Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!hplabs!hplabsz!taylor
From: vned@engr.uky.edu (D. V. W. James)
Newsgroups: comp.society
Subject: Re: University Education and Industry Needs
Message-ID: <1473@hplabsz.HPL.HP.COM>
Date: 25 Jan 88 05:33:07 GMT
Sender: taylor@hplabsz.HPL.HP.COM
Organization: Univ. of KY Engineering Computing Center
Lines: 17
Approved: taylor@hplabs

An interesting book that I would like to recommend to everyone is
"The Media Lab" by Stuart Brand.  It gives a relatively detailed, and
certainly interesting, description of the origin, goals and work at this
lab at MIT.

One of the interesting things about the lab, and the part that makes 
it appropriate to this discussion, is that over 90% of the labs funds 
come from various corporations.  These include Apple, IBM, NEC, Kodak, 
a couple of the braodcast networks and movie studios and others.  For 
your donation you get unlimited visiting rights to the Lab, which means 
that you can see *all* the work going on, not just the stuff you are 
explicitely interested in.  The process seems to work just fine; in 
essence the companies are all funding a think tank that shares the 
results.  Read the book for a better explanation, but it seems to be 
a nearly ideal mix of corporate and academic strengths.

Vnend