"MSFT had something called blackbird or bluebird, which was gonna be their AOL clone."
How successful was that clone of a dead business model?
"what motivation would any of them have had for providing complete interoperability. "
The same motivation that drove PC into success over Mac in terms market penentration . . . and the same reason why Mac was reborn after it adopted PC hardware and unix software. Yes, every company tries to set up "tollgate" just like every department in the government tries to set up their own tollgate. The difference is that private companies compete and always have an incentive to eat each other's lunch, whereas the various departments are set up as non-compete entites by laws and regulations.
"you are thinking small. look at the specs of computers like ASCI Blue Pacific, ASCI White, BG/L (Blue Gene/L), Roadrunner. and look at the price tag."
And they are peanuts compared to the revenue from billions of microprocessors sold worldwide every year. If government research model worked, the Soviets would have long won the Cold War. They did not lack brilliant minds; nor did they lack bureacratic organization; what the lacked was the invisible hand giving them the price signal to allocate resource properly.
"the best way to beat the system was to cheat so extensively that your failure would mean failure of the whole system. that way, if you lose, you're guaranteed a government rescue. "
Isn't that the natural result of any system that entails government back-stopping? How is it any different from welfare queens? or elderly who give away all their assets to relatives in order to qualify for government assistance?
"if you oppose taxation, elect suitable representatives. you have representation. again, that's how we govern ourselves. "
Once again, who are "we"? Are you sure you are not some closet soviet-style collectivist? Soviet too had representation; in fact, measures were usually passed with 96% votes. BTW, the Brits also thought the North American colonists had representation. As for why not a beach front property in Costa Rica, the answer is quite simple: economy of scale; specialized skills are more useful when it can be leverage to a larger audience.
"throw robotics at the free market and u get roomba. throw robotics at the army and you get hoards of wireless reconaissance drones. "
You are forgetting the armies of robots in the auto industry. The robots behind Honda and Toyota's reliability beats the wanton human-killing drones anyday. In fact, even the roomba is more useful to human prosperity than human killing drones, which does typify what the government usually does with technology.
"no, the soviet union and china did not have government-funded PEER-REVIEWED research. they had government projects. there is a serious difference. "
Of course they had peer-reviewed research. The IPCC global warming peer-review process is very much modeleed after the soviet process: science mixed with authority and politics.
"american universities are superior, of course. its known world-wide. why? because researchers at universities are doing cutting edge research. why? because they are funded through peer reviewed grants, which in turn they use to fund their own research and train their graduate students. and in turn they turn over technology to industry (cisco) or produce graduate students who exploit what they've learned (google) or spin off their own companies (akamai). "
Peer reviewed grants are widely available in most big countries. It's the last part, the connection to industries, that's missing in many other countries. In other words, it's the connection to the free market that makes American universities superior.
"and i'm sure, with v2's raining down on them, most folks appreciated the urgency. although clearly turing did not appreciate the army's efforts to cure his homosexuality. "
Need I remind you that it was an optional war for the UK? And that screening for homosexuality (and communist tedencies later, and probably islamic tendencies now) are part and parcel of the government funding process with peer-review; obviously, such critical matters can't be left to some long-haired mad scientist with deviant tendencies (whatever the deviance of the day is politically defined).
"free market is cool but it can use guidance, especially when the issue is basic research. that is the role of government or philosopher-kings or whoever we can find to take responsibility for such enormous decisions. with luck, they'll be smart people with good advisors. hockey moms need not apply."
In other words, if it's guidence to bring fund to my pet project, it's cool; otherwise, let's fight over the money through armies of lobbyists.
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