OT on DNA (or maybe not so OT) (Re: Meeting with a political person)

kim2 at bruning.demon.nl kim2 at bruning.demon.nl
Mon Jan 21 17:04:47 UTC 2002


On Mon, 21 Jan 2002, Richard Smedley wrote:

> kim2 at bruning.demon.nl wrote:
>
> > Maybe the biology world needs something like the FSF too. ^^;;
>
> It has it :-)
>
> http://www.genewatch.org/Press%20Releases/pr18.htm
>
> and its own sourceforge ;-)
> http://www.hdra.org.uk/hsl/index.htm


Hurray! That's good.


One might wonder if several anti-patent organisations might not work
together for some initiatives. (Though admittedly this might not yet be
(seen) as relevant at the moment).

<future developments>
I think that in the near to medium-range future more and more industries
are going to run into patent problems, due to advanced computerisation and
miniturisation.

Things are getting smaller and cheaper. Originally you would need an
entire building to house some production facility, and millions of dollars
to build and operate it. Due to emerging technologies such as nanotech and
biotech and evolutionary advances in CAM systems, these production systems
are getting smaller and smaller. People are already speculating that in
the not-even-so-distant future, you will have manufacturing facilities
that can easily sit on your desk.

Imagine downloading your office-chair off the internet and "printing" it
out. Now there's a whole can of worms, just waiting to be opened. :-)

</future developments>

Currently production systems for digital media, paper documents, small
mecahnical components and other small things can fit on your desk. Semi
automated systems for making chemical compounds also probably fit on your
desk, though they might be a bit messy.

In approx 10 years time electronic circuits could be produced automaticaly
on the desktop. Larger and larger mechanical components should also be
produceable in time.

I think you can see where this is going to go. I once read on a company
website something like "We're going to napsterise the entire world."

Who knows, maybe they'll succeed ;-)


Hmmmm, right now, the FSF is on the front line. It might be a good idea to
try and fit the FSF activities into a larger scale stratagy.

Something like stimulating biological firms to use GNU Gene-sequencing
software might be a good idea for instance. Or getting a micro-factory
company to use GNU CAD/CAM :-)

That way we stick to the basic way of working the FSF has, and still help
out "our friends".

Comments?

read you soon,
	Kim Bruning




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