We had a fete to commemorate Doug Engelbart's life at the Computer History Museum on Monday evening, the 45th anniversary of "The Mother of All Demos" It was a packed house, with luminaries speaking (albeit a bit long), and much ado about one of the quirkiest iconoclasts I've ever known.
Ted Nelson, the Xanadu futurist and scourge of many a computer industry manager, gave the most eloquent talk, which you can see at http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/16/an-homage-to-douglas-engelbart-and-a-critique-of-the-state-of-tech/?_r=1&
Ted caught the spirit of Doug, I felt (and so did most of the audience, based on the applause) when he said: "This is weird. Doug was dumped by ARPA, dumped by SRI, shunned by XeroxPARC, and spent his last thirty years wandering in exile. And here we are, grasping at shreds of his robe, to say 'we're carrying on his vision'."
I first met Doug in 1966, when a young product marketing kid, Paul Schmidt, at HP took me (at a ripe old age of 25) over to meet Doug at SRI (then still on campus in a smallish lab). Doug had me operate the chordic keyboard, the foot treadle and the knee lever. It was like you could be an impresario if you were truly multidextrous.
Doug bought an HP 1300A from me, as did Alan Kay up at University of Utah and a few others ahead of their time. As the first commercially available computer graphics display, it was a pretty strange box to behold, and at $2,000, hardly an insignificant purchase. This was the box that later earned me Dave Packard's gratuitous "Medal of Defiance" since he had ordered it to be cancelled.
We crossed paths again circa 1982 when I organized HP's first Coporate Engineering function, and we were trying to figure out how to get disparate parts of HP to talk together. Through my wife at the time, I met Patty Burbank, a first cousin of Doug's wife -- yes, in a hot tub, as befits the Silicon Valley aura of the day-- and she said she'd help reconnect us.
A couple of years later, Bert Raphael and his team (notably Walt Underwood and Mark Laubach with Dave Farber as advisor) bought the first commercially sold router from a fledgling company named cisco systems (small letters, no caps). A.nd built virtually the first multi-mediated communications rail for any company on the globe, 2nd largest email network of the day acc. to one pundit. And HP was like the 60th largest Fortune 500 company, so this wasn't exactly "standard procedure' yet
Bert and I hired Doug then to try to implement his Augmented Knowledge ideas, which we did via a group of HP Productivity Engineers (longish story here, to be told later).... That encounter started a deeper association for me with Doug that lasted the rest of his life. Consequently, I co-hosted the 40th anniversary of "the Mother of all Demos" at Stanford with Media X in 2008, meeting many of the giants in this sub-culture.
Thinking about all of this on Monday night, I just had to marvel at the folk who turned out--and reflect on how all of these ideas, the contention, the arguments, the insane competitive wars, and the camaraderie all combined to change the world--maybe even for the better?
I was proud to know him, and thrilled to have had the privilege. May he rest in peace.
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
Thursday, November 14, 2013
Meeting a legend in the History of Science
Two nights ago, my wife and I sat down at a Hearing Symposium next to another gentleman my age; we shared the situation that our wives are telling us that neither of us can hear as well as we once did.
My wife is an engaging conversationalist, and she drew him out. He said his accent was from his English youth, but he was "a ‘dumb immigrant’ who came to this country right out of college, and stayed, ‘on the east coast’ "
Which to a Westerner, especially for two who briefly tried the East Coast at mid-life+, made sense.
To her question of ‘what do you do?’ he replied that he was a historian. I said, brightly, that I was an erstwhile historian myself. He said, “of what?” I proudly said, History of Technology”, and went on to say, “maybe you’ve heard of SHOT. I was just at their annual conference.”
Arnold Thackray said in reply, “Yes, I’ve heard of them.”
Well, off we went. I had explored the idea of a PhD in the History of Science and Technology in 1966, coincident with getting a History Master's degree in Urban Studies from the University of Colorado (looking for something to do while working at Hewlett-Packard at a hinterland division). I'd met luminaries in the field at the time -- I. Bernard Cohen at Harvard, Thomas Kuhn at Princeton, Carroll Purcell at UC Santa Barbara, and Melvin Kranzberg at Case Western (now Carnegie Mellon). It was an attractive field, nascent to be sure, and I decided to 'stay in electronics' which was just 'going digital'. Logic Analyzers might not have happened the same way if I'd shifted, who knows?
Well, Thackray met Cohen virtually at the same time, came to Harvard to teach, went on to found the department at the Univ of Pennsylvania, and then the Chemical Heritage Foundation. He retired, sort of, to the West Coast five years ago, but is working on projects still.
We have met, discussed our mutual interests at this point (which are several!), and commiserated about our choice of line of work.
Thackray, among many achievements, did the biography of Arnold Beckman--a tour-de-force in the chemical instrumentation world, one we knew well at HP.
He added, to the 'dumb immigrant' story, saying he was a 'dumb entrepreneur also, starting a non-profit corporation re the History of Science, and a 'dumb geoscociologist' as well, since he chose both a field where everyone looks forward, not back, in a country clearly the least interested in history of any nation.
I couldn't help thinking I've found a kindred spirit!
My wife is an engaging conversationalist, and she drew him out. He said his accent was from his English youth, but he was "a ‘dumb immigrant’ who came to this country right out of college, and stayed, ‘on the east coast’ "
Which to a Westerner, especially for two who briefly tried the East Coast at mid-life+, made sense.
To her question of ‘what do you do?’ he replied that he was a historian. I said, brightly, that I was an erstwhile historian myself. He said, “of what?” I proudly said, History of Technology”, and went on to say, “maybe you’ve heard of SHOT. I was just at their annual conference.”
Arnold Thackray said in reply, “Yes, I’ve heard of them.”
Well, off we went. I had explored the idea of a PhD in the History of Science and Technology in 1966, coincident with getting a History Master's degree in Urban Studies from the University of Colorado (looking for something to do while working at Hewlett-Packard at a hinterland division). I'd met luminaries in the field at the time -- I. Bernard Cohen at Harvard, Thomas Kuhn at Princeton, Carroll Purcell at UC Santa Barbara, and Melvin Kranzberg at Case Western (now Carnegie Mellon). It was an attractive field, nascent to be sure, and I decided to 'stay in electronics' which was just 'going digital'. Logic Analyzers might not have happened the same way if I'd shifted, who knows?
Well, Thackray met Cohen virtually at the same time, came to Harvard to teach, went on to found the department at the Univ of Pennsylvania, and then the Chemical Heritage Foundation. He retired, sort of, to the West Coast five years ago, but is working on projects still.
