtime that every business experiences. Anyone who pockets these kind of subsides while clear-felling has committed fraud against the Commonwealth and should be imprisoned.
It’s like subsidising factories in small towns: the mindset that you can make a decent living without investing in your own skill base has got to go, along with the idea that you can vote your way around it. A real problem, and again nothing to do with tax.
Primay Industray utilises a national resource, one which renews annually.
To not maximise this resource is a failure and is shameful.
er.. to even suggest that Qld has actually done anything about providing for the future is stretching it a bit. About now an unavoidable truth is showing, nothing much has been done since Joh went. (that is: nothing much except squandering the contents of the piggy bank)
Well the Dairy Industry for one doesn’t seem to think that the Howard Government has done a lot for them.
• The dairy industry feels that current government structures for delivery of education and labour programs should be reviewed as they do not align with industry needs.
• Learning should be seen and promoted by the dairy industry, government and education providers as the foundation of farm success, industry progress, regional prosperity and national wealth;
• Government should support and the dairy industry should drive the dairy learning system to achieve those outcomes;
• Government can help improve agriculture’s profile, so people see agriculture as a highly skilled and vibrant high tech industry. This should help agriculture to be viewed as the career of first choice – not a last resort.
• Increasing complexity and competition for resources is applying significant pressure to industry at a time when concerns about education outcomes are being expressed. There is a deliberate policy for industry to influence education outcomes more directly.
The end result of innovation is productivity (and productivity is one of the most powerful drivers of genuine economic growth and wealth). And yes most city dwellers are woefully ignorant of the exceptional performance of productivity growth in the agricultural sector. Suggest you have look at the sector results from the Productivity Commission for long term figures on productivity. The agricultural sector is only outperformed by the communications sector
http://www.pc.gov.au/commission/work/productivity/performance/industry/highlightsrecent.html
While Dairy Australia (and all the other rural R&D corporations) do a wonderful job let’s keep it in perspective. The farmer levy is match dollar for dollar by the Fed govt which is then often matched dollar for dollar (or there abouts) by other investors such as CSIRO and state governments. Now don’t get me wrong – this is a great example of government/industry planning and collaboration that the Coalition inherited and the Federal Treasury economic rationalists would love (and try) to remove.
Andrew E, I have not sneered at innovation. I have sneered at interventionist “industry policy” (as that term is commonly understood). Innovation is something better left to the entrepreneurs in private enterprise.
You’ve provided some fantastic examples of tinkering around the edges yourself: misdirected farming subsidies and regional development subsidies. It’s bizarre that you can say that this has nothing to do with the tax system – where do you think the cash for those subsidies comes from? Oh, that’s right, the small-scale farmers for whom your heart bleeds.
BBB
Pardon me, it’s tinkering at the margins that’s your problem. A great deal of innovation has arisen from tinkering at the margins.
Entrepreneurs in private enterprise are too busy meeting with accountants, suppliers and customers to innovate effectively (and no, the brave new world of tax won’t even address that let alone fix it). Innovators nee to be left alone to do that, and they can and do so in public sector, private sector, not-for-profits and in their own back yards. Look at the great innovations to come out of this country and they tend not to have come from your Howard Roark types.
I wouldn’t describe misdirected farming subsidies as “tinkering”, nor as “fantastic” – that’s your definition, and if you want to run away with your attempt to reframe the discussion that’s up to you. Tax is one issue but not a major one, and there is plenty that government can and should do besides cut taxes in order to stimulate innovation.
Are Australia’s farmers still the most efficient in the world?
That is, they produce more food per person employed (farmer) in farming than any other country.
Could I also recommend this article on the topic at hand. Take pity on its intellectual feebleness due to the sheer absence of any reference to the crushing and sudden burdens of taxation crushing the life out of this country etc.
They’re busy talking to customers you say? Deary me. However does innovation arise from that pointless exercise?! What rubbish you have written.
I see. Innovators, including private-sector innovators, need to be left alone to innovate, but entrepreneurs are incapable of innovation. Huh? And no one is arguing that the public sector cannot be innovative. It routinely is. Whether or not public sector innovation, purchased with private sector funds (appropriated through taxation), represents value for money is an entirely different question.
Sigh. Fantastic meaning ‘good’. As in ‘good examples’. At this point I can’t help but think you are wilfully misunderstanding me. In the bigger scheme of the Australian economy, farm subsidies are probably less than tinkering.
