more on a rant from your Editor on the state of ourfield in research

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "David P. Reed" <dpreed () reed com>
Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2002 08:23:43 -0400
To: dave () farber net
Subject: Re: <[IP]> more on a rant from your Editor on the state of ourfield
in research

Dave -

There was a fascinating article a couple of years ago (in the NYTimes, as I
recall.)   In it, Bill Gates and Marc Andreesen were asked about the value
of college.   Each of them strongly argued that it is a waste of time.  The
article strongly hinted that college level learning and research are not
necessary to become an acknowledged technology expert.

Our richest American "technologist" (Bill Gates) essentially never went to
college.  Most of his employees in technology areas have bachelor's degrees
(at least from my experience with visiting MS over many years).

Over the past 25 years, the of my professional organizations (ACM) has had
to "dumb down" (my words) its own leading journal, Communications of the
ACM, because most practitioners in the field found it too arcane for their
tastes.

My favorite general technology magazine (Technology Review) stopped
carrying articles about deep scientific subjects a few years ago (and fired
its editors and columnists), to replace the content with rah-rah articles
about the latest products and innovations in the marketplace.  Abandoning
its goal of explaining the technology of one field to bright technologists
in other fields,  since that was deemed boring.  Instead the magazine
celebrates the new and cool - sort of a Wired for the pocket protector
set.  TR is a fine magazine, now.  But what serves the old purpose?   Does
anyone besides me care?

In contrast, Science magazine (AAAS), which has always been my window on a
lot of cutting edge science, has been working hard to bridge boundaries -
it even includes pointers to competing magazines' articles, and reviews of
great web sites.

So what does that say about the value our field places on learning about
the past?


------ End of Forwarded Message

-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as interesting-people () lists elistx com
Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/