We have met, discussed our mutual interests at this point (which are several!), and commiserated about our choice of line of work.
Thackray, among many achievements, did the biography of Arnold Beckman--a tour-de-force in the chemical instrumentation world, one we knew well at HP.
He added, to the 'dumb immigrant' story, saying he was a 'dumb entrepreneur also, starting a non-profit corporation re the History of Science, and a 'dumb geoscociologist' as well, since he chose both a field where everyone looks forward, not back, in a country clearly the least interested in history of any nation.
I couldn't help thinking I've found a kindred spirit!
Friday, November 8, 2013
Cuban Reflections
My wife and I just returned from an 'educational visit' to Cuba. As you probably know, it is not easy to 'go to Cuba' if you are an American, but there are a few 'allowed' tours for specific purposes through dedicated tour groups.
Cuba is a country about the size of Northern California from say Salinas to the far end of Napa Valley, about fifty miles wide (not wide enough to reach to Sacramento, for example), with 11 million people, about the same as our geography supports. It is much more distributed--Havana is the 'big city' but is only about three million folk.
Musing in the last post about what it took to make the Minneapolis Plan workable, it occurred to me that the Cuban system does have the characteristic that someone runs the place. More than we could assert for our region with the multifarious leaderships, jurisdictions, and goals.
Mind you, I am not arguing for the Cuban system--it clearly is a failed economic model. But some things stood out. They have opened the country to tourism, and while Americans are scarce (some 100,000 last year used these 'educational' tours to visit), some two million tourists from Canada, Mexico, Europe, and Asia visited, leaving behind something on the order of an estimated $4B to stimulate the local economy.
The opportunities for 'old car' aficionados are amazing. It is like a time warp for 1940-1959 American cars, including Henry J's, Studebaker Larks, Packards, and Hudson Jets. I always wondered where some of those things went. A million 1953-1956 Chevies seemed to buzz about, along with great 'restored' Buicks, Pontiacs, Fords, and Oldsmobiles, pleasing most of us on the trip. I could have sworn that I saw some folk shed a nostalgic tear or two. I saw a '59 DeSoto station wagon, not sure I ever saw one stateside.
Some were surprised by the new Audi's, Toyotas, VWs, and even Mercedes and BMWs. None of those countries are embargoing Cuba. None in our group were surprised by the omnipresent Lata's and the Moshvich's from Russia. The sleek modern Chinese bus that took us everywhere was said to be 'junk' by the driver.
Gasoline is approx $7/gallon, which for a 1955 Chevy with at best 14 mpg is pretty hefty. And wages are reportedly, for Cubans, on average about $0.40/day, so two weeks of wages buys 14 miles of travel by 'old car'. Cooking oil is a week's wage for a liter, we were told.
On the other hand, the travel folk get paid in CUCs, which is the 2nd tier of money. Our guide, a PhD in Chemical Engineering, can make a year's wages in two weeks of tour guiding. Guess what she's doing. Ditto for our bus driver.
Surprisingly to me, there was little feel of a police state or lurking army types with machine guns... hardly the feel of Yugoslavia in the 1980s or China in the 1990s. People were even candid about their views of the 'regime' though they did not use megaphones.
The recent 'celebration' of the 50-year anniversary of the Russian missiles arriving seemed incongruous, as did the tank and missile display at the Museum de Revolutionarie. Polemic books about the U.S. and its Seven League Boots are available for purchase; some of the facts about U.S. foreign policy were not that comfortable to read about from their perspective.
Which maybe is why we need to think about this. How many of you have visited (and enjoyed) Japan or Germany or Italy? Seventy years ago, they were the enemy, remember?
Weird. But we felt privileged to see this country before it morphs into modernism.
The Minneapolis Miracle
Minneapolis in 1950 was a pretty desolate, cold, forbidding place in the winter, and yet they had a couple of things going for them. First of all, they had a tremendous Scandanavian education ethic, coupled with a 'home-schooling' belief in 'well-rounded' folk that translated into a love of the arts.
Somewhat surprisingly, they voted for computers to augment the grain mills producing cereal, and the result built a formidable Computing Base. There is a new book, by Thomas Misa, director of the Babbage Institute, called Digital State, that describes some of what they accomplished with Control Data, Cray Research, Sperry, ATC, and Honeywell just to name a few. For nearly three decades, they were the true competitor to IBM on a worldwide basis.
The Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium, MECC, was briefly mentioned, but unfortunately Misa missed the real significance of this group. It in fact spawned the Apple Education group, which transformed American schools a decade ahead of any other country, which accounts still today for the leadership America has in software development. This particular factoid was also missed by Walt Isaacson's sweeping grandiose biographical treatment of our wunderkind, Steve Jobs
But my purpose here is to reflect on another element scarcely mentioned in Misa's fine book--> the Minneapolis 5% club. This was conceived by Bill Norris, the CEO of Control Data as a self-taxing scheme to rebuild Minneapolis and St. Paul (the twin cities) for the arts and sciences. Working first with the downtown Minneapolis Club, sort of a brahman Bohemian Grove membership, he convinced them that the larger corporations of the Twin Cities should set aside 5% of their pre-tax earnings and pay it to a local "Development Fund" rather than send their tax dollars to Washington D.C. and hope for grants from the national level back to their fine arts efforts. The good news was that corporate taxes then were even higher than today, so a 5% tax kept locally only cost the companies 2.5% of net earnings. The second piece of good news was that Minneapolis/St. Paul had seven of America's top 50 corporations, so this was sizable money (General Mills, General Foods, CDC, SperryRand, Honeywell, 3M, and Post Cereal). Today, of course, local Minneapolis firms include Sheraton, Target, Best Buy and Cargill -- DID YOU KNOW THAT CARGILL is as large in revenue as APPLE? Yup, foodstuffs are 'big business'.
Today, Minneapolis has more Arts per capita by a factor of five than any other city in America--some sixty-three civic playwright groups for a middling size town. It worked, for their goals. You might have been to the Guthrie Theatre?
It wasn't just 'the arts' but also the sciences. Mayo Clinic owes its strength in part to this initiative, as do many of the best biomedical advances we've enjoyed.
