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MIT Media Lab Tightens Its Belt
Forbes Magazine has this story about the MIT Media Laboratory's current "burn rate" problem. It seems that the Media Lab is feeling the same big draft at its posterior that dot-com companies felt last year after years of go-go growth and seemingly unlimited funding. The Media Lab is particularly sensitive to this downturn due to its heavy reliance on corporate sponsorship, as well as its fondness for unconventional, even eccentric, research. Items that will no longer receive funding according to a January 5th internal E-mail from the Lab's Executive Director Walter Bender: cellular telephones, first-class air travel, food at internal Lab meetings, and furniture. Other more serious cutbacks for the Lab include layoffs for 29 staff members and reduced funding for students, including salaries for "Undergraduate Research Opportunities" (UROP) positions. The Media Lab had previously paid such positions $8.75 and up in order to remain competitive with industry offers that even not-yet-graduated students were receiving.
First class cross country airfare - $2000.
Limo to and from the airport - $400.
Building designed by I.M. Pei - $4,000,000.
Inventing the "smart" potholder - priceless
Does that mean no more bathroom server?
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
$8.75 per hour huh? To some of the brightest minds in the world? I say cut the stupid first class travel, cut the nice office equipment, but save that salary. These "kids" are cutting edge innovators.
Imagine if something like this had happened to the folks at Bell Labs? Even with all the layoffs Lucent had, business there went on pretty much as usual. Throughout history, the true innovators were rewarded for their knowledge, not penalized for something they didn't really have anything to do with. Poor spending is poor spending, but save the salaries...
I expect to hear from people on my innovators of history part, but bear in mind I said most....
thanks
Sent from your iPad.
I agree it must be a typo - undergrads can make $8.75/hour making copies in the admissions office. No way is that even clos to competitive with the other offers these guys were getting.
Among the things Bender says won't be paid for out of the laboratory till: cell phones, limos, first-class flights and furniture.
and...
But why is the Lab unhealthy in the first place? Unlike other academic institutions at MIT and elsewhere, the Media Lab gets the bulk of its money from corporate donors. Among them: IBM, Intel, Gillette, ChevronTexaco and LEGO .
Damn, so now all those MIT researchers will be forced to build their own Lego chairs and tables? Sounds like the kind of perfect ergonomic environment we all need. Don't like the height of the table? Just snap off the legs and away you go.
--Chag
I worked at the media lab as a freshman MIT EECS student last spring for $8 an hour. My group was decked out with donated 18.1 inch LCDs, food at meetings and other perks. I can't imagine all the things professors and grad students got to play around with. All good things have to come to an end, the environment there through the dot-com boom was definitely too good to be true.
The recent layoffs and cutbacks were spurred by the discovery that the Media Lab didn't have $6 or $7 million in the coffers, but were rather that much in the red.
Let me say that again: instead of a surplus of several million US dollars, they had a similar deficit. I can't fathom how anyone keeping the books -- even the most incompetent of accountants -- could make such a mistake. But it was made, and it's what sparked this whole trimming-of-the-fat. Worst bit is that some regular employees (not grad students, not UROPs) are having their hours cut, while the UROPs -- many of whom do nothing but sit on their asses all day long -- can work full weeks.
Let's hope some generous sponsor(s) will cough up the cash to get them back on track and not disrupt their research too much.
The MIT Media Lab has apparently always aimed a little high--for example, the article states that their building was designed by I.M. Pei. The world's most famous architect? For a Media Lab? It seems they could spend their money more frugally. They may be hurting from the dot-com bust and the economic slowdown, but that's to be expected--everyone is hurting. The MIT Media Lab is hurting more because they've spent money unwisely in the past.
Of course, I could be completely and utterly wrong.
I understand they had to offer the $$$ to keep people from going elsewhere. But I remember when students used to do this for free, and loved it. This is probably the most fun you will ever have, and you will look back on those years fondly. I'd love to go back and play with the toys we had in robot and VR lab.
Memories of early Nintendo Powerglove hacking... Mmmmm.
On another note, does anyone think they'll need to tighten their lego budget?
Some men spend their entire lives trying to kill themselves for having been born. --Ross MacDonald
give me a break. these students who work at the media lab could make quite a bit more than $8.75 an hour in pretty much any field in existance. MIT pays a minimum wage on campus of $8 for undergrads. i suspect that this is the 'industry' that they are trying to remain competitive with.
but, then again, there is little chance that these students are there to cash in on the huge salary. i am currently an undergraduate assistant for a january class at mit (2.670) where students make a working stirling engine, and learn enough solidworks to make a working assembly of the engine. i could easily spend this time during january and work a real job solid modelling and make at least 5 times the amount.
but i like teaching. its not about the money.
