Participating in a discussion is a great way to learn and contribute to ideas for superstructing. When you post a comment, try to provide information that others may not know, and avoid getting into arguments. Winning discussions are all about working together to get smarter.

Please login or register to post


    21st Century Ideas: How to present long term gain from techonology as short term money?

    How to persuade money holders into technology investments

    Started by: Sloba Raves:2

    Subscribe » RSS

    Greatest problem today is that research is money driven! If we can allow scientist to explore alternate theories, to do what they find fascinating instead of what they will receive grant money for. So, THE problem is how to decouple financial backing and politics with science ?

    bounty system? let a lot of contributers donate money to particular projects?

    I disagree with Sloba. (Disclosing my bias here - I am a capitalist who is focused on advanced technology.) The problem isn\\\'t just that the money is coupled to politics/science. That is a problem, but not as severe as you might think. And government funded projects probably won’t change this, much. I think the main issue is the short-term thinking promoted by the Silicon Valley Venture Capital (SVVC) model. They need to see a return on investment of 10x, within 3 years. Almost no company can do that, certainly no company that required significant investment in hardware. Lasers, robotics, photocells, space access, energy and nanotech all required significant initial capitalization. There are plenty of projects that can and would work, financially, but not within the timescale dictated by SVVC. These other projects are deemed \\\'failures\\\' and so are not funded. A shift in VC thinking, or a changed/expanded financial ecosphere or a new (additional) VC model would go a long ways toward solving this problem - and expanding our options. If the capital is throttled, it does not matter how good your idea is, it will not get funded. A changed definition for \\\'success\\\' would make a big difference. If there were a new VC model of: 5x ROI in 5 years and you would have a flood of new products/services/solutions. In order to do that, you would need to adjust the role of VC, as a professional steward of capital and companies. This would be time consuming, but I think the rewards (financial, personal, and social) would more than justify it. Keep your fingers crossed… I am working on this problem. Michael Laine http://www.twitter.com/mlaine and/or /mlaine2019 - in game.

    What about 100x ROI in 15 years - like UIET Superstruct. And I get the further out the return, the larger the risk - the more unknowns enter the equations. Part of having creative humans about I'm afraid.

    What about inventing a sort of investor mutual fund arrangement? (if there is such a thing - you will know I am very naive in this department - sometimes a handy when conversation gets mired too deep in its own idiom)

    I see similar problems: some ideas may be promising, but do not yield immediate returns or profits or some people may even not realize that a lot of money could be saved in the long run. But what I seem to see is that many long term ideas and goals can be coupled with some short(er) term applications as "side effects" along the way. Try to sell the intermediate products. Since every innovation is integrated into a network of other innovations and applications which will be created and used along the way of development, one might just have a look at short term profits and applications that could come with it on the way to your final goal. Entertainment, gaming, ICT are always good candidates for this. Take motion analysis software for developing virtual actors in Hollywood, BCIs for gaming (that have to be less precise and sensitive), Entertainment robots (that require less AI than e.g. nursing robots), new nanotech materials for sports products etc.




    Nominate For A Badge

    Badge:
    More detail on badges



    NOMINATE CANCEL