Why am I carrying on like this? Well, just think about it. Pittsburgh took a 2% plan version of the Twin Cities plan and rebuilt the Golden Triangle. If we had a 1% plan for just our top ten companies in the valley, it'd be $740M this past year instead of $34M. The U.S. Treasury would be $250M lighter, which could be made up by repatriating one-tenth of one percent of the squirreled-away money from last year from the same companies in the Bahaman/Irish scams... and we'd have some true outreach money--like $1B over a decade or so for local agencies. That presumably could do some good.
If there were an agreed-on plan for how to use the money, it might even make sense.
Somewhat surprisingly, they voted for computers to augment the grain mills producing cereal, and the result built a formidable Computing Base. There is a new book, by Thomas Misa, director of the Babbage Institute, called Digital State, that describes some of what they accomplished with Control Data, Cray Research, Sperry, ATC, and Honeywell just to name a few. For nearly three decades, they were the true competitor to IBM on a worldwide basis.
The Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium, MECC, was briefly mentioned, but unfortunately Misa missed the real significance of this group. It in fact spawned the Apple Education group, which transformed American schools a decade ahead of any other country, which accounts still today for the leadership America has in software development. This particular factoid was also missed by Walt Isaacson's sweeping grandiose biographical treatment of our wunderkind, Steve Jobs
But my purpose here is to reflect on another element scarcely mentioned in Misa's fine book--> the Minneapolis 5% club. This was conceived by Bill Norris, the CEO of Control Data as a self-taxing scheme to rebuild Minneapolis and St. Paul (the twin cities) for the arts and sciences. Working first with the downtown Minneapolis Club, sort of a brahman Bohemian Grove membership, he convinced them that the larger corporations of the Twin Cities should set aside 5% of their pre-tax earnings and pay it to a local "Development Fund" rather than send their tax dollars to Washington D.C. and hope for grants from the national level back to their fine arts efforts. The good news was that corporate taxes then were even higher than today, so a 5% tax kept locally only cost the companies 2.5% of net earnings. The second piece of good news was that Minneapolis/St. Paul had seven of America's top 50 corporations, so this was sizable money (General Mills, General Foods, CDC, SperryRand, Honeywell, 3M, and Post Cereal). Today, of course, local Minneapolis firms include Sheraton, Target, Best Buy and Cargill -- DID YOU KNOW THAT CARGILL is as large in revenue as APPLE? Yup, foodstuffs are 'big business'.
Today, Minneapolis has more Arts per capita by a factor of five than any other city in America--some sixty-three civic playwright groups for a middling size town. It worked, for their goals. You might have been to the Guthrie Theatre?
It wasn't just 'the arts' but also the sciences. Mayo Clinic owes its strength in part to this initiative, as do many of the best biomedical advances we've enjoyed.
Why am I carrying on like this? Well, just think about it. Pittsburgh took a 2% plan version of the Twin Cities plan and rebuilt the Golden Triangle. If we had a 1% plan for just our top ten companies in the valley, it'd be $740M this past year instead of $34M. The U.S. Treasury would be $250M lighter, which could be made up by repatriating one-tenth of one percent of the squirreled-away money from last year from the same companies in the Bahaman/Irish scams... and we'd have some true outreach money--like $1B over a decade or so for local agencies. That presumably could do some good.
If there were an agreed-on plan for how to use the money, it might even make sense.
Taking in and giving back
Okay, I couldn't resist. The last post 'celebrated' the corporate donors in our valley. But there's a context worth considering here....
Vis-a-vis the list of Silcon Valley 'donors' to our local charities, etc., I took the top five locally based high-tech firms (Cisco Intel, Applied Materials, Oracle, and SAP) and compared them in aggregate (see the last post) to five other local firms who didn't reach very far up that same list (Apple, Google, HP, eBay, and Facebook). Call them GROUP A and GROUP B
GROUP A (working from the most recent fiscal year reports)
ANNUAL REV = $163 B, growing 2.5% last year
Annual PROFIT = $36B, a healthy 21.5% margin, completely flat from last year
CASH and Equiv = $103B, up 6%
TOTAL ASSETS = $306B, up 11%
TOTAL DONATIONS locally = $32.1M, up 33%
GROUP B
ANNUAL REV = $360 B, growing 8% last year
Annual PROFIT = $40B, a fairly healthy 11.0% margin, down 20% from last year (HP the drag)
CASH and Equiv = $223B, up 18%
TOTAL ASSETS = $462B, up 12%
TOTAL DONATIONS locally are LESS THAN $3.0M, with eBay doing $1.0M announced.
So, lessee, Group B, which tends to get much more favorable Stock Market press, wouldn't you agree, makes the same amount of net profit, has twice as much cash which is growing 3x as fast, and more than twice the annual revenue, which is growing three times as fast...
and GUESS WHAT--the offshore tax shelters for these five are working JUST FINE, and the net charitable contributions at home are ONE-TENTH that of their collegial companies. So the 'giving' companies are THIRTY TIMES as generous as their somewhat more famous colleagues.
Thank goodness for the contributions of those who suport our local agencies!
Vis-a-vis the list of Silcon Valley 'donors' to our local charities, etc., I took the top five locally based high-tech firms (Cisco Intel, Applied Materials, Oracle, and SAP) and compared them in aggregate (see the last post) to five other local firms who didn't reach very far up that same list (Apple, Google, HP, eBay, and Facebook). Call them GROUP A and GROUP B
GROUP A (working from the most recent fiscal year reports)
ANNUAL REV = $163 B, growing 2.5% last year
Annual PROFIT = $36B, a healthy 21.5% margin, completely flat from last year
CASH and Equiv = $103B, up 6%
TOTAL ASSETS = $306B, up 11%
TOTAL DONATIONS locally = $32.1M, up 33%
GROUP B
ANNUAL REV = $360 B, growing 8% last year
Annual PROFIT = $40B, a fairly healthy 11.0% margin, down 20% from last year (HP the drag)
CASH and Equiv = $223B, up 18%
TOTAL ASSETS = $462B, up 12%
TOTAL DONATIONS locally are LESS THAN $3.0M, with eBay doing $1.0M announced.
So, lessee, Group B, which tends to get much more favorable Stock Market press, wouldn't you agree, makes the same amount of net profit, has twice as much cash which is growing 3x as fast, and more than twice the annual revenue, which is growing three times as fast...
and GUESS WHAT--the offshore tax shelters for these five are working JUST FINE, and the net charitable contributions at home are ONE-TENTH that of their collegial companies. So the 'giving' companies are THIRTY TIMES as generous as their somewhat more famous colleagues.
Thank goodness for the contributions of those who suport our local agencies!
