UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
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Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#2That’s great.
Removing a platform for people that say, in hindsight, ‘it was obvious that was going to fail’ is a step in the right direction.
If western societies insist on outsourcing R&D through misguided tax laws, they have no idea the amount of harm they are doing to the next generation of young people (who will be subservient to the innovating countries that were smarter in their policies).
Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#3So immediately this is where people will go to hide their pork?
Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#4That’s great. Removing a platform for people that say, in hindsight, ‘it was obvious that was going to fail’ is a step in the right direction. If western societies insist on outsourcing R&D through misguided tax laws, they have no idea the amount of harm they are doing to the next generation of young people (who will be subservient to the innovating countries that were smarter in their policies).
I'm not so positive. There is potential for this to become just another way to channel pork to friends and cronies. Which, considering the track record of the current executive, is probably the most likely scenario.
I'm all for DARPA-like initiatives, but when it comes to taxpayers' money we should have decent accountability mechanisms.
Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#5Ah yes, another way for the tories and their rich friends to siphon public funds to private pockets with zero transparency.
Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#6That’s great. Removing a platform for people that say, in hindsight, ‘it was obvious that was going to fail’ is a step in the right direction. If western societies insist on outsourcing R&D through misguided tax laws, they have no idea the amount of harm they are doing to the next generation of young people (who will be subservient to the innovating countries that were smarter in their policies).
> the innovating countries that were smarter in their policies
Such as? Are "we" now going to say the state is better at innovating than the private sector? Under what conditions?
(I'm inclined to believe that it could work - it was after all the model that gave us Concorde - but there are also a lot of ways in which it could go wrong and I absolutely do not trust the government with a track record of bunging corrupt money at shell companies.)
Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#7What on earth could possibly go wrong with this.
Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#8That’s great. Removing a platform for people that say, in hindsight, ‘it was obvious that was going to fail’ is a step in the right direction. If western societies insist on outsourcing R&D through misguided tax laws, they have no idea the amount of harm they are doing to the next generation of young people (who will be subservient to the innovating countries that were smarter in their policies).
I'm not so positive. There is potential for this to become just another way to channel pork to friends and cronies. Which, considering the track record of the current executive, is probably the most likely scenario. I'm all for DARPA-like initiatives, but when it comes to taxpayers' money we should have decent accountability mechanisms.
Usually these initiatives should be extremely transparent, and they're the exact opposite. That's not good.
A current example is the covid 19 vaccine contracts, which were multi billion dollar/euro/pound deals, with accelerated research and approvals, and so far only one contract was made public.
It is specially concerning when some vaccines were developed with public funding.
Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#9That’s great. Removing a platform for people that say, in hindsight, ‘it was obvious that was going to fail’ is a step in the right direction. If western societies insist on outsourcing R&D through misguided tax laws, they have no idea the amount of harm they are doing to the next generation of young people (who will be subservient to the innovating countries that were smarter in their policies).
IMHO, the exemption from the freedom of information act is more in fact aimed at protecting investment in sensitive new tech by in effect making it secret until the government decides otherwise.
That's why the title of the article is actually "Secrecy for high-risk tech research". It's 'high risk' but also aimed at being high rewards and potentially targeting sensitive domains so they don't want others to know what they are doing until after they have reaped the benefits.
I cannot read the whole article because of the paywall but the freedom of information laws do not prevent anything in terms of what to invest into. They only create a legal duty to provide information on demand.
The aim of this new agency has never been altruistic. It has always been discussed as a tool to further the UK's interests in the global competition. Clearly the government thinks that a level of secrecy, or at leat government control, is required.
Re: UK to launch taxpayer-funded high-risk tech research agency exempt from FOI
#10That’s great. Removing a platform for people that say, in hindsight, ‘it was obvious that was going to fail’ is a step in the right direction. If western societies insist on outsourcing R&D through misguided tax laws, they have no idea the amount of harm they are doing to the next generation of young people (who will be subservient to the innovating countries that were smarter in their policies).
> the innovating countries that were smarter in their policies Such as? Are "we" now going to say the state is better at innovating than the private sector? Under what conditions? (I'm inclined to believe that it could work - it was after all the model that gave us Concorde - but there are also a lot of ways in which it could go wrong and I absolutely do not trust the government with a track record of bunging corrupt…
> Are "we" now going to say the state is better at innovating than the private sector? Under what conditions?
At greater scale the State is definitely better at innovating compared to the private sector. Look at the internet itself and at www (CERN is basically a state project), and if we want to go even larger look at the war industry.
There's no way a "private entity" would have had the gall to build some rockets in order to bomb out London and its environs, and without the V2 rockets we probably wouldn't have had NASA and we wouldn't have had two private persons ~70 years later (Musk and Bezos) trying to build and innovate in private and with lots and lots of money what the Nazi regime did in 1943-1945 while being bombed out to hell and back by the Allies.
And then there's the entire nuclear industry which wouldn't have happened without Nagasaki and Hiroshima, both state-run (killing) projects.