Communications of the ACM
President Obama Touts Role of Basic Research in Innovation
In his recent address at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy, N.Y., U.S. President Barack Obama cited the need for the United States to strengthen its commitment to basic research, which he says is vital to the country's global competitiveness. He stressed that tapping the Internet's full potential is essential to U.S. innovation, and this entails faster and more wide-scale broadband deployments and the implementation of rules to guarantee that the Internet remains fair and open to all U.S. residents.
Obama noted Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski's announcement of guidelines designed to achieve this goal. He announced his proposal of grants through the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and the National Science Foundation to investigate "the next communications breakthroughs, whatever they may be."
Obama also said that he has established a goal to invest three percent of U.S. Gross Domestic Product into basic research and development, which he said has been badly neglected for decades. "When we fail to invest in research, we fail to invest in the future," Obama said. "Yet, since the peak of the Space Race in the 1960s, our national commitment to research and development has steadily fallen as a share of our national income."
From Computing Research Association
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