Corpoate Citizenship
Nov 8, 2013, 6:06am PST
The Silicon Valley Biz Journal today carried a story about Corporate Giving in the area, titled:
The Silicon Valley Biz Journal today carried a story about Corporate Giving in the area, titled:
Meet Silicon Valley's 25 most generous companies
It was quite a list. Cisco was the #2 most generous company for the second year in a row, donating $12.0M to local agencies, up 29% from last year's $9.3M. This at a time when the company has furloughed 4,000 workers to maintain its profitability as its sales growth has slowed.
Intel, also hit with declining microprocessor sales to a sluggish PC market, was the #3 most generous, giving $7.3M, up from last year's $5.1M that earned it a 5th place ranking in 2012.
Applied Materials, one-tenth the size of Intel and supplier of much of its fabrication technology, was #4, with $4.8M, slightly up from last year.
Oracle, not thought of usually as a very generous company, was #5, donating $4.1M, down $500K from last year (maybe the sailboat party cost more than we thought).
SAP, the German company with a major R&D lab in Palo Alto, gave a whopping $3.9M up 829%, incluidng a major gift to the Computer History Museum for which I'll personally thank them!!!
Juniper, Symantec, and Agilent were #12,13, and 14 respectively, donating nearly $5.0M between them.
NetApp and Adobe gave $13M and $1.0M respectively, which eBay matched, but IBM could not.
Odd, isn't it, that we have the three largest high-tech firms in the world with major operations here (Apple, HP, and IBM), two of them HEADQUARTERED here, and collectively only one even made the list (IBM) with $651K, down 18% from last year.
Monday, October 28, 2013
APPLE SURPRISES to the upside
Contrary to the ARGUS INSIGHTS prediction (see post 5 days ago), Apple reported nearly 34 M iPhone sales--below the higher street predictions which went to 37M, but well over the 27-31M prediction by Argus. You can't win 'em all, right?
But my guess is that the Argus team will be sifting data the next few days, trying to assess where they erred, and what the algorithm tuning needs to be to become more predictive.
It's amazing to think about the jobs for numerical analysis mathematicians these days compared to twenty years ago. Ditto for library science (huh?), and curation of data (you thought it was only for museums and working for Britannica, right?).
The intersting thing to me is that these new jobs, and their immediacy, are ample proof of the STEM thesis, although clearly not what the pundits had in mind when they started the clamor.
But my guess is that the Argus team will be sifting data the next few days, trying to assess where they erred, and what the algorithm tuning needs to be to become more predictive.
It's amazing to think about the jobs for numerical analysis mathematicians these days compared to twenty years ago. Ditto for library science (huh?), and curation of data (you thought it was only for museums and working for Britannica, right?).
The intersting thing to me is that these new jobs, and their immediacy, are ample proof of the STEM thesis, although clearly not what the pundits had in mind when they started the clamor.
Sunday, October 27, 2013
MEDIA X @ Stanford
Media X@Stanford University, now entering its twelfth year, is one of the groups that should have impact and import for SHOT, although in truth Media X is focused on 'the future' rather than the past.
The interesringthing to me about STS, VTSS, and Media X at Stanford is that they all are multi-disciplinary, which is a difficult thing for most faculty folk to deal with, especially before they have tenure. Ditto for the Center for Information Technology at Santa Barbara (CITS @UCSB). All of these groups were represented at SHOT, but none of them (except STS at Stanford) have practdicing historians as their chief faculty.
This is a story worth amplifying, but it will have to await another day
The interesringthing to me about STS, VTSS, and Media X at Stanford is that they all are multi-disciplinary, which is a difficult thing for most faculty folk to deal with, especially before they have tenure. Ditto for the Center for Information Technology at Santa Barbara (CITS @UCSB). All of these groups were represented at SHOT, but none of them (except STS at Stanford) have practdicing historians as their chief faculty.
This is a story worth amplifying, but it will have to await another day
SHOT conference findings
SHOT = Society for the History of Technology. Some 300 members attended in Portland, Maine for four days, including the annual meeting of the SIGCIS (Special Interest Group for Compuers and Information in Society) with about 45 members.
Quick: what are the three reasons to have a conference in Portland, ME in October?
I would have said (1) Autumn color, (2) Lobster, and (3) a personal visit to L.L.Bean
I'd offhand say that 275+ of the attendees did not have any of these three in mind. These folk were amazingly single-minded, fixated on their professional interests. Which was, at one level, beautiful.
Too bad, since there is apparently a glut on lobster. $2/pound wholesale at the dock, $3/pound retail at the dock; $3.99/pound retail at the local supermarket. NOW THERE's A DEAL
Fall color was good, not great, in town, but 'upstate' even ten miles from the water, was classic New England brilliant reds and oranges. Sugar maple glowed, sour gum were radiant, oaks were tanning nicely, and birch, cottonwood, and alder added soft yellows.
I didn't go to L.L.Bean.
My paper was apparently well received, judging from comments afterward, and a request to consider printing it in the IEEE Annals. You can see it at www.researchgate.net/Chuck_House/
One of the clear questions that arose had to do with integrity and scholarly approach. You may recall some years back that Stephen Ambrose, among others, had a little difficulty when it was found that much of his material in his best-selling books was plagiarized. And then a spate of issues surrounding popular historians surfaced, including the prestigious and pious Doris Kearns Goodwin of Harvard, winner of two Pulitzer Prizes for works that were heavily plagiarized, it turned out.
What was impressive to me then during the controversy was how the eminent historians and journalists of the day--Arthur Schlesinger Jr. and Walter Isaacson prominent among them--rose to her defense with piteous cries about how ethical she really is, and so forth, when in fact she was guilty, Guilty, GUILTY
So guilty in fact that she had paid off one woman in order to keep it quiet years before, but did not fix the book in subsequent re-printings. And then, the ultimate insult, according to Eric Weiner in the Huffington Post: Doris Kearns Goodwin: World's Most Decorated Plagiarist Kudos to the good people at the New York Historical Society for looking beyond the past sins of plagiarism committed by Doris Kearns Goodwin and bestowing on the prolific celebrity historian a prestigious award and $50,000 prize in honor of her recent biography of Abe Lincoln, "Team of Rivals." On Wednesday the society announced that it was naming Goodwin "American History Laureate" and was giving her its inaugural book prize, which ... carries a price tag of fifty grand.
