3 ms·

> Academia has have their 50 year run with software research and the end result is quite disappointing. You might want to tell that to the students and faculty

> Academia has have their 50 year run with software research and the end result is quite disappointing. You might want to tell that to the students and faculty at MIT, Berkeley and CMU who wrote the papers and much of the software powering your shiny new macbook and iphone.

johansch 11y ago
Most of them were students, not academic researchers . The sole reason they were there was that it was the only way to get to computers. Since you mention MIT: I guess one example is how much effort Marvin Minsky's influence wasted in AI research and how he single-handedly killed more relevant research in that area for decades. What I was trying to get at though is what I have seen in the EU. Basically they don't even attempt to do basic research - most of the money goes to building product-like software systems, but without any realistic customer feedback loop (they already got the funding from oblivious tax payers thousands of miles away!). It's just wanking.
- johansch 11y ago
  I also remember reading about Google's Larry and Sergei being reprimanded or scolded for being too occupied of what would be useful to users, rather than thinking about what might be make a good academic paper. Then they left Stanford.
- xamuel 11y ago
  >without any realistic customer feedback loop This is so so true (I spent some time working as a post-doc in England). There are tables filled up this very moment with dignified scientists arguing about bikesheds in CRUD applications that wouldn't get three upvotes here on Hacker News. And remember: if you can't open it in MS Excel, that makes it "Big Data"! All joking aside though, what universities are doing with their postdocs is abusive and immoral and they're going to regret killing the golden goose when they've squandered all the prestige in these positions.

3 ms·

> Academia has have their 50 year run with software research and the end result is quite disappointing. You might want to tell that to the students and faculty

by thescriptkiddie 11y ago

johansch 11y ago
Most of them were students, not academic researchers . The sole reason they were there was that it was the only way to get to computers. Since you mention MIT: I guess one example is how much effort Marvin Minsky's influence wasted in AI research and how he single-handedly killed more relevant research in that area for decades. What I was trying to get at though is what I have seen in the EU. Basically they don't even attempt to do basic research - most of the money goes to building product-like software systems, but without any realistic customer feedback loop (they already got the funding from oblivious tax payers thousands of miles away!). It's just wanking.
- johansch 11y ago
  I also remember reading about Google's Larry and Sergei being reprimanded or scolded for being too occupied of what would be useful to users, rather than thinking about what might be make a good academic paper. Then they left Stanford.
- xamuel 11y ago
  >without any realistic customer feedback loop This is so so true (I spent some time working as a post-doc in England). There are tables filled up this very moment with dignified scientists arguing about bikesheds in CRUD applications that wouldn't get three upvotes here on Hacker News. And remember: if you can't open it in MS Excel, that makes it "Big Data"! All joking aside though, what universities are doing with their postdocs is abusive and immoral and they're going to regret killing the golden goose when they've squandered all the prestige in these positions.