Actually I think you are right here, and it’s clear that I’ve overstated the case that lower taxation is the only answer. Reducing the non-tax regulatory burden is also part of the solution, as you have indicated. I suppose there is even a case for broad-based R&D tax treatments that apply equally across industries. But taking money from successful firms and handing it out to a grab-bag of government-selected “innovators” is the wrong course of action. I doubt we disagree on that.
Cheers
BBB
But taking money from successful firms and handing it out to a grab-bag of government-selected “innovators� is the wrong course of action. I doubt we disagree on that.
BBB you describe the Pork Barrelling of the Howard Government very well there as Peter Martin did the week prior to the budget.
Steve (at the pub)
Efficiency is a difficult issue to define – especially “world comparisons�. Do we mean technical efficiency (using some measure such as yours) or economic efficiency? A country’s resource endowment is critical – low labour/high capital cost vs. high labour/low capital. Australian farmers have to produce high levels of food per farm/person because our cost of labour is high.
It is compounded in agriculture by high levels of protection. Let me take dairying – Australia and NZ each produce 2% of world milk production yet account for 50% of the world trade in dairy products – despite high levels of protection in most countries and corruption of the world’s dairy trade. Australian and NZ dairy farmers can produce milk at low cost (relative to most other countries) – it’s not that they are intrinsically innovative rather they are now exposed to international competition (so they have to be innovative) and they produce milk in climatically favorable areas.
steve, I think your links are all screwed up. But I agree with you. More’s the pity.
BBB
Try this .
Thanks steve. Good to see Peter Martin’s alternative is tax cuts, rather than an equally absurd list of left-leaning interventions. There is hope for him yet. I would have liked to see him nominate education as another potential policy focus, though (no, funding education is not a ‘left-leaning intervention’).
BBB
I do believe his tongue was firmly planted in his cheek BBB.
As was mine…
BBB
The Minister for PorkBarrelling’s spending of taxpayers hard earned cash so far this year is extensive.
Yeah but steve, whose side are you going to be on when Rudd gets stuck in? The taxpayers’ with me? Or the ALP’s?
BBB
I’m afraid you’ll be a lone wolf crying in the wind BBB.
Well at least you’re honest about it.
Cheers
BBB
When change comes sometimes the biggest users of pork from the barrell are the ones most hurt by change. Maybe the people most marginalised by the Howard Government’s Industry policy will now be able to come to the fore in a new sense of creativity and innnovation.
From the SMH- “Labor’s industry policy will also include a renewed emphasis on government procurement, and a commitment to bring forward the reviews of the automotive and textile, clothing and footwear sectors scheduled for next year. The co-operative research centre program will also be re-evaluated.
Senator Carr ( he is Shadow Minister for this department ) said government procurement did not mean preferential treatment for Australian suppliers, although that may be justified in certain circumstances.
Instead, the approach could include taking into account full life-cycle costs, adopting a philosophy of ‘why not Australian?’, providing early opportunities for small business to tender, and minimising the complexity of tenders. More active policies were recommended when big projects were considered, he said.”
Sounds like a perfect pork barrelling opportunity.The early opportunities will be available for which companies?
Procurement should protect the tax payer by promoting cost effectiveness first and foremost not protecting a parliamentary member’s electorate’s voter’s incomes.
Minimising complexity sounds like decision making by ministerial fiat.
Do readers suggest the ALP will be able to resist these moral hazards?
If governments want to promote efficiency and innovation they must have clear and transparent tendering processes involving full disclosure.
A competition policy with a strong enforcement agency is also essential for consumers to have confidence they are being offered goods and services in a market unaffected by price fixing collusion.
The passage reproduced if correct above isn’t a satisfactory beginning I’m afraid.
mark says:
I doubt very much whether Mark’s venture into indicative industry planning will bear much more fruit than his behind-the-curve political forecasting.
The Australian mineral sector is one of our best value-adding industries. It is also one of the most high-tech. The more advanced sectors are gearing up to introduce AI systems. There is nothing wrong with specialising in our comparative advantage in this sector. Especially with giga-countries like PRC and IND demanding a bigger slice of the global mineral pie.
Our biggest economic problem is the lack of sci-tech human capital accumulation. The best industry policy is breeding, bringing in and bringing up high-quality intellectual proprietors ie high IQ individuals. This may include the development of Artificial Intelligence agents.
