tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post397487711461567314..comments2024-03-18T23:39:02.190-07:00Comments on Volatile and Decentralized: Academics, we need to talk.Matt Welshhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04255792550910131960noreply@blogger.comBlogger42125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-15248411498307983902016-01-16T17:53:30.602-08:002016-01-16T17:53:30.602-08:00I made a similar point a while back on research on...I made a similar point a while back on research on recommender systems, that showing performance of recommendations on a toy problem and small data doesn't help advance the state-of-the-art:<br /><br />http://glinden.blogspot.com/2006/01/recommender-systems-and-toy-problems.html<br /><br />There's the legitimate response that the academic community doesn't have access to the data they need. Despite some releases on anonymized data, the companies that have data mostly hold on to it tightly, and the main way to get access to it is to work at the company. Not clear how to solve this, but it's a hard problem for academic research.Greg Lindenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09216403000599463072noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-57202757652674039292016-01-12T08:25:59.420-08:002016-01-12T08:25:59.420-08:00
Am here to testify what this great spell caster ...<br />Am here to testify what this great spell caster done for me. i never believe in spell casting, until when i was was tempted to try it. i and my husband have been having a lot of problem living together, he will always not make me happy because he have fallen in love with another lady outside our relationship, i tried my best to make sure that my husband leave this woman but the more i talk to him the more he makes me fell sad, so my marriage is now leading to divorce because he no longer gives me attention. so with all this pain and agony, i decided to contact this spell caster to see if things can work out between me and my husband again. this spell caster who was a woman told me that my husband is really under a great spell that he have been charm by some magic, so she told me that she was going to make all things normal back. she did the spell on my husband and after 5 days my husband changed completely he even apologize with the way he treated me that he was not him self, i really thank this woman her name is Dr Aluta she have bring back my husband back to me i want you all to contact her who are having any problem related to marriage issue and relationship problem she will solve it for you. her email is traditionalspellhospital@gmail.com she is a woman and she is great. wish you good time.<br />He cast spells for different purposesmccarthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14264030625164091772noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-14941765072354445322016-01-11T21:23:39.137-08:002016-01-11T21:23:39.137-08:00I think NSF's budget is about $7 billion with ...I think NSF's budget is about $7 billion with about $800-900M going to CS. DARPA is about $3 billion per year and a significant fraction goes to CS (e.g., I20 is mostly CS focused and their budget is about $500 million). I'm not sure what Google's grant budget is, but I think a "lot of" funding would be in terms of hundreds of millions.<br /><br />I do agree with your point that academia could do more to work with industry, but many people in industry have little interest in working with academia. I remember running into this issue after joining a security group in a large software company. It seemed like the focus was so short term on what to do next week, that there was very little interest or opportunity in working with other groups or taking outside ideas. This was true even if they came from a research groups within the same company. Although I learned a fair bit while there, I wouldn't recommend academics join that group. I'm sure your group is different, but there are also academic groups that do a great job at working with people in industry.<br /><br />As a side note, I really like the approach Stokes takes in his book "Pasteur's Quadrant" by describing fundamental research and applications as completely separate axes. It seems like Google's based their research funding on this paradigm, which is quite smart in my opinion.Joe Hendrixhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04416117987714046906noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-11256966113292151802016-01-11T15:54:26.032-08:002016-01-11T15:54:26.032-08:00Millions of dollars a year isn't tiny.Millions of dollars a year isn't tiny.<br />Matt Welshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07077674014671176946noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-78731281694571314622016-01-11T11:41:14.297-08:002016-01-11T11:41:14.297-08:00> We give a lot of funding to academic research...> We give a lot of funding to academic researchers<br />Surely you meant to say you give a tiny bit of funding to academic researchers.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-83685614122633760682016-01-11T06:01:17.573-08:002016-01-11T06:01:17.573-08:00I agree with your last sentence, save for the fina...I agree with your last sentence, save for the final 3 words; I would say that the greatest advances have come *as a side effect* of people tinkering around or working on other, though often related, problems. While some advances (e.g. pure mathematics) come from largely decoupled work, most stem from an individual's attempts at solving a different problem entirely.