September 13, 2013 **** Socialists never learn**** Thomas Lifson****
** ** The socialist president of France, Francois Hollande, thinks the French government can pick winners when it comes to the industries of the future. * *** Nicholas Vinocur of Reuters<http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/12/france-industry-idUSL5N0H73T020130912>writes: **** Francois Hollande laid out a 10-year roadmap on Thursday to revive French industry by promoting new technologies to drive job creation, but which offered little public money from stretched state coffers. (snip)**** "France is a nation of inventors, pioneers and producers," Hollande said, citing France's role in previous centuries and decades in developing technologies from the steam engine to hot-air balloons and rechargeable batteries.**** "We have a duty to remain so," he added, nonetheless insisting the plan was not a return to the so-called "dirigiste" state-directed industrial policies of the 1960s and 1970s.**** France's new Public Investment Bank will be on hand to offer credit for innovation - no amount was specified - but officials said they hoped to match every euro of public money invested with 10 euros raised from private investors.**** State-appointed "industrial officers" will press firms to work together and develop successors to French projects of the past such as the supersonic Concorde or high-speed TGV train - both fruits of state-funded research plans. (snip)**** Flanked by Industry Minister Arnaud Montebourg, Hollande was shown robot technology, models of an electric plane built by EADS, a driverless car being developed by Renault-Nissan and an ultra-fuel efficient vehicle being tested in Peugeot's laboratories that would retail at 15,000 euros ($20,000).**** At present both Peugeot and Renault are struggling to maintain production in France due to high labour costs and employment laws that make it tricky to adjust staffing levels.**** Apparently news of Solyndra has not reached the Élysée Palace, and Minitel, France's previous surefire, can't-fail, effort to pick the big industry of tomorrow, has been flushed down the memory hole. That's weird, because it was only a year ago that the plug was pulled on it after three decades of state-led investment.**** Not many Americans even noticed Minitel, but the French were pretty sure they had outsmarted the Yankees and the Japanese three some decades ago. The BBC <http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18610692> explains:**** It was born in the white heat of President Valery Giscard d'Estaing's technological great leap forward of the late 1970s.**** An expert report then concluded that with proper investment the nation's telephone network could be complemented by a visual information system, accessed through screen-keyboard terminals.**** "As well as being a technological project, it was political," says Karin Lefevre of France Telecom. "The aim was to computerise French society and ensure France's technological independence."**** [image: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/assets/450px-Minitel1980.jpg]Rolled out experimentally in Brittany, Minitel went national in 1982, offering the telephone directory and not much else.**** Gradually the offer increased to a vast array of services - banking, stock prices, weather reports, travel reservations, exam results, university applications, as well as access points to various bits of the state administration.**** All users had to do was dial up a number on the keyboard, then follow instructions that juddered out in black and white across the screen.**** Minitel reminds me of Hi-Vision, the analog-based hi definition television system pioneered by the Japanese government broadcaster NHK, which I watched debut in Japan in the early 1990s. There was a considerable push to offer content and sell a critical mass of the very expensive receivers, so that Japan could dominate the next stage of television equipment and receivers. Like Minitel, Hi-Vision was rendered obsolete by American technology which developed digital high definition.**** Bureaucrats make lousy choices when it comes to developing commercial products. Their goals, time horizon, and degree of flexibility and responsiveness are all wrong. France is making a big mistake.**** *Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2013/09/socialists_never_learn.html* at September 15, 2013 - 02:50:47 PM CDT**** __._,_.___ __,_._,___ -- -- Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "PoliticalForum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
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