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Which the BLS calls the "information sector", and does not mention "tech" anywhere. This seems like the most appropriate label, because there's no reason that p

Which the BLS calls the "information sector", and does not mention "tech" anywhere. This seems like the most appropriate label, because there's no reason that people inventing femtosecond lasers, fusion power, hydrogen catalysts, bipedal robots, rare-earth-free magnets, self-driving cars, and any other manner of novel technology belong in the same category as media licensing. But internet service providers and people writing video-compression algorithms probably do.

derefr 3y ago
> there's no reason that people inventing ... novel technology belong in the same category as media licensing Well, sure they are. Patents are information: R&D insights distilled into a useable implementation. Insofar as the final output of your company is a patent for other companies to license, your company is, in an economic sense, an information creation company — regardless of what happens "inside" the company on a day-to-day basis. Boston Dynamics, for one example, isn't a robot company; it's a robotics R&D lab — which is to say, it's an "information about how to build robots" company. Information about how to build robots is what they create, and what they sell (or rather license); other companies (and governments/militaries) then buy that information / license to use that information — and supporting informational materials like trained data models, designs for FPGA programs to execute those models on, and robotic sensor- and motor-complex designs that those models were trained to use — and put it together themselves, or have some other subcontractor put it together, into actual robots.
- mitthrowaway2 3y ago
  We can include oil and gas exploration in the infotech-entertainment-telecom economy too! After all, all those geological surveys are just information about where the oil and gas is located! And quantitative finance too, etc...
- amenhotep 3y ago
  Other things that are information: romance novels, interior design layouts, daily of routines of possibly cheating husbands. Are you going to contend that authors and decorators and private detectives are also information workers? I'd respect the commitment to consistency if so, but it seems to stretch the definition past the point of usefulness.

derefr 3y ago

> there's no reason that people inventing ... novel technology belong in the same category as media licensing Well, sure they are. Patents are information: R&D insights distilled into a useable implementation. Insofar as the final output of your company is a patent for other companies to license, your company is, in an economic sense, an information creation company — regardless of what happens "inside" the company on a day-to-day basis. Boston Dynamics, for one example, isn't a robot company; it's a robotics R&D lab — which is to say, it's an "information about how to build robots" company. Information about how to build robots is what they create, and what they sell (or rather license); other companies (and governments/militaries) then buy that information / license to use that information — and supporting informational materials like trained data models, designs for FPGA programs to execute those models on, and robotic sensor- and motor-complex designs that those models were trained to use — and put it together themselves, or have some other subcontractor put it together, into actual robots.

mitthrowaway2 3y ago
We can include oil and gas exploration in the infotech-entertainment-telecom economy too! After all, all those geological surveys are just information about where the oil and gas is located! And quantitative finance too, etc...
amenhotep 3y ago
Other things that are information: romance novels, interior design layouts, daily of routines of possibly cheating husbands. Are you going to contend that authors and decorators and private detectives are also information workers? I'd respect the commitment to consistency if so, but it seems to stretch the definition past the point of usefulness.