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The Technology Race Between U.S., China
by Winter Casey
China soon will be better than the United States at developing basic science and technology and offering products and services that reflect that lead, according to a new study from the Georgia Institute of Technology. But U.S. experts said the conclusions should be taken with a grain of salt.
"The 2007 statistics show China with a technological standing of 82.8, compared to 76.1 for the United States, 66.8 for Germany and 66.0 for Japan," according to a summary of the study. "Just 11 years ago, China's score was only 22.5. The United States peaked in 1999 with a score of 95.4."
Nils Newman, a co-author of the National Science Foundation-backed study, said the United States has been the main driver of the global economy since World War II. "Now we have a situation in which technology products are going to be appearing in the marketplace that were not developed or commercialized here."
"It's like being 40 years old and playing basketball against a competitor who's only 12 years old -- but is already at your height," Newman added. "The future clearly doesn't look good for the United States." The institute has been comparing the technological competitiveness of 33 nations every three years since 1987.
Although the report summary has China racing ahead, its indicators rely not just on data but also on subjective expert opinions. The study does note that the indicators "suggest tremendous short-term momentum for continued growth in technological competitiveness [for China] but some flags of potential concern longer term."
Jim Lewis, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, noted that until 1945, there was multi-polar competition among major powers and the United States did not usually lead. Once it took the lead, predictions of decline proved wrong.
In 1958, Lewis said, "the president's science adviser said the Soviets were going to surpass us. They didn't. In the 1960s, the Commerce and Treasury departments said it was the European Union that would drive the global economy.. They didn't. In the 1980s, everyone thought Japan would pull ahead." These days, he added, "we need to ask if China's score would fall if we subtracted the IT exports of Chinese subsidiaries of U.S. companies."
Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, said "the prediction of China's ascendancy is significantly overstated." China is still "an extremely poor nation with high levels of inefficiency and low levels of productivity," he argued.
"Even the Georgia Tech study acknowledges that China's position on several indicators has declined in the last two years and their predicted position in 15 years is lower than many nations," Atkinson said. "What the report also did not point out is that to the extent China is gaining in the innovation economy, a not insubstantial portion of that gain is coming from high-tech mercantilist policies that violate the spirit, and often the letter, of international law."
Scott Wallsten, vice president for research and a senior fellow at iGrowthGlobal, said the study's conclusion that China has skyrocketed in its high-tech exports is misleading because it includes every export made by U.S. companies but assembled in China.
Michael Nelson, a professor at Georgetown University, said "it is impossible to dispute that China's steadily becoming a global leader in key technologies." But he added that the study can't predict whether China will surpass the United States and Europe or how China "might use its growing technological prowess to dominate market segments or shape technical standards."
Thailand Touts Its Fight Against Piracy
Thailand's head intellectual property official said she hopes U.S. trade officials this year will recognize improvements in her country's protection of intellectual property, according to the Thai News Agency.
Puangrat Aswapisit, director-general of the Intellectual Property Department, said Thailand wants to be removed from the United States' "priority watch list" of the worst IP infringers in 2008.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative each year recognizes improvements by some foreign trading partners to better protect intellectual property in its annual "Special 301" report. Last year Thailand along with Argentina, China, Chile, Egypt, India, Israel, Lebanon, Turkey, Russia, Ukraine, and Venezuela all received poor IP marks and were put on the priority watch list. Nations on the list risk losing trade privileges if they fail to make enforcement progress.
Puangrat said her department is submitting information that shows Thailand has made progress.
Also on the IP front, the European Union and China are working on a plan to increase the protection of intellectual property. "The action plan will include specific commitments for both parties to strengthen cooperation on protecting [intellectual property rights], with details still under discussion," Laszio Kovacs, the EU commissioner of taxation and customs, said in Beijing.
Xinhua News Agency reported Tuesday that the commissioner said both the European Union and China have agreed to establish IP plans.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has announced two projects in Canada and South Korea to test a program designed to speed patent examinations. Under the program, known as the Patent Prosecution Highway, offices in those nations can use the work done by the U.S. PTO rather than repeating the process.
PTO recently hosted a meeting of IP leaders from Brazil, China, Egypt, India and Mexico. The gathering was the first time officials from the six offices had met to discuss mutual interests.
Canadian Official Wants Privacy Changes
Canadian Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart is pressing the government to change its privacy laws.
"We have seen a proliferation of identity theft and spam, as well as a tripling of reported data breaches around the world last year," Stoddart said in a statement Monday in recognition of Canadian Data Privacy Day. The Office of the Privacy Commissioner said Stoddart wants the government to make it mandatory for businesses to notify people when their personal information has been compromised.
Data Privacy Day is supported by the International Association of Privacy Professionals, Google, Microsoft and the Center for Democracy and Technology, among others.
Report: Internet Health Clicks Reflect Bias
When Internet users perform Web searches about health, they are likely to pay more attention to information that matches their beliefs, according to research released this week by the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia.
Researcher Enrico Coiera said the Web is increasingly being used by people to guide individual health decisions. The use of the Internet for health has resulted in people ordering drugs online, as well as "complementary medicines online and these can interfere with other medications," said Coiera. Even if good information is available online, it doesn't mean people will change their views, he added.
"Our research shows that, even if search engines do find the 'right' information, people may still draw the wrong conclusions," he said. "In other words, their conclusions are biased." Coiera, who is also the director of the university's Center for Health Informatics, said people are strongly influenced by the first or last documents they view in searches.
Researchers from the university created a Web interface that they said could help people better sort search information and reduce decision bias.
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