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-22494996224794058082016-01-10T19:22:13.904-08:002016-01-10T19:22:13.904-08:00TANKS I LIKEOBAT ABORSITANKS I LIKE<a href="http:doktersahabat.net" rel="nofollow">OBAT ABORSI</a>Obat Penggugur Kandunganhttp://doktersahabat.netnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-53461337207207775442016-01-10T08:28:11.116-08:002016-01-10T08:28:11.116-08:00Many good points, Matt. You explicitly focus on e...Many good points, Matt. You explicitly focus on engineering and problem-based research driven and weighted by here-and-now size/significance/pain-point/USP status, the natural domain of R&D organizations. I am with you. It leaves implicit the raison d'etre -- and arguably both strength and mission by virtue of being complementary -- for academic institutions: Being independent, in pursuit of genuinely new knowledge (per se) and seeking public enlightenment (of all). These were the guiding principles of Humboldtian universities, whose unexpected consequences were serendipitous technological and commercial successes shifted across fields (pure math to crypto, pure chemistry to pharma, etc), space (somewhere else) and time (much later). No contradiction to what you advocate, expect, maybe, this:<br /><br />"I don't think we can make the workshop material public, unfortunately." <br /><br />You say academics should take industrial sabbaticals or internships -- a good thing! -- in order to see what's already been solved and what's really important, which I'm a bit worried about if requiring a Hotel-California-style cloak of company secrecy. I'd argue it's fair game to require anybody claiming novelty to produce public, reproducible evidence, including the data. It's the price of secrecy that one might get "scooped" by somebody who's doing is half-bad. A low price for a company (and often paid), but intentionally high (to favor sharing) for an academic pursuing the (Humboldtian) university's rather than the company's mission. <br />Fritz Hengleinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12926790279495715949noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-134497510101581232016-01-09T22:35:20.507-08:002016-01-09T22:35:20.507-08:00Math? Astronomy? Chemistry? Medicine? Biology? I t...Math? Astronomy? Chemistry? Medicine? Biology? I think you may have an inflated view of how big your niche of the world is. Most scientists rarely worry about industry. I'd say working along with industry is the much less frequent, and most ill advised route for an academic. The nucleus for most impactful advances on human life have and continue to come from people tinkering around in no particular direction. Anonymous Herohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08165920909685524118noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-17421946913466465872016-01-09T15:16:10.370-08:002016-01-09T15:16:10.370-08:00I fully agree with this article. I spent six month...I fully agree with this article. I spent six months at Google research which was an eye opener for me. Pivotted my research after my visit and my lab is less focused on publishing and more on developing open source software that can make a direct impact on people's lives.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-58477076347510985442016-01-09T04:40:14.915-08:002016-01-09T04:40:14.915-08:00I think it has more to do with the fact that the m...I think it has more to do with the fact that the majority of app developers is willing to program in java but not haskell. <br /><br />(IMHO, Haskell has effective ways of programming with side effects if you need them. But I agree that it is a difficult language for newbies.)Laura Dietzhttp://web.informatik.uni-mannheim.de/dietz/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-59678202653918687372016-01-08T12:33:13.193-08:002016-01-08T12:33:13.193-08:00That is things most PHD want to know but they do n...That is things most PHD want to know but they do not have chance, there are still too few internship from Google or some other industries. But really if Google can reveal more about what industry really needs, at least fresh PHDs get this big picture, otherwise they will be forced to go through paper jungleWebcrafthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09232078592880811827noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-12015057950964561202016-01-08T08:36:30.055-08:002016-01-08T08:36:30.055-08:00A place like Google is large enough that 3 days is...A place like Google is large enough that 3 days isn't going to give you a lot of context, but informal visits like this are possible.Matt Welshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07077674014671176946noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-39068247189548885292016-01-08T08:35:29.305-08:002016-01-08T08:35:29.305-08:00I guess this depends on the field and how you couc...I guess this depends on the field and how you couch the research. A lot of systems and mobile research is fairly practical, but I don't know how other fields view this.Matt Welshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07077674014671176946noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-49060690243109584452016-01-08T08:34:16.586-08:002016-01-08T08:34:16.586-08:00That's a fair point, and many academics do in ...That's a fair point, and many academics do in fact work outside the immediate interest of industry. I don't think it's the best or only way though.Matt Welshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07077674014671176946noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-52868334563356471262016-01-08T06:37:31.387-08:002016-01-08T06:37:31.387-08:00You don't to dive straight in a commit to the ...You don't to dive straight in a commit to the length of time that it needs to do an internship or a sabbatical. I negotiated three days in one company, where they arranged that I got to talk to everyone: sales team, support desk, developers, management. That gave me enough context to know what questions to ask and to determine whether a longer internship would be useful. Is this sort of short, intensive, personal experience something that Google (and others) would be willing to copy?Fredhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05736679221757582406noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-28991180724246170602016-01-08T06:10:15.133-08:002016-01-08T06:10:15.133-08:00I would say that it is difficult for some reviewer...I would say that it is difficult for some reviewers do realize the relevance of a practical research. In my specific case, I took almost two years to get a paper accepted because of this.Sabrina de F. Soutohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11595087972145840206noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-66293158199927717742016-01-07T23:50:11.246-08:002016-01-07T23:50:11.246-08:00Well you titled your post provocatively. You want ...Well you titled your post provocatively. You want to get the eyeballs, well they are here. It is not difficult to squint and see how my answer was within the boundaries of your contrived post: it is those academics that may want to do "industry relevant" research that I am advising against doing it. A very clear cut argument can be made that contributing creatively to any problem is better than toiling in the narrow confines of a short lived business agenda.Anonymous Herohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08165920909685524118noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-82454436364157132952016-01-07T22:42:07.949-08:002016-01-07T22:42:07.949-08:00I think this is wrong-headed and not, in general, ...I think this is wrong-headed and not, in general, a good way of having an academic career.