Why raise this now? Because I saw, firsthand, the enthusiasm that 'the academy' can muster to defend its own against charges of misguidance or worse. SHOT is supposed to appeal broadly to historians of science and technology, but also to practitioners across a multitude of disciplines where technology is impactful--economics, environment, business, labor, public policy, science and the arts.
What I experienced though, mostly, was that historians are favored and the viewpoints of others have a hard time getting on the floor, whether for difficulties of wording the abstract 'just so' or using the right citation index, or having less than complete historical context for observations made 'from the floor'
That didn't stop a good session one night on "how do we attract new members?" since we seem to be dwindling in numbers. And maybe it fueled the closing day, when one leader listed the top dozen or so books and papers and awards for SIG-CIS in the past decade, and asked what was common across all of the authors. The answer, which the group did not get, was that NOT ONE of the winners teaches History of anything to students. They're mostly all writers, many of them ex-practitioners. Hummn...
Quick: what are the three reasons to have a conference in Portland, ME in October?
I would have said (1) Autumn color, (2) Lobster, and (3) a personal visit to L.L.Bean
I'd offhand say that 275+ of the attendees did not have any of these three in mind. These folk were amazingly single-minded, fixated on their professional interests. Which was, at one level, beautiful.
Too bad, since there is apparently a glut on lobster. $2/pound wholesale at the dock, $3/pound retail at the dock; $3.99/pound retail at the local supermarket. NOW THERE's A DEAL
Fall color was good, not great, in town, but 'upstate' even ten miles from the water, was classic New England brilliant reds and oranges. Sugar maple glowed, sour gum were radiant, oaks were tanning nicely, and birch, cottonwood, and alder added soft yellows.
I didn't go to L.L.Bean.
My paper was apparently well received, judging from comments afterward, and a request to consider printing it in the IEEE Annals. You can see it at www.researchgate.net/Chuck_House/
One of the clear questions that arose had to do with integrity and scholarly approach. You may recall some years back that Stephen Ambrose, among others, had a little difficulty when it was found that much of his material in his best-selling books was plagiarized. And then a spate of issues surrounding popular historians surfaced, including the prestigious and pious Doris Kearns Goodwin of Harvard, winner of two Pulitzer Prizes for works that were heavily plagiarized, it turned out.
What was impressive to me then during the controversy was how the eminent historians and journalists of the day--Arthur Schlesinger Jr. and Walter Isaacson prominent among them--rose to her defense with piteous cries about how ethical she really is, and so forth, when in fact she was guilty, Guilty, GUILTY
So guilty in fact that she had paid off one woman in order to keep it quiet years before, but did not fix the book in subsequent re-printings. And then, the ultimate insult, according to Eric Weiner in the Huffington Post: Doris Kearns Goodwin: World's Most Decorated Plagiarist Kudos to the good people at the New York Historical Society for looking beyond the past sins of plagiarism committed by Doris Kearns Goodwin and bestowing on the prolific celebrity historian a prestigious award and $50,000 prize in honor of her recent biography of Abe Lincoln, "Team of Rivals." On Wednesday the society announced that it was naming Goodwin "American History Laureate" and was giving her its inaugural book prize, which ... carries a price tag of fifty grand.
Why raise this now? Because I saw, firsthand, the enthusiasm that 'the academy' can muster to defend its own against charges of misguidance or worse. SHOT is supposed to appeal broadly to historians of science and technology, but also to practitioners across a multitude of disciplines where technology is impactful--economics, environment, business, labor, public policy, science and the arts.
What I experienced though, mostly, was that historians are favored and the viewpoints of others have a hard time getting on the floor, whether for difficulties of wording the abstract 'just so' or using the right citation index, or having less than complete historical context for observations made 'from the floor'
That didn't stop a good session one night on "how do we attract new members?" since we seem to be dwindling in numbers. And maybe it fueled the closing day, when one leader listed the top dozen or so books and papers and awards for SIG-CIS in the past decade, and asked what was common across all of the authors. The answer, which the group did not get, was that NOT ONE of the winners teaches History of anything to students. They're mostly all writers, many of them ex-practitioners. Hummn...
Thursday, October 24, 2013
Carl ICAHN vs ARGUS INSIGHTS
So, a few hours ago, Apple stock was at $525 per share. Now, after TWO PRESS ANNOUNCEMENTS, it is at $530.
Here's the Icahn story:
Here's the Icahn story:
Carl Icahn to Apple: Now's time for $150B stock buyback
The effect of that buyback could be dramatic, Icahn says in letter to CEO Tim Cook: in three years, Apple's share price could swell to $1,250
And the last post was about Argus Insights, estimating that the 3rd quarter sales will DISAPPOINT. Which would likely depress the stock, at least momentarily.
Think about it: 2 new iPhones, and a new iPad two days ago, and ARGUS says "they'll disappoint" Actually, haven't the intro's already disappointed? Is that baked into the price?
What is the Apple encore? TV on your phone? MobiTV offers that today; when Apple does it, the Android versions will likely prevail (Samsung builds both already, right?)
Is the Apple iPhone 'wristwatch' apt to be the winner? Boy, talk to HP about HP-01. HP was so proud of this years ago that they gave it their premier model number.
Either Icahn is right, or Argus is right? Or, both could be right. And, actually, both could be wrong.
Enough to make a share owner nervous?
I'm betting on Argus
Out on a limb--Argus Insights
We've been impressed by ARGUS INSIGHTS on several occasion. They have "CALLED IT" on 'future events' based on their (somewhat) unique forecasting methods. They broadly sample written customer feedback re products, features, performance, claiming to gather 'more reliable, more timely, and more accurate' info than most 'data scraper' companies (e.g. Attensity, Inxight, etc).
This time, their press release today could be either a bombshell or a bust. See it at:
http://www.prweb.com/releases/argus-insights/apple-q4-iphone-forecast/prweb11230398.htm
They are flatly calling the Apple iPhone 5S and 5C a disaster, predicting 3rd quarter sales will be flat versus Q2, even with both new Phones. They go further, anticipating a 4th Q falloff from a year ago of sizable proportions.
Their numbers are a full 10% lower than the average of analysis out there, and 15% lower than the last Apple guidance.
WHAT IF THEY'RE RIGHT?
A stock price of $530/share is going to be hard to support if ARGUS is right.
IF THEY'RE RIGHT, you might want to consider what ARGUS INSIGHTS could bring to your company???
We'll know on October 28th, won't we?
