NIST Advanced Technology Program Awards

An anonymous submitter writes "Look, some research money awarded to all the recent slashdot topics! Printable LCD displays and circuits, high accuracy biometric algorithms, holographic data storage, an overclockers dream, and the DMCA fights back. See all the projects listed for NIST's FY2002 funding."

Comments

Doesnt Suprise me

[L33t-Geek]

Slashdot is widly seen around the web as a realable source for information. The fact that several stories on this site have been picked up by other news media outlets and have qualified for grants isnt amazing, its pretty obvious when you concider the amount of people that read this sites stories. Just some thoughts. -Geek

Re:Doesnt Suprise me

[Anonvmous Coward]

"Slashdot is widly seen around the web as a realable source for information."

Reliable... as long as you actually read the article. Sometimes I think the /. presentation of a story should be moderate-able.

"A user has moderated your story -1, Troll to your article titled "Microsoft Claims Linux is Slow""

Heh. :)

That's a lot of nuts!

[GigsVT]

Content Specific Camcorder Jamming for Digital Projectors
Requested ATP funds: $2,000 K
Cinea plans a two-year project to develop and test prototype technology for distorting unauthorized recordings of digital movies without affecting human visual perception of the original version. Based on a previous feasibility study, the company will modify the timing and modulation of the light used to create the displayed image such that frame-based capture by recording devices is distorted.

Next year they will probably give a grant to the camera manufacturers to develop technology that will defeat this. Really... where does the NIST get off on taking sides in a political issue like this. Let the movie companies worry about copy protection, and don't spend my tax money on it.

Re:That's a lot of nuts!

[Cervantes]

They spend your tax money on putting 80-year old medical marijuana growers in jail, forcing everyone to digital tv and cable whether they like it or not, and flying the president and his 80-person entourage all around the country so he can attent fundraisers for his party... why should this be any different?

Oh, and lets not forget using your tax dollars to build a fake company to entrap two russian hackers ... add on administrative costs, the plane tickets to fly them over here, cost of the trial, cost of keeping them in jail...

Don't like it? Write your congressman, write your senator, heck, even write your president (or, if Gore isn't available, settle for Bush ((OH, the karma's gonna pay for that one!)) ). Remember, if you have enough time to post on slashdot, then you have enough time to email your government. There is a page somewhere that gives easy access to email links for everyone, but being at work, I don't have it handy. I'm sure it'll pop up shortly.

Re:That's a lot of nuts!

[GreyWolf3000]

You make some good points, but the whole "get up and do something about it, like email a congressman" thing just doesn't work. They respond to large constituent bases. I realize that no one should criticize the government if he hasn't first taken the time to use his voice and speech to change something.

In this case, you have to realize the utter futility of the act. I'm not flaming you (though I am peeved at how moderators love "get up and write a letter" posts), but really, the US government is not a monolithic thing--your local congressman won't really have anything to do with this organization. Do you think that this could get floor time? "My constituents have been claiming that another organization's awards are promoting copy propretecting viewpoints, and it's time we stopped that."

Perhaps copy protection itself could, and I agree a letter for that would be a good idea, but congress has like zero say in overseeing the validity of these awards.

Slashdot pull?

[jukal]

Look, some research money awarded to all the recent slashdot topics

Some of these might have actually got a pull from /. in getting the award. How about pulling one of these open source challenges as well? There seems to be a lot of interest for a Linux API for the Synaptic cPad for example - still it missing.

This is corporate welfare

[SexyKellyOsbourne]

It sounds like a good idea to fund technology that will improve our lives, but when the government uses public money to fund research that will eventually lead to large private profits by paying for the financial risk of researching the technology, it is corporate welfare.

You may like the technology, but corporate welfare is a huge drain on the treasury that only makes the rich richer, borders on socialism, and forces the taxpayer to take the fall for technology that won't work for private businesses.