<br /><br />It's not the only path, but many successful academics work on stuff that can be more or less immediately turned into a product or a startup company. Others work farther out on things that might not be practical for years to come. You *can* do industry-relevant research if you want to; this post is about avoiding the pitfalls.Matt Welshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07077674014671176946noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-56703344979689413432016-01-07T22:18:42.376-08:002016-01-07T22:18:42.376-08:00Ideally, academics should really stay away from an...Ideally, academics should really stay away from any research that can in any way and form be profitable for a company. Companies should do it all on their own. In fact, Matt is correct, when academics try to do it they usually don't do it well enough and company people get frustrated (e.g. Matt). Best way to have academic+industry mashup is the way it usually happens: academics do something new, some companies benefit from it and take it further.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-5591735318838447062016-01-07T21:30:33.852-08:002016-01-07T21:30:33.852-08:00I loved this post. I am an academic ("trying ...I loved this post. I am an academic ("trying to be" would be more appropriate) but I come from an engineering world. I learned some of the points you mention as keys that we need to focus on as academics, in an effort to visualize/aim at real products.<br />I'm trying to apply that everyday, it's difficult.<br />We have biotechnology projects and try to really align with what medical people NEED! The people we collaborate with are reluctant to it, it's natural for them to prove a concept. Don't ask for a field solution. Don't ask for a solution at all...<br />I believe we can change that, as students are willing to see their work used, in other people's hands. Especially in healthcare.<br /><br />But it's a struggle to ask for any quality tests, or yield evaluation, or repeatability, or debugging, or any optimization of a prototype.<br /><br />Thanks for sharing. You have a new follower.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18253264035382894940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-32224411007474546252016-01-07T21:29:32.935-08:002016-01-07T21:29:32.935-08:00I loved this post. I am an academic ("trying ...I loved this post. I am an academic ("trying to be" would be more appropriate) but I come from an engineering world. I learned some of the points you mention as keys that we need to focus on as academics, in an effort to visualize/aim at real products.<br />I'm trying to apply that everyday, it's difficult.<br />We have biotechnology projects and try to really align with what medical people NEED! The people we collaborate with are reluctant to it, it's natural for them to prove a concept. Don't ask for a field solution. Don't ask for a solution at all...<br />I believe we can change that, as students are willing to see their work used, in other people's hands. Especially in healthcare.<br /><br />But it's a struggle to ask for any quality tests, or yield evaluation, or repeatability, or debugging, or any optimization of a prototype.<br /><br />Thanks for sharing. You have a new follower.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18253264035382894940noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-17117577325041346012016-01-07T20:47:40.927-08:002016-01-07T20:47:40.927-08:00I'm not a good person to write about having a ...I'm not a good person to write about having a successful research career outside of a university, because I don't think I'm having a research career anymore :-) But see: http://matt-welsh.blogspot.com/2012/06/googles-hybrid-approach-to-research.html<br /><br />I don't think we can make the workshop material public, unfortunately.<br />Matt Welshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07077674014671176946noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-21574015541788964372016-01-07T17:47:02.696-08:002016-01-07T17:47:02.696-08:00Maybe you shouldn't be an academic if you don&...Maybe you shouldn't be an academic if you don't actually have any ideas. Doing the right thing is hard, because people have incentives to do the wrong thing - everybody has constraints. Academics somehow think this is special to them. Also, the main point of this post is that the proposals themselves are bad - where are all the revolutionary ideas? If someone has a truly good idea, it's actually not hard to get funding in my personal experience.Deniz Kuralhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01645386276306151972noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9186457242428335144.post-20612933512951395202016-01-07T16:22:45.263-08:002016-01-07T16:22:45.263-08:00Good points Matt. I've spent all my research c...Good points Matt. I've spent all my research career in industry, and faced a different challenge .. problems that are valued in an industrial research setting being considered engineering or integration work by the academic community. I stopped publishing for a few years because it seemed pointless.<br /><br />Two requests: can you please write a blog post about how to have a successful research career in CS outside of a University? Also, the workshop you held at Google on mobile computing challenges .. any chance you can make the agenda or any of the material public? Thanks!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com