Comments on: Australian science and scientists http://clubtroppo.com.au/2008/10/09/australian-science-and-scientists/ Fri, 09 Jan 2009 04:59:45 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.5 By: Rafe Champion http://clubtroppo.com.au/2008/10/09/australian-science-and-scientists/#comment-323236 Rafe Champion Sat, 11 Oct 2008 04:16:05 +0000 http://clubtroppo.com.au/?p=6036#comment-323236 Yes Conrad, now you mention it there are quite a number of dodgy sites that have been done with one-off grants. The ones I know about are small and arts-related so the waste of funds was petty in the larger scheme of things but it is a pity when it happens to a big site at a major university. It is a pity that the part designed for school teachers has not been picked up by someone else to keep the content current. But maybe there are better sites available that are being maintained. The bio of scientists is a waste of space given the quality of material in the National Dictionary of Biography. Yes Conrad, now you mention it there are quite a number of dodgy sites that have been done with one-off grants. The ones I know about are small and arts-related so the waste of funds was petty in the larger scheme of things but it is a pity when it happens to a big site at a major university.

It is a pity that the part designed for school teachers has not been picked up by someone else to keep the content current. But maybe there are better sites available that are being maintained.

The bio of scientists is a waste of space given the quality of material in the National Dictionary of Biography.

]]> By: conrad http://clubtroppo.com.au/2008/10/09/australian-science-and-scientists/#comment-322940 conrad Thu, 09 Oct 2008 20:49:18 +0000 http://clubtroppo.com.au/?p=6036#comment-322940 It's easy to bet on why it has been pensioned off -- it's more than likely they got funding from one of the government sources for a certain number of years, and once it ran out, that would have been pretty much the end of it (except for a big tick for project successfully completed). There are unfortunately innumerate projects like this which provide databases of this, that, and the next thing (some of them once useful and good), but that's just the way funding and grants often work. It’s easy to bet on why it has been pensioned off — it’s more than likely they got funding from one of the government sources for a certain number of years, and once it ran out, that would have been pretty much the end of it (except for a big tick for project successfully completed). There are unfortunately innumerate projects like this which provide databases of this, that, and the next thing (some of them once useful and good), but that’s just the way funding and grants often work.

]]> By: Jacques Chester http://clubtroppo.com.au/2008/10/09/australian-science-and-scientists/#comment-322863 Jacques Chester Thu, 09 Oct 2008 12:13:24 +0000 http://clubtroppo.com.au/?p=6036#comment-322863 "Sparc" or "SPARC" is also the name of a<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sparc" rel="nofollow"> family of processors</a> from Sun Microsystems. “Sparc” or “SPARC” is also the name of a family of processors from Sun Microsystems.

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