More information on corporate welfare can be found here:

http://www.cato.org/pubs/handbook/hb105-9.html

http://www.citizen.org/congress/welfare/index.cfm

Re:This is corporate welfare

[aero6dof]

It really depends on how you look at it. I'm sure you can find abuses, but there are also major benefits to this type of funding.

For many projects, the technology developed is at a risk-level that most private companies wouldn't touch otherwise. In many cases, because of the funding source, the gov't also retains a right to use it for themselves. This is arguably the best way for the government to spin off discoveries from basic research in public labs to private companies. The discoveries pay off for the government. Society receives the benefits of the discoveries, and in the long term the IP becomes public. It's not perfect, but I don't think the practice should be abolished.

Another side benefit is that the technology funding results in a product or range of products needed by the government becoming available at a cheaper cost. The commercial companies produce the project more efficiently than the goverment could produce a good for itself (or hire a company to produce it for gov't use).

Re:Links

[Chaltek]

Printable LCDs
Biometrics
Holographic Storage
Overclocking (Cooling)
Your Rights Online (DMCA)

~Chaltek

the benefits of retarding camcorders?

[Lurking Grue]

If the motion picture industry estimates that they "lose" $3 billion each year to "piracy" why don't they cough up the $2 million investment into this technology? It could pay for itself very quickly. (If their numbers are anywhere near accurate, that is.)

From the NIST website: The ATP views R&D projects from a broader perspective - its bottom line is how the project can benefit the nation. In sharing the relatively high development risks of technologies that potentially make feasible a broad range of new commercial opportunities, the ATP fosters projects with a high payoff for the nation as a whole - in addition to a direct return to the innovators.

So how exactly does this use of our tax dollars have a "high payoff for the nation as a whole? "

Don't they ever learn?

[JohnA]

The team that is using $2,000,000 of your taxpayer dollars to "further digital rights management infastructure" has a deep rooted history in another lovely product... Circuit City's DIVX (not to be confused with the MPEG-4 codec). Take a look at their homepage or their executive bios page for more details.

I guess they couldn't get any private investment after they blew $200 million on DIVX...

I disagree

[FallLine]

While I am normally strongly opposed to the various forms of corporate welfare, e.g., subsidies, protectionist policies, etc., the ATP is one government program that I strongly support.

Firstly, unlike those other programs, aka government welfare, these funds are used to pay for the basic research that will lead to economic production, rather than inefficiency.

Secondly, this program is primarily about defraying RISK, not the COST per se (as would be the case if they were subsidizing production or what have you). What you fail to realize is that many projects are not viable for but a handful of the largest corporations because the level of risk is so high that they cannot afford to even do the research. Who wants to invest in a company, where before they can do anything or make any money, they need to invest 5m (purely for research) for, say, 5 years, with only a 10% probability of success? Would you? Very few investors are willing to incur this kind of risk, even when the potential payout is multiplies higher whatever the initial investment is. Btw, the venture capital community is generally NOT willign to for a number of reasons. There is a reason why the only successful drug producers are

Thirdly, the NIST prevents companies from engaging in total crapshots on the governmentsdollar by requiring the company to pay for 50% (and in the case of larger companies 60%) of the research.

Fourthly, there are many additional costs that the companies must pay for to commercialize the technology.

Fifthly, working for a company that received a grant from the NIST last year, I can tell you that most of awards are NOT to large companies, so the rich getting richer complaint does not hold water.

Sixthly, the successful investments will yield additional tax receipts that far exceed the grant amounts, especially when secondary beneficiaries are taken into consideration.

Seventhly, this is a meritocracy. Although it's not perfect, they select the best of the best, at least in theory. The researchers that hope to essentially live off of perpetual research do not get funded. You really have to convince them that it can and will be commercialized.

Eightly, the companies sole opportunity to really benefit comes from making it into a commercial success, i.e., they're not allowed to pocket the money.

Anyways-I support it and that's enough for now, I'm going home.