So, Bill has decided to spend all this money to eradicate HIV and Malaria. All very noble, but will throwing money at the problem actually do any good? Bill's announcement was especially well timed, as it conincided a new ESR essay on originality http://wn.net/daily/esr-original.html.
ESR argues that you can't buy innovation. To paraphrase:
"People who innovate essentially do it because they are clever and capable of original thought, not because they have huge amounts of money thrown at them. Developing these ideas can swallow up huge amounts of money, but it won't get you that original grain of originality."
Microsoft, as Slashdotters know all too well, likes to take the innovation shortcut, which is to wait for someone else to do all the hard work, and then buy up the results.
So how will the Bill/Microsoft approach work when attacking these great scientific challanges? Throwing money at HIV, or any problem about which we have insufficent knowledge, will not make it go away. You have to wait for some scientists to do the basic research, and come up with a breakthrough, which in all probability will be in a totally different field from the one where the cash got ploughed in.
So, the Bill Foundation might be a nice publicity stunt, but wonder who much real difference it will make? Of course, they can always "Embrace and extend" the real breakthrough, if it comes...
I've just found this jem in today's (London) Times. At then end of the usual "shock horror, they learned how to make bombs from the internet" story was this quote.
"Last year local authorities in Washington DC issued a pamphlet offering tips on how to tell if a child is a secret bomb-maker. "Generally these teenagers excel at academic activities," it said.
Slashdot Mirror
So, Bill has decided to spend all this money to eradicate HIV and Malaria. All very noble, but will throwing money at the problem actually do any good? Bill's announcement was especially well timed, as it conincided a new ESR essay on originality http://wn.net/daily/esr-original.html.
ESR argues that you can't buy innovation. To paraphrase:
"People who innovate essentially do it because they are clever and capable of original thought,
not because they have huge amounts of money thrown
at them. Developing these ideas can swallow up huge amounts of money, but it won't get you that original grain of originality."
Microsoft, as Slashdotters know all too well, likes to take the innovation shortcut, which is to wait for someone else to do all the hard work, and then buy up the results.
So how will the Bill/Microsoft approach work when attacking these great scientific challanges?
Throwing money at HIV, or any problem about which we have insufficent knowledge, will not make it go away. You have to wait for some scientists to do the basic research, and come up with a breakthrough, which in all probability will be in a totally different field from the one where the cash got ploughed in.
So, the Bill Foundation might be a nice publicity stunt, but wonder who much real difference it will make? Of course, they can always "Embrace and extend" the real breakthrough, if it comes...
I've just found this jem in today's (London) Times. At then end of the usual "shock horror, they learned how to make bombs from the internet" story was this quote.
"Last year local authorities in Washington DC issued a pamphlet offering tips on how to tell if a child is a secret bomb-maker.
"Generally these teenagers excel at academic activities," it said.