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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."
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.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
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.
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
Printable LCDs
Biometrics
Holographic Storage
Overclocking (Cooling)
Your Rights Online (DMCA)
~Chaltek
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? "
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.