This time, their press release today could be either a bombshell or a bust. See it at:
http://www.prweb.com/releases/argus-insights/apple-q4-iphone-forecast/prweb11230398.htm
They are flatly calling the Apple iPhone 5S and 5C a disaster, predicting 3rd quarter sales will be flat versus Q2, even with both new Phones. They go further, anticipating a 4th Q falloff from a year ago of sizable proportions.
Their numbers are a full 10% lower than the average of analysis out there, and 15% lower than the last Apple guidance.
WHAT IF THEY'RE RIGHT?
A stock price of $530/share is going to be hard to support if ARGUS is right.
IF THEY'RE RIGHT, you might want to consider what ARGUS INSIGHTS could bring to your company???
We'll know on October 28th, won't we?
Tuesday, October 8, 2013
ResearchGate posting
In the last post, I mentioned my opportunity to talk to a historian's conference this next Friday--about how HP 'got into computers' and parenthetically, how Beckman failed to do so.
The paper and the 'dataset' (which means the PowerPoint slides) are entered in my ResearchGate file at
If you don't know about ResearchGate, don't be surprised. It is a fairly nice repository for papers and supporting documents (like PowerPoint Slides) 'over the years' for the 'bigger events;' like a conference or a publication.
I am using this ResearchGate for several papers that InnovaScapes has prepared or workshops that we have given.
You might find some of this interesting. Drop me a note of what matteres most to you
History time -- SHOT conference this week
SHOT stands for Society for the History of Technology. This group, mostly historians of science and technology (and increasingly of Computer Science and Technology), has their annual meeting in Portland, ME this week -- think autumn colors galore.
I've joined, partially because The HP Phenomenon was well received (and even reviewed) by some in this group. And, significantly, though I've had to learn some new jargon, they're allowing me to give a paper on the origins of HP in computing.
As I worked on the paper, though, and met one of my colleagues on our panel, I was startled to hear his view that Pasadena in the 1950's was a key hotbed for computing, nearly as much and maybe even more so than MIT. And as I wrestled with this new thought, it hit me that I myself was in Pasadena in the 1950's, and boy, I surely didn't remember any of this.
True, we did have a Boolean algebra session in 10th grade (1955) that I remember well, and I did tour Consolidated Electrodynamics in 1954 as the guest of a sponsor of an Eagle Scout dinner, but I never thought of computing arising there in any significant way.
Well, truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. My colleague, it appears, is right. Fueled by the aircraft manufacturers in the area (far more important than Seattle at the time -- Douglas, North American, Northrup, Lockheed, and Convair, to name a few), analogic computation was the way to solve tons of partial differential equations, whereas the behemoths being done at UNIVAC, IBM and CDC were not.
And the irony is that Beckman Instruments was a major player, due to its need for the same kind of analogic computation for its spectrometry equipments. This led Arnold Beckman first to ask the exiled Wm Shockley if he'd consider trying to shrink the size of the backroom computer Beckman had built, using his newfangled transistor, and then when Arnold conceived the idea of using an 'instrument controller' to do industrial automation ala the Automation book by John Diebold in 1955, he funded Shockley in what was called the Beckman Shockley Laboratories. Whereupon Shockley's mother became quite ill, in Palo Alto, and Shockley asked to move the new lab to the Bay area. Beckman agreed, and the name 'Beckman' didn't make the move, although when the Traitorous Eight turned on Shockley a year later, they called Arnold first to get possible relief from their tormenting leader. It was only after he tried to be conciliatory and then stiffened that they left and set up Fairchild.
There's a great little story here about how small companies deal with large ones, but the bigger story, I think, is that Silicon Valley could well have been in West Los Angeles instead of the Bay area. And then I think about the old joke, "If your aunt had balls, would she be your uncle?" Probably not....
I've joined, partially because The HP Phenomenon was well received (and even reviewed) by some in this group. And, significantly, though I've had to learn some new jargon, they're allowing me to give a paper on the origins of HP in computing.
As I worked on the paper, though, and met one of my colleagues on our panel, I was startled to hear his view that Pasadena in the 1950's was a key hotbed for computing, nearly as much and maybe even more so than MIT. And as I wrestled with this new thought, it hit me that I myself was in Pasadena in the 1950's, and boy, I surely didn't remember any of this.
True, we did have a Boolean algebra session in 10th grade (1955) that I remember well, and I did tour Consolidated Electrodynamics in 1954 as the guest of a sponsor of an Eagle Scout dinner, but I never thought of computing arising there in any significant way.
Well, truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. My colleague, it appears, is right. Fueled by the aircraft manufacturers in the area (far more important than Seattle at the time -- Douglas, North American, Northrup, Lockheed, and Convair, to name a few), analogic computation was the way to solve tons of partial differential equations, whereas the behemoths being done at UNIVAC, IBM and CDC were not.
And the irony is that Beckman Instruments was a major player, due to its need for the same kind of analogic computation for its spectrometry equipments. This led Arnold Beckman first to ask the exiled Wm Shockley if he'd consider trying to shrink the size of the backroom computer Beckman had built, using his newfangled transistor, and then when Arnold conceived the idea of using an 'instrument controller' to do industrial automation ala the Automation book by John Diebold in 1955, he funded Shockley in what was called the Beckman Shockley Laboratories. Whereupon Shockley's mother became quite ill, in Palo Alto, and Shockley asked to move the new lab to the Bay area. Beckman agreed, and the name 'Beckman' didn't make the move, although when the Traitorous Eight turned on Shockley a year later, they called Arnold first to get possible relief from their tormenting leader. It was only after he tried to be conciliatory and then stiffened that they left and set up Fairchild.
There's a great little story here about how small companies deal with large ones, but the bigger story, I think, is that Silicon Valley could well have been in West Los Angeles instead of the Bay area. And then I think about the old joke, "If your aunt had balls, would she be your uncle?" Probably not....
Monday, September 23, 2013
Chasms sketched
I mentioned the several chasms in an earlier post. Here, built on the rubric of Geoffrey Moore's work at the tail end of "Dealing with Darwin," are two drawings that 'say a lot' in my view
This first one is adapted from Moore's book (which, by the way, is one of his better ones, built on a case study of Cisco from about 1995-2003)
We've mentioned before, both in this blog and in my INTRAPRENEURING INNOVATION blog, that this difference between Intrapreneurs and Entrepreneurs has been mostly ignored or misunderstood
And now, to the "CHASMS" in addition to the classic MARKETING CHASM that Moore so aptly described in "Crossing the Chasm"
I used these slides in a talk at the Stanford Graduate School of Business last week, part of one of their "get smart" workshops commissioned with key companies. The talk built on the historic success of HP and some of their transformations -- including the difficulty of some of those transitions. For that, they distributed copies of THE HP PHENOMENON, which is now close to being out of print since the first run is sold out, and the hue and cry hasn't been fully electric. Yes, it was Stanford's third best selling Biz Book ever when it hit the streets, but that is not a high bar. It would have been 719th or so at Harvard Biz Press. You can still get 'em at Amazon or thru Stanford Press if you hurry.
