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Google To Fund Ideas That Will Change the World
Peace Corps Online writes "This week, as part of their tenth birthday celebration, Google announced the launch of project ten to the 100th, a project designed to inspire and fund the development of ideas that will help to change the world. They have called on members of the public to share their ideas for solutions that will help as many people as possible in the global community, offering a $10 million prize pool to back the development of those chosen as winners. 'We know there are countless brilliant ideas that need funding and support to come to fruition,' says Bethany Poole, Project Marketing Manager for Google. 'These ideas can be big or small, technology-driven or brilliantly simple — but they need to have impact.' The project's website asks entrants to classify their ideas into one of eight categories listed as Community, Opportunity, Energy, Environment, Health, Education, Shelter and Everything Else. Members of the public have until October 20th to submit their ideas by completing a simple form and answering a few short questions about their idea."
So who actually profits from this? Does Google sift the data and then start up in-house projects or do they run a program like the MacArthur genius grant, where the money is provided with little to no strings attached?
Given the earlier controversy over their EULAs containing clauses to forfeit all rights to your IP, this isn't just an idle question.
$_ = "wftedskaebjgdpjgidbsmnjgcdwatb"; tr/a-z/oh, turtleneck Phrase Jar!/; print
That's a hell of a lot of extra work to globally disseminate your idea to the world.
You wouldn't let Google have the hassle of doing the footwork if they flipped you a few mil? I think maybe you lack some of the foresight/vision/humanitarianism that the contest seeks to capitalize on.
Just sayin....
Some projects require resources no matter how you look at it: e.g. labs, connections with other intelligent people, test subjects, etc. Unless you are rich or have a project that requires minimal resources, you may have a hard time doing all of the research and commercializing all of the work on your own. Now if you can do such a thing, kudos to you; but, these grants (and that is what they are) are probably meant for grand projects that bring together specialists across many different fields. What I'm curious about is how their process will differ from what the government already does in terms of funding such projects. Will google be equally rigorous in validating the work that comes out of this, or are they just looking for the next gadget to earn them millions? It seems interesting, so I'll just have to wait and see how it pans out.
Google isn't asking for profitable ideas or anything like that.
Sure, some of them could end up being profitable, but that's not the point. They want to invest in nice ideas which could improve the life quality of people. From the video, you can clearly see they're interested in ideas that could, for instance, ease the burden put on poor people in countries like Africa. You can hardly profit from that.
This is called philanthropy. And it's amazing how people from the US find this so absurd.
Sometimes, there really isn't a catch.
Term limits for all Congresspersons.
That by itself should result in the solution of a whole host of problems.
Use Google's infrastructure and clout to combat censorship and surveillance of dissidents by oppressive regimes.
So, let's see, that means that you're simply going to dismiss the technology because you assert that the people doing the work aren't capable of doing it correctly. Do you have any proof, or are you just expressing your own anti-nuclear bias. Oh, and before I forget, fusion is a form of nuclear energy as well.
Good, inexpensive web hosting
Assuming the "not not" was a typo:
I think you're only thinking of things that have near-term benefits. This would probably exclude reducing your environmental impact, not having kids to benefit mankind etc. And don't laugh, the reason I chose not to have kids is because I decided that this would probably be the best thing anybody but a genius could do for mankind. I wanted 3 or 4 kids when I was 19 and then read a report about projected global population growth and the terrible environmental impact it would have and decided that truly caring about mankind meant not to add more people into the pool. That was 30 years ago and I feel just as strongly about the correctness of my decision now as I did then.
When 1person suffers from a delusion,it is called insanity.When many people suffer from a delusion,it is called religion
If you think this is a troll, you are culturally insensitive.
Community: How can we help connect people, build communities and protect unique cultures?
Assumes connecting people is a good thing. Sometimes people want to be left alone. Not all cultures are worth saving (varies by what culture you are in)
Opportunity: How can we help people better provide for themselves and their families?
Generally; remove the [government, dictator, local warlord] that is the problem.
Energy: How can we help move the world toward safe, clean, inexpensive energy?
Use up all the unsafe, dirty, expensive energy sources at a higher rate.
Environment: How can we help promote a cleaner and more sustainable global ecosystem?
I dunno, look dirty clean enough to me. I expect it to last longer than I will.
Health: How can we help individuals lead longer, healthier lives?
Tell them to eat less junk food and exercise more. Also ask them not to breed if they might pass on nasty traits that might contribute to short unhealthy lives in their offspring. On the other hand, maybe people already live long enough. Maybe a shorter, happier life would be better.
Education: How can we help more people get more access to better education?
Education is over-rated. Your local cleric can tell you everything you need to know.
Shelter: How can we help ensure that everyone has a safe place to live?
Lower their expectations. Great grand-pappy had a sod house he built himself, and he was happy with it. No tax collector buggin him 'bout it neither!
Everything else: Sometimes the best ideas don't fit into any category at all.
Buy lots of happy pills. Give them to EVERYONE. If your definition of helping people is to make them happy, who cares if it is "real"?
Didn't you know? Only the smart people read the warnings.
So removing the warnings would only kill smart people; stupid people already kill themselves.
If you really want that effect, you should remove legislation such as helmet and seatbeat laws.
GPL Deconstructed
Solar power is the only form of practical fusion power we have now, it is likely to be the only form of practical fusion power for the next several decades at least, and it scales from small dedicated solar powered devices to multiple megawatt sized solar farms. As for it being 24/7 we don't need that so much, the grid itself doesn't run peak capacity 24/7. We typically get larger demands during the heat (and sunshine) of mid day, when solar really rocks. As an adjunct to what we have now, a few billion panels more out on roofs all over would negate the need to build so many more fossil fuel plants, especially those "peaker" plants, and once you start talking billions of panels, economies of scale cost savings kick in and more R&D will come with it. You as joe sixpack also get to own it, compared to leasing your infrastructure with an open ended contract from the power company. Something else to consider if one wants to build equity instead of renting forever, and to have a supply independent of the vagaries of power politics and the rigged energy market.
Solar PV since its invention has dropped from thousands of dollars per watt to now under 4 bucks. This is not insignificant and is an indication of the direction it has been going. We are *this close* to having it being really cheap.
Diversified energy sources all contributing is the "silver bullet" energy solution, there isn't going to be any single "one" type of energy source in our immediate future that will cover all needs. Solar has a prominent place in the mix and could be more widely used (as some nations are doing right now, the US lags quite a bit in that regard).
In fact, this thread is about google looking for new ideas, solar is a good enough idea for them that they have already dumped some millions into it for their own purposes.
Term limits for all governmental employees, every single one, plus no pensions. Make all of government be forced to compete and live in the real world eventually and you'll see a lot less bullshit out of government.
The catch with all of those hidden competition is it let's the creator of the competition, access ideas from tens of thousands of people and keep all the ones it likes and never mention them publicly except to exploit them and only make few ideas public which it will only reward with a percentage of the prize money on offer. All of this while generating millions of dollars worth of free advertising whilst trying to create a false impression of google goodness in the public's eye.
The worship of all things google is, well, just so over. The privacy invasive, censorship loving, mass marketing, spamword advertsing princesses are just yesterdays news, of course that is a way rich but the googlites just have to accept the fact, things have changed and their meme marketing success aren't working any more.
The competition might be fun in it was all done very publicly and openly with every idea submitted published on the web site and the review and grading of those ideas also done in a very public fashion or does google want to keep it's secrets while prying into everybody else's ;).
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen