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Wasn't relativity and the transistor both mainly driven by government funding and contracts? The transistor was originally developed and sold to the government,
by sliverstorm 12y ago
Wasn't relativity and the transistor both mainly driven by government funding and contracts? The transistor was originally developed and sold to the government, who wanted them for ICBM's. They exploded with time, but the seed venture as I understand was built on that contract.
- WalterBright 12y agoIf you consider working for the patent office and doing relativity in your spare time government funding, I suppose. Bell Labs funded Shockley in 1947. I don't think anyone was thinking about ICBMs at the time.
- api 12y agoBell was a government enforced monopoly, so almost government. Definitely insulated from normal market forces.
- spacemanmatt 12y agoI think you have confused regulation with subsidy. Bell didn't collect money from the government to operate.
- ghaff 12y agoWhere did parent say they got a subsidy? AT&T was certainly insulated from normal market forces which had a lot to do with their ability to fund Bell Labs to work on a lot more fundamental research than is the norm just about anywhere else. Google is the outlier today--at least until such time as their search money press slows down.
- api 12y agoBeing completely insulated from competition is a huge indirect subsidy. Same net effect.
- spacemanmatt 12y agoI think you have confused the ends with the means.
- sliverstorm 12y agoRight, Shockley wasn't bootstrapped by the government, but my memory is that the government & their ICBM's were the first actual customer for the transistor and that contract was both how and why it went from cat's whiskers on germanium to the planar silicon process. You're right though, I was probably wrong about relativity.