Why does Europe suck at technological innovation? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why does Europe suck at technological innovation?

#41

Post by jarek » Fri, Jun 10, 2011, 1:52 PM UTC

btilly wrote: post #38

jarek wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except Rasmus was born on Greenland and was in university in Ontario when he created PHP. Claim Ontario or Canada as a capitalist paradise at your own risk :).

Rasmus was born on Greenland which is a Danish possession, so he is a Danish citizen by birth. Which makes him a Dane, as I said. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rasmus_Lerdorf for verification. Furthermore I didn't make any claims about a "capitalist paradise", either explicitly or implicitly. In fact another of the three is Bjarne Stroustrup, a professor in academia. He may live in the USA, but he's an academic, a…

I'm not sure how a data point this specific is then interesting for this subject. Three people, having been born as Danish citizens, went on to become original creators of three most popular languages today, two of whom did so in generally fairly uncapitalistic environments, now live in the U.S. This is not a small problem for Europe.

Re: Why does Europe suck at technological innovation?

#42

Post by btilly » Fri, Jun 10, 2011, 2:34 PM UTC

jarek wrote: post #41

btilly wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rasmus was born on Greenland which is a Danish possession, so he is a Danish citizen by birth. Which makes him a Dane, as I said. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rasmus_Lerdorf for verification. Furthermore I didn't make any claims about a "capitalist paradise", either explicitly or implicitly. In fact another of the three is Bjarne Stroustrup, a professor in academia. He may live in the USA, but he's an academic, a…

I'm not sure how a data point this specific is then interesting for this subject. Three people, having been born as Danish citizens, went on to become original creators of three most popular languages today, two of whom did so in generally fairly uncapitalistic environments, now live in the U.S. This is not a small problem for Europe.

It is interesting because the data point is not an isolated example.

From Dijkstra to Torvalds, there are a many prominent examples of top notch computer talent from Europe choosing to live in the USA. The resulting brain drain leaves fewer top people in Europe, and more opportunities for Americans to benefit from that talent. Benefits range from their availability for American businesses to the fact that it is easier to meet and be inspired by that talent if you live in the USA. (Particularly if you live near a tech center like Silicon Valley.)

Re: Why does Europe suck at technological innovation?

#43

Post by micheljansen » Fri, Jun 10, 2011, 6:35 PM UTC

eibrahim wrote: post #18

micheljansen wrote: post #13

As a "European" from The Netherlands, I feel I need to say something about the inflammatory title of this article. Europe does not "suck" at technological innovation, there is simply no such thing as "Europe" at this scale. Like the article says: Europe is still 27 very different markets. As a US consumer, you are used to a being part of a massive and hugely uniform market that also happens to speak the language of i…

Wait, you mean Europe is not a country? That's funny... I always hear that complain from my "African" friends... Now you know how it feels to lump people into one group "African", "Middle Eastern", "Asians", etc... :)

Excellent point. I never said it is good to lump anyone into any category, but I am not writing articles for Slate :)