We should also strip the negative gearing concession and capital gains tax concession for residential investment property. It just encourages unproductive speculation in real estate.
Our biggest ethical problem is to develop individual principals whose economic interests identify with ethical ideals. And to make sure that institutional agencies correlate with principal preferences with agent policies.
Our ethnic problem is largely under control, thanks to Howard’s hard line common sense cultural identity policy.
Mark, I think the pollies dramatise this whole thing alot.
Labor and the Libs industry policy is virtually identical. They like to put out press releases denouncing each other as ‘not doing enough’ or ‘providing canberra-centric solutions’
When it comes down to the nitty gritty, Carr supports the big ticket innovation policies, including the grant programs and the tax concession (which as a side note, is being changed so that foreign companies can claim the full 175% tax break even if the Intellectual property is held offshore)
If Rudd gets in he will immediatley implement the ‘printing companies assistance package policy’, meaning that people like me will have to change their business cards and their signature block from ‘Innovation Division’ to ‘Innovation and Science Department’, or some shit like that.
Besides that, not a lot will change.
Which is why we’re 1% of the world’s steel market and the world’s largest exporter of iron ore.
Or Krell Mind Boosters and Gingko Balboa, oh you mean we bring in qualified people and educate people – well duh.
Good luck with that one.
Which ones? What? How? Why? Which principal preferences? Which agent? What does it mean Jack? Did you crib this from Dianetics?
The biggest ethic problem was their tiresome moaning after we gave them jobs in asbestos mines and they got mesothelioma.
anthony, I kinda liked Jack’s population policy of encouraging immigration among Strocchibots.
I’ve got a problem with the “bringing in” part. The AFL has a salary cap to ensure a level playing field. We ought to do the same and stop robbing other countries of the products of their education sector. We don’t even pay a transfer fee.
If we insist on stealing doctors and nurses then we should also commit to taking in the sick that those people would otherwise have treated.
Rich countries should pay their way and train their own technical workers.
anthony, I kinda liked Jack’s population policy of encouraging immigration among Strocchibots.
It’s a good ‘un from L. Jack. We sell them the minerals and they give us the bots.
If Cap’n Jack decided to immigrate, on the other hand…
DITR: “foreign companies can claim the full 175% tax break even if the Intellectual property is held offshore”…
so if IBM, ‘frinstance, develop an iGivaToss wimax gadget, (which implements government of/by/for the iPeople according to the BigBrother model, and we get to toss a couple of iRep’s from The_iHouse each week,) which also functions as the iNationalIDCard, with fingerprint recognition, for iCitizenServicesAccountAudit…
they’ll do the research and testing in OZ, albeit with outsourced PRC engineers, where they get the australian taxpayer to pay for it via the tax break, and then score the AEC e-democracy tender with the iGivaToss platform?
Sweet.
Yes Jack. What this country really needs right now is housing-supply-killing tax policy. Brilliant stuff, keep it up.
BBB
The interesting this that neither side seems to be talking about is the availability of early stage venture capital and the role it plays in developing innovative industry.
It’s all very well to be talking about the education system and preferred tendering and what-not, but the fundamental fact is that labs, computers, researchers and design and development cost money – and without venture capital funds that are prepared to tip a couple of million dollars into an early stage company and then help manage the development of the product and business, many of them won’t get much further than the laboratory bench or the CAD suite.
Australia doesn’t have a particularly well developed venture capital sector, by most accounts – there’s plenty of private equity cash sloshing about for later stage companies, but camparatively little money or expertise for early stage speculative investment.
The US, by comparison, has a large and mature venture capital sector (mostly by virtue of the size of the economy) – or, as an alternative model, Germany has had recent success in expanding the size of its life sciences industry, partly through the intervention of Government backed development banks (run on an aggressively commercial basism before anyone starts bleating about socialism and innefficiency).
I think it’s interesting that most of the Australian discussion has centred around regulatory change, limited levels of direct government grant assistance and R&D tax models – all of which are useful, but none of which provide the long term cash investment that innovative startups need to get through the early years.
“It’s all very well to be talking about the education system and preferred tendering and what-not, but the fundamental fact is that labs, computers, researchers and design and development cost money …”
Lets try to think of it as a continuum perhaps ?
Researchers are generally post-doctural people and we need to keep them in Australia so suitable funding from any source would be welcome.
