[LINK] Einstein's fridge an example for NICTA?

[Tom Worthington]

At 12:07 PM 12/11/2006, Brendan Scott wrote:
>The problem with all of this is that benefits are determined by the 
>reporting mechanism (eg royalties/money).  Any other benefits are 
>automatically discounted to valueless. ...

It is desirable that research contributes to the common good. But if 
the Australian government is funding the research, I think some 
effort should be put into some of the commercial benefits going to 
Australians. It seems odd to fund research only to benefit our competitors.

>Organisations like NICTA have to invest more money in developing 
>models which better value their contributions to the economy and 
>better justify the investment made in them. ...

The best way to demonstrate value to is to be able to point to 
Australian businesses making money from the research. One suggestion 
I made early on was that all NICTA researchers be required to attend 
a course on how to commercialize research. That way they would at 
lease be sensitized to the issues.

It does not take much effort. The first couple of PHD students at ANU 
who I asked: "how do we make money out of this research?" just looked 
at me blankly. No one had ever asked them to think how their research 
could be used. But then they quickly got the idea and were ready with 
some suggestions on how to exploit their work.



Tom Worthington FACS HLM tom.worthington at tomw.net.au Ph: 0419 496150
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