725,000 public sector jobs face axe, economist warns

ILW

Well put. The problem is that we have many brilliant people in research who should show great benefits to this country, BUT th ecivil servants who control things cannot see any further than how to squeeze more funding out of the taxpayer rather than taking advantage of the successes they have had. I do believe it is an attitude within much of the public sector.

tomterm8

ILW wrote: »

If they had pateneted this and a license fee of say £1.00 had been payable on every computer in the world, we would have had an education system that would be the envy of the world. Another opportunity missed by the public sector.

It was an intentional decision not to patent the world wide web, since communication protocols need to be open if they are to be widely adopted.

Similarly, it was a national security decision not to patent the first series of computers, since they were used for cryptology, and designing the first nuclear weapons. To patent something you need to publish it, and we didn't want to tell the Nazis our codebreaking secrets - computers are one of the reasons we won WWII.

ILW

marklv wrote: »

It's not the job of the public sector to create anything. The job of the public sector is to carry out government business, without which the nation cannot be properly governed.

So are you now saying that the public sector creates nothing at all?

StevieJ

marklv wrote: »

You are a true idiot if you believe that an organisation can be run without managers. You need managers in any large organisation and it's for you to say who needs to be work where.

I take it you are a middle manager in the public sector

ILW

tomterm8 wrote: »

It was an intentional decision not to patent the world wide web, since communication protocols need to be open if they are to be widely adopted.

Similarly, it was a national security decision not to patent the first series of computers, since they were used for cryptology, and designing the first nuclear weapons. To patent something you need to publish it, and we didn't want to tell the Nazis our codebreaking secrets - computers are one of the reasons we won WWII.

Fair enough, but what about the previous example of the LCD?
Cannot believe that was a matter of national security.

lemonjelly

ILW wrote: »

If they had pateneted this and a license fee of say £1.00 had been payable on every computer in the world, we would have had an education system that would be the envy of the world. Another opportunity missed by the public sector.

You are sidestepping the arguement here though.

ou have asserted that the public sector don't create anything. There are now 4 examples (& I'm sure more will come) of major developments essential to the modern age created & developed by the public sector.

You then switch tack to argue certain creations shouldn't necessarily have patents, but fudged that arguement, as clearly it is a hugely popular way of "creating wealth".

Thing is, when the LCD was created, it wouldn't have been created as a money spinner. The PC wasn't (it was never believed people would have them in their homes). The polio vaccine was developed to make people better, as nuclear armageddon aside, it was the biggest fear facing americans. The www was created for imformation & knowledge sharing (not marketing/advertising blah blah). You are focussing on how we, later on have adapted to use these inventions.

Back to the original point though. Clearly the public sector is responsible for creating some significantly important "things" on which we now rely. So that arguement about the public sector has been knocked over.

Because of this, you can't then move your arguement to say "well if we'd taken out patents we'd be better off".

ILW

marklv wrote: »

You are a true idiot if you believe that an organisation can be run without managers. You need managers in any large organisation and it's for you to say who needs to be work where.

When there are more managers than front line staff, there is a problem. I have every right to comment, because I am paying for it

ILW

lemonjelly wrote: »

You are sidestepping the arguement here though.

ou have asserted that the public sector don't create anything. There are now 4 examples (& I'm sure more will come) of major developments essential to the modern age created & developed by the public sector.

You then switch tack to argue certain creations shouldn't necessarily have patents, but fudged that arguement, as clearly it is a hugely popular way of "creating wealth".

Thing is, when the LCD was created, it wouldn't have been created as a money spinner. The PC wasn't (it was never believed people would have them in their homes). The polio vaccine was developed to make people better, as nuclear armageddon aside, it was the biggest fear facing americans. The www was created for imformation & knowledge sharing (not marketing/advertising blah blah). You are focussing on how we, later on have adapted to use these inventions.

Back to the original point though. Clearly the public sector is responsible for creating some significantly important "things" on which we now rely. So that arguement about the public sector has been knocked over.

Because of this, you can't then move your arguement to say "well if we'd taken out patents we'd be better off".

I have never said that the public sector do not create anything.
I was just saying that if they come up with a great commercial product, they should have a duty to take advantage of its value to return some cash to the public purse.
We seem spend a lot of time and public money inventing something, only to give it away and let others countries reap the benefits. A believe it is a matter of attitude within much of the public sector who believe cash comes from nowhere.

tomterm8

ILW wrote: »

Fair enough, but what about the previous example of the LCD?
Cannot believe that was a matter of national security.

As I understand it, the UK government via the UK's Royal Raidar Estalishment and the university of Manchester discovered cyanobiphenyl liquid crystals in the 1960's, which had no practical utility until work in the 70's by Hoffmann-LaRoche (which was work on a LCD display for a digital watch). It was really quite a lot latter - in 1997 - when Hitachi produced the first TV with a LCD display of good enough quality to be functional that they took off.

In other words, they didn't patent cyanobiphenyl liquid crystals because they didn't think they would make a profit from it.

ILW

tomterm8 wrote: »

As I understand it, the UK government via the UK's Royal Raidar Estalishment and the university of Manchester discovered cyanobiphenyl liquid crystals in the 1960's, which had no practical utility until work in the 70's by Hoffmann-LaRoche (which was work on a LCD display for a digital watch). It was really quite a lot latter - in 1997 - when Hitachi produced the first TV with a LCD display of good enough quality to be functional that they took off.

In other words, they didn't patent cyanobiphenyl liquid crystals because they didn't think they would make a profit from it.

So it appears the public sector did not invent the LCD, just one of the materials it was made from.
Even so a patent for a cost of a few thousands of pounds could have been a pretty good investment, cannot see many private sector companies having let that go.