Today’s physics news: Internet has no “off switch” @timberners_lee

Physics news for Thursday 6 September 2012.

Tim Berners-Lee: The internet has no off switch

There is no “off switch” for the internet, says the British inventor of the world wide web – and that is a good thing, because it could only be undone by governments around the world coordinating to turn it into a centralised system. Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who launched the first web page on Christmas Day 1990, was speaking at the launch of a global league table showing which countries put the web to work best.

The Guardian

Fight club: Do prizes and awards boost innovation?

In this article, Dr Ainomaija Haarla, present and CEO of Technology Academy Finland, and Dr Dean Baker, Centre for Economic and Policy Research, discuss whether prizes and awards boost innovation in science and technology.

The Times: Eureka  (Subscriber only)

Get the bridge builders in

Funders have launched a £30 million initiative to encourage engineers to find solutions to medical problems. The Wellcome Trust and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council are jointly funding the Innovative Engineering for Health programme, which will fund a minimum of three projects over seven years. The funders said they hoped the scheme would give researchers flexibility and resources to develop engineering solutions to pressing healthcare needs such as tackling mental health issues or rare diseases.

Times Higher Education