The more interesting -- i.e. more timely -- slides had to do with Apple's performance from 1997-2010, for which Professor Haim Mendelson has two great essays, and I have a 1 hour workshop that shows clearly that Jobs would NEVER have made it to the iPhone 5 if he'd had a normal Board of Directors. They'd have fired him certainly by the tenth year, if not a lot sooner. It is a dramatic example of these principles, exactly as no Business School in America would teach.
I wrapped up with this slide, which is key for the last sentence, that applies to Steve and Apple even more than to HP history
This first one is adapted from Moore's book (which, by the way, is one of his better ones, built on a case study of Cisco from about 1995-2003)
We've mentioned before, both in this blog and in my INTRAPRENEURING INNOVATION blog, that this difference between Intrapreneurs and Entrepreneurs has been mostly ignored or misunderstood
And now, to the "CHASMS" in addition to the classic MARKETING CHASM that Moore so aptly described in "Crossing the Chasm"
I used these slides in a talk at the Stanford Graduate School of Business last week, part of one of their "get smart" workshops commissioned with key companies. The talk built on the historic success of HP and some of their transformations -- including the difficulty of some of those transitions. For that, they distributed copies of THE HP PHENOMENON, which is now close to being out of print since the first run is sold out, and the hue and cry hasn't been fully electric. Yes, it was Stanford's third best selling Biz Book ever when it hit the streets, but that is not a high bar. It would have been 719th or so at Harvard Biz Press. You can still get 'em at Amazon or thru Stanford Press if you hurry.
The more interesting -- i.e. more timely -- slides had to do with Apple's performance from 1997-2010, for which Professor Haim Mendelson has two great essays, and I have a 1 hour workshop that shows clearly that Jobs would NEVER have made it to the iPhone 5 if he'd had a normal Board of Directors. They'd have fired him certainly by the tenth year, if not a lot sooner. It is a dramatic example of these principles, exactly as no Business School in America would teach.
I wrapped up with this slide, which is key for the last sentence, that applies to Steve and Apple even more than to HP history
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
CHASMS
We've been concerned lately about CHASMS or ABYSSES -- places that innovation 'gets stuck' for whatever reason.
Many are familiar with the Technology Adoption curve, built around Everett Rogers' famous S-curve. Geoffrey Moore, in Crossing the Chasm, popularized the notion that there is a large chasm between the Early Adopters and the Main-Line users -- a chasm that needs to be crossed in order to develop a large customer base for any new innovation.
Think Cisco with routers, vs. 3Com and bridges. Bridges connected users to a Local-Area-Network (LAN), and routers counnected LANs to each other to build a Wide-Area Network (WAN). Many companies emerged in the early 1980s to build LAN technology; very few emerged building WANs. Until the world had enough LANs, there was 'no need' for WANs.
Said differently, Cisco spent four years looking for commercial customers to little avail; academic institutions on the other hand loved their technology. Once enough LANs were built, the WAN became an essential link, but it took quite a while.
Analogously, the IBM PC didn't exactly ignite a firestorm at Intel; after three years of sales and a vote of "Man of the Year" for the PC by Time Magazine, IBM still did not make Intel's TOP FIFTY list.
What concerns me today though is the fact that this CHASM that Moore describes is but one of several that get 'in the way' of corporate transformation from fundamental innovation.
Moore's CHASM is a MARKETING or CUSTOMER CHASM. This one can be impacted by companies, to speed it up, or to ameliorate the issues, but it is seldom within full control of your company.
There are three others that could be titled:
1. A FUNDING CHASM
2. AN IMAGINATIVE CHASM
3. A CANNIBALISM CHASM
Each of these, by contrast with the CUSTOMER CHASM, are largely under your own control. We will elaborate on each of these in succeeding posts
Many are familiar with the Technology Adoption curve, built around Everett Rogers' famous S-curve. Geoffrey Moore, in Crossing the Chasm, popularized the notion that there is a large chasm between the Early Adopters and the Main-Line users -- a chasm that needs to be crossed in order to develop a large customer base for any new innovation.
Think Cisco with routers, vs. 3Com and bridges. Bridges connected users to a Local-Area-Network (LAN), and routers counnected LANs to each other to build a Wide-Area Network (WAN). Many companies emerged in the early 1980s to build LAN technology; very few emerged building WANs. Until the world had enough LANs, there was 'no need' for WANs.
Said differently, Cisco spent four years looking for commercial customers to little avail; academic institutions on the other hand loved their technology. Once enough LANs were built, the WAN became an essential link, but it took quite a while.
Analogously, the IBM PC didn't exactly ignite a firestorm at Intel; after three years of sales and a vote of "Man of the Year" for the PC by Time Magazine, IBM still did not make Intel's TOP FIFTY list.
What concerns me today though is the fact that this CHASM that Moore describes is but one of several that get 'in the way' of corporate transformation from fundamental innovation.
Moore's CHASM is a MARKETING or CUSTOMER CHASM. This one can be impacted by companies, to speed it up, or to ameliorate the issues, but it is seldom within full control of your company.
There are three others that could be titled:
1. A FUNDING CHASM
2. AN IMAGINATIVE CHASM
3. A CANNIBALISM CHASM
Each of these, by contrast with the CUSTOMER CHASM, are largely under your own control. We will elaborate on each of these in succeeding posts
Sunday, August 25, 2013
TED x talk on Innovation Resilience
At InnovaScapes Institute, we are mindful of the processes that get in the way of Innovation. In fact, we are dedicated to teaching ways to recognize and overcome them.
I recently gave a talk about elements of the process, especially tackling resilience as a needed quality
See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2oeSFkV7eE&feature=youtu.be
I recently gave a talk about elements of the process, especially tackling resilience as a needed quality
See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2oeSFkV7eE&feature=youtu.be
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Concluding this set of LIBERAL EDUCATION posts -- Part VIII
The question is how much this
excellent system is at risk because of the dysfunctional California legislature,
a dyspeptic electorate, and the seemingly endless budget issues that face the
state. It is against that backdrop that
increased tuition, alumni donation programs, and revocation or at least major revision
of Proposition 13 are crucial issues for our time.