The Media Lab still has a place, but it may, during the economic downturn, see itself overshadowed by more concrete research--by tangible products like drugs.
Pass the bowl, I need to do some "tangible research"...
I'm a 2000 man.
It's probably a typo (on Slashdot? Nooo....), but $8.75 an hour is pretty close to the minimum wage here in Massachusetts. Is that actually what was meant here? If so, no wonder they were having staff problems :)
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
First Class tix, cell phones...all justifiable because so much irreplaceable work has come out of the Media Lab. Hold on, let me think of some...uhhhh...ummmmm...I know, lots of articles about themselves in Wired!
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
From the beginning, the Media Lab was a monument to technical optimism--or maybe hubris. Its very building, designed by MIT alum and world-famous architect I.M. Pei, was a symbol of elegance and waste. On the outside, its tiled surface resembles nothing so much as a bathroom.
But inside, it is almost entirely empty, with a giant courtyard stretching up through its center--just because it looked cool. Maybe if that space had been filled with offices, the Lab wouldn't be spending money constructing a new building next door. And perhaps without the expense of the new building, the Lab wouldn't need to lay off staff now. At one point, Bender says he actually suggested filling some of the atrium -- which is four stories high -- with office space instead of moving staff out of the building. MIT nixed the idea.
(quoted directly from the article)
Just like the Internet bubble - spiffy on the outside, empty and nearly useless within.
Items that will no longer receive funding ...: furniture
"Son, when I was your age, I had to walk 8 miles to school... in the snow... with no shoes... uphill... in both directions. We didn't even have classroom chairs in those days!"
Developers: We can use your help.
sorry but paying cellphone time for anyone is pretty stupid unless they are the on-call administrator. same goes for first class travel or the catered meetings. (bring a coke and a twinkie if you're hungry, the rest of us have to buy our own lunch!)
The problems I saw was excessive spending for un-important things thus taking funds away from many important projects.... gluttony at it's finest.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
It finally all makes sense. Media Lab set up a "European Branch" in Dublin about a year ago, for which they got about 50 million IRP (approx) $60 million, which was allocated from the indigenous research funds supposedly reserved for research activities in Irish Universities (not the most affluent at the best of times, but still producing solid results). The initial payment was not exclusively for the Dublin site, rather a large chunk was redirected back to Media Lab in Mass., supposedly it represented a "payment" from the Irish people so that Irish students we could have the privelege of access to Media Lab's IP. To the best of my knowledge, the number of students in the Dublin institution, a year after its establishment, can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Oh yeah, I almost forgot that they managed to get a clause agreed on that a significant percentage of all funds donated to "Media Lab Europe", i.e. the Dublin based institution, would be redirected back to Media Lab in Mass. We're suckers.
Meejalab
MIT is more well known because of a few famous people who taught, graduate or worked there. People shouldn't put too much stock in prestiege. All degrees are only as valuable as the effort you put into it. Likewise, an university is only as good as it's students' ability to be resourceful. I don't know that having the world at your finger tips with first class flights really fosters a scrap dog mentality. If necessity is the mother of invention, having everything at your fingers tips (as MIT is accustomed to) might inhibit creative thinking.
$5M in sponsorship for the "smart potholder"? Screw that. Throw some funding at the the "silent jackhammer."
These are students. Their primary concern is education and graduation. Along with that, they get (often as a part of financial aid) on campus or school related jobs.
The media lab offers work that is in a related field, the opportunity to see cutting edge research up close, the opportunity to work with the best researchers and learn how it's done. That is what they are mostly getting. that's why it is called Undergraduate Research Opportunities. Oh and by the way, they also get a little cash on the side.
How many of you have turned down more money to get a job that is more fun, in a more interesting area, or has better environment? I have. If these students want more money, they can quit school and get super wage jobs. That's not why they are there.
There is nothing so silly as other peoples traditions, and nothing so sacred as our own.
Many people think that it's a typo...it's not. The MIT Minimum Wage is basically ~$8/hr...Meida Lab UROPs got paid a little more base starting salary. Hardly the small fortune the article makes it out to be, considering how much most could've gotten paid locally at some dotcom (esp., during the height of the boom).