Venture capital is available in Australia – it just tends to be very commercially oriented and institutions like CSIRO and the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute appear to be struggling for funding for pure research.
Thats apart from the drive to commercialise their efforts .
The idea I’d like to see promoted is that funding education will lead to innovation and it will then be able to attract funding.I’m not that bothered about whether it is for manufacturing in whatever form people choose to define it – it is all good – for services , IT, tourism, agriculture even education services.
What is a little disappointing is the apparent lack of interest in economics . It is the foundation of all our interactions and unfortunately many think analysing it or encouraging discussion about commercial matters suggest only sympathy for greed and self interest .Even the discussion on Club Troppo was a bit limited and tends to be very dry reading as the participants routinely use too much jargon.
How could anybody ever take seriously the ideas of someone who expressed themselves thusly:
Bollocks. Statements like this are just weasel words that can mean whatever anyone wants them to mean.
Cheers…
Oh dear, I see young Strocchi’s been at “the singularity is coming, hooray!” websites again. You really should lay off that stuff Jack, especially before bedtime, otherwise you’ll just have more feverish dreams all night. Still maybe you could hook your AIs up with Birdy’s Think Tank and who knows, diamond nano-rod fungibles in every sky home’s pot?
And I mean really AIs? That’s such such 20th century thinking. Big data in data out decision-making nodes? That’s a command economy mindset. Ubicomp and self-correcting fuzzy logic networks is where it’s at baby. The neu noosphere. You’ll notice the most amazing and successful use of computing power ever, the internet, is the utter opposite of stabilised and centralised data control.
Meanwhile back in the reality-based community.
Actually your point about a brain gain is taken. But the way to achieve that these days is not through presenting a more insular and conservative society but through offering great quality of life, excellent access to hard and soft infrastructure from tech to cash and an open minded culturally and socially laissez faire environment.
Eg: most of the US’s export income now comes from IP and the most of that is generated out of West and East Coast regions traditionally reviled as sinks of cultural and social iniquity by the kinda of social conversatives you seem to line up with. Or do you think it’s just a complete accident of fate that the most bohemian city in America, San Francisco, hatched Silicon Valley in its armpit. Or that the world’s entertainment industry is driven by the city of lost angels and flakes that found themselves.
Moving on, Crankynick and boredinhk raise excellent points about thinking of innovation beyond just whizzy science and tech stuff and about the need for venture capital.
Interesting to note here that Australia is now the world’s fourth largest managed funds market thanks to some pretty innovative thinking by our fin services pros (and compulsory super) yet our VC market is still so weedy.
True, reforming limited liability laws for VC partnerships over the past few years has seen the likes of Starfish, GBS Ventures and SciVentures seeding our biotech sector a bit more effectively. And it’s heartening to see the MTAA Super Fund getting in on the action. But we still don’t have anything like CalPERS (in quality if not quantity) taking a controlled but stimulating punt on the future of our ideas and skills instead of our bricks and mortar.
Maybe it’s a combination of historical and cultural factors (young, lacking in confidence, far away from home and nervous) and a small domestic market in which to trial stuff, but Australia’s never quite adopted the risk taking mentality of the Yanks at their best. US VCs kinda like it if you’ve failed once or twice – at least it shows you’ll go for it and have learnt from experience. While at the same time our attempts at successful dirigisme never went much beyond basic infrastructure (Hello Snowy Mountain River Project).
So I reckon a big part of lifting our innovation game is educating everyone along the commercialisation pipeline from fund managers to R&D bods to skills providers to bureaucrats to supporting service sectors (TDL, design, tech and prof services, etc) to get a lot more aware and funky/lateral about how it all knits together. And to take a bloody punt more often.
Here’s something else to chew on to keep this thread alive. The meaty bits kick around page 16. The dotty arrow motif is kinda pointless but kute.
Yo! Gorgeous! Yes, you the LP mod on duty. I think my last comment on this thread got akismetted. Care to have a fish around in the spam trap? There’s a drink in it for you. Or at least an utterly bizzare personalised link.
Cheers.
Thankee LP mod.
Here’s your bizzare personalised link. Just like Glenn Gould only smaller and hairier.
Alan Greenspan’s new book is a welcome and long overdue correction of the mythology surrounding Labor in office from 1983-96. The deifying of Keating and silencing of Hawke is one of the more egregious misrepresentations of history in Australian history.
Greenspan has returned Hawke to his rightful place as Australia’s greatest Prime Minister.