It would be nice to report
that the evening ended on an upbeat note, but in fact it was disappointing.
‘Bob’ (Dr. Robert Jacobsen) remained engaging, trading insightful stories and examples in response to
many questions, but there was no conclusion, no call to action, no point of
view that seemed to hang together enough to generate a direction.
Walking back to our
campsite, one attendee lamented the missed opportunity, which provoked a
question about just what defines ‘educational excellence’ anyway. Is it learning facts, skills, and concepts –
or is it learning how and why to learn?
It is hard to imagine, for a 21st century world where the
predictions are that each person on average will have five or more careers,
that the purpose of an educational system is to teach job skills – it isn’t
even possible. And it is equally hard,
almost nonsensical, to imagine that teaching facts, especially factoids, in a connected
Internet-based world has much value or utility.
The undergraduate school,
we felt, is the nexus of opportunity – this is the place to discover, to
experiment, to turn with disinterest from one pursuit to savoring the next, to
finding your inner passion. And mentors,
coaches, and colleagues – some still call them teachers, upper classmen, and
classmates – are invaluable in this discovery process. The secret, though, of the UC undergraduate
experience is not just the breadth, the relatively modest cost, or the local
site – it is that when that passion is discovered, it can be embraced, grabbed
deeply and inhaled, from researchers who have dedicated their lives to this
domain. This is not skill-based
learning, and certainly not on-the-job training. It is completely antithetical to the government’s
“gainful employment” metric, belatedly and stupidly imposed to reduce student
loan default rates.
How do you place value on
the twenty-one separate music degrees offered at UC Santa Barbara or the
eighteen language degrees at UCLA? These
are not routes to high-paying Silicon Valley jobs presumably, although one
could have argued similarly about abstract mathematics and statistics two
decades ago, and missed entirely the huge opportunity today at such companies
as Google and Facebook for those specific skills.
Can you imagine yourself
back at age seventeen? Was it course
content, friends, or the pending job that mattered most? Some offer the ‘three rules of two’ as a good
metaphor for the successful young college student: (1) make a friend in two
days; (2) be stimulated by a teacher within two weeks; and (3) have a
project-based success within two months.
Experience these and you’ll
become more, rather than less, enthused.
This is not an argument for survey courses – in fact, it is just the
opposite. Immerse, go deeply quickly,
get infected with a field. See if it
lights your fire. If not, move on. But you’ll catch fire best if you meet
someone already on fire.
The really good schools –
those with Nobel Laureates, for example -- put them in the freshman classroom,
not tucked away in an obscure cloistered lab.
And those schools listen carefully to student ratings – who inspires in
the classroom? These are content-free
discoveries often. It is the ‘why’ that
excites researchers, not the ‘how’ – and that, we concluded around the
obligatory campfire (even though the day had been unseasonably hot), is the
secret of the UC campuses, the true genius of a Clark Kerr. Put excellent researchers on your campus, and
honor them but all the while expect them to mingle and mix with the youngest
students, to create that wonder, that spark of enthusiasm, that sense of ‘what
it takes’ to pioneer on the cusp of an important question or performance or
action. Great things will come of it.
Seems so simple, now that
we’d heard Jacobsen and reflected on it ourselves. What might it take to inculcate this message
with the California legislators and the voting public?
Excellence and the Leiden Report -- Part VII
It is worth spending a moment on the worldwide Leiden
Ranking, inasmuch as it represents perhaps the most comprehensive
rating of independent universities on scientific performance available. This is a multi-faceted set of fairly
objective metrics, trying to skirt historic prejudice.
The list for 2013, fairly
consistent for the past decade, shows some stunning results, with five UC
campuses in the top fifteen worldwide research schools. Every UC campus except Merced is in the top
100. The list shows some of America’s and
England’s best known science schools, ranked relatively low by comparison (e.g. Carnegie, Cambridge, Oxford, Cornell,
Georgia Tech):
1 1. MIT
2. UC Santa Barbara
3. Stanford
4. Princeton
5. Harvard
6. Rice
7. UC Berkeley
8. Caltech
9. UC San Francisco
10. Yale
11. UC Santa Cruz
15. UC San
Diego
21. Carnegie Mellon
24. Cambridge
25. UC Los
Angeles (UCLA)
30. Oxford
32. Cornell
34.Georgia Tech
35 UC Riverside
44. UC Irvine
67. University of Illinois, Champaign/Urbana
87. UC Davis
105. SUNY Stonybrook
Table 1 – Leiden Science rankings
Each school on this list
has achieved distinction; that all of the UC universities are so well
represented is remarkable. Taken
together, the UC system is an amazingly diverse and accomplished set of
universities, each of them broad in undergraduate offerings, and yet each of
them uniquely able in specific graduate sectors – enough that each has attained
overall world ranking – no mean feat.
This is under-recognized, but it is undoubtedly a fundamental reason for
the strong economy and creative accomplishments of Californians over the past
century. No other university system in America, or even the world, is like this.
But it is fragile. Consider: About $1.4 billion has
been cut from the UC system since 2009. It’s a trend of declining support that
escalated once the Great Recession hit. In
the past 10 years, state funding for UCLA has decreased by about half. The impact is palpable, especially for the
traditional academic departments. For example, Patrick Geary, a
distinguished scholar in medieval history, left UCLA in December after 18 years
as a history professor and has yet to be replaced.
In Geary’s view, the quality of a
UCLA education has declined considerably since 2009: “It’s been very hard, and
you just get to the point where you feel that UCLA is going to turn into Cal
State Westwood or Westwood Community College or something like that in the
future,”
According to Geary, he is the third
of three senior professors in his field to leave without being replaced in the
last six years. The losses were a significant blow to an already small
specialty. The university is operating under a partial faculty-hiring freeze.
Since 2009, academic departments have left at least 47 full-time faculty
positions unfilled ‘like Geary’s’ saving $6.8 million, according to a budget
plan released by UCLA officials in February 2011.
The slow hiring trends will
continue for several years, according to the budget plan. Last year, the economics department hired
four assistant professors. The new faculty members did not make up for the six
vacancies left over from the previous year of no hires. “The number of students
is going to increase faster than we are going to be able to hire new faculty to
teach them,” Roger Farmer, a distinguished professor and chair of the
department. said. “If that persists, I would hope the university would provide
resources so we could give students the education they deserve.”
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