Also, as a former Media Lab UROP, I can strongly state that the UROPs in the Media Lab were the BACKBONE of work in the Media Lab. Another misconception from the article is that they UROPs had "projects" that they circulate looking for funding that the Media Lab would fund. Couldn't be more wrong. The UROPs are/were more like contract programming labor hired to support/flesh out the theories of the grad. students/professors. Cutting such is going to be the hardest cut to make...
It's tragic that a significant portion of the private sector takes this kind of a stance. The Media Lab, in it's day, was a unique place where sometimes extremely disparate companies were able to work together, share ideas, and advance not only their businesses, but technology in a much more significant way than they would have separately.
What happens when Intel sits down with Lego and some creative, bright students? Lego gets Mindstorms... Intel gets an entirely new product line. This was the place where corporate R&D hit the academic cutting edge. It brought you HDTV, Mindstorms, Electronic Ink (which is turning very quickly into printable transistors). It's working on building automation with cooperation from both appliance companies and building companies. MEMS, Education, Agents, News Delivery... Hell, students there even had a part in remeasuring Mt. Everest. Worthless indeed.
As for "frivolous perks," the professors at the lab get paid academic salaries. Many of them, who consult with their sponsors as a condition of their sponsorship contracts, travel 150-200k miles /year. Have you tried logging that much travel in coach, without a cell phone?
Yes, there are significant parts of the Media Lab designed to make it "plush" for both sponsors and researchers, but you don't attract some of the brightest and most creative people on the planet by giving them a cinder block office $5.25 an hour.
While limos, first class flights, and a new nicely designed building might seem outrageous, one should keep in mind that sites that look pedestrian and work on basic research rarely get corporate funding.
Every company wants to donate money to a "successful" department and, like it or not, a lot of people controlling the money determine success by the outward signs. Likewise, good research that doesn't have some flash/publicity potential isn't worth a whole lot when it comes to getting donations. It's why some of the wierder projects are very important from a fund-raising point of view. They get you noticed.
Of course, you can go too far, start looking ostentatious and have your projects look like time wasters. It's a careful balance and not an obvious one at that.
Like nomadic, who replied above, I also suffered through a public university. In my case, the computer science program was barely able to afford the basics. This is in Minnesota, USA which is one of the most highly taxed regions of the country and yet, we could barely afford the basics. I paid my own tuition, I paid for my own meals, I paid my own room and board, and I worked the $4.25/hour jobs to do it. I emerged from school with much less debt than my coastal peers and, for the most part, with much more willingness to bust my ass to succeed.
To me, that is valuable. Having a role in remeasuring Mt. Everst, Legos products, and other commercial innovations is interesting to be sure. However, if we don't afford our students a bit of hardship, then how are they to have enough character to make real contributions to the world and not just invent the next profit margin gimmick? MIT may have done some important things in the past (and are probably doing so right now in some ways), but it didn't do those because they had every convenience and plush toy available to them. Why should that be the case now? If I provide all those extras, who am I going to attract? Will I attract those with an interest in being among the elite? Or will I attract those with an interest in being merely comfortable? If I simply provide an education with a reputation for producing lean and mean technologists, who will I attract? I will attract those who are motivated to become better.
As for professors, I do not begrudge any professor their salary. They put up with way too much for the likes of me to badmouth them. But there's a limit there too.
Excessive comfort does not promote real innovation.
Please mod this post only if you think others should/n't read this. I have enough ego^H^H^Hkarma. Thanks!
A few weeks ago a friend of mine in the Media Lab mentioned to me that the shit was really hitting the proverbial fan because of the missing millions, and that layoffs and cutbacks were a result of this. So, as I understood it, the belt tightening was a direct result of this serious accounting mistake (oops) and not some nebulous result of the dot com slowdown.
Yes, the Media Lab was a unique place, but even during my time at MIT (4 years ago already), it was considered an embarrassment by the majority of the MIT community. This is the place that could suck down $40 million a year and have only Lego Mindstorms to show off after a decade of work by the entire laboratory. This is the place that would hire fashion models to wear their wearable computer crap for the dog and pony shows they'd run to try to suck more money out of the industry suits. This is the place that would do non-novel, non-useful research as long as it looked cool and they could show it off to their corporate sponsors.
The majority of the research that was done at the Media Lab belonged in industry, and was of no academic significance (electronic ink being on of the few counter examples). The only real reason it was tolerated at MIT was 'cause the Media Lab brought in its own money (and a lot of it).
And no, HDTV was not created by the Media Lab, the EE department (Prof. Lim) worked on that.