Friends: Here is what a US expert thinks about China and India as threats to the US domination in technology. He says we have a poor government in India, our education system (barring a few exceptions) is no good and our infrastructure is crumbling. Should we not do something to improve? Regards. Arun [Subbiah Arunachalam] ---------------------- In his recent book, "Three Billion New Capitalists: The Great Shift of Wealth and Power to the East", Clyde Prestowitz quotes a Chinese friend: "We've had a couple of hundred bad years, but now we're back." Yet shrugging off the burden of history is not so easy, particularly when, as recently as 1966-76, the brightest and sparkiest people were dumped in labour camps. The Chinese have been able to turn their country into a manufacturing giant because of their willingness to work harder and longer; but turning it into a service giant, let alone an innovation hub, will require different qualities. China's biggest problem is a culture of deference--a culture that was refined by the mandarin tradition and then reinforced by the Communist Party. For many Chinese it is bad form to question superiors. So far, China has been much more adept at borrowing other people's ideas than producing its own, particularly when it comes to high-level innovation. But there are plenty of other problems, ranging from poor English-language skills to weak intellectual-property rights. Many Western companies are rightly nervous about developing new products in a country where ideas are routinely stolen. India's difficulties have more to do with another intractable problem: poor government. The country's infrastructure is crumbling and the education system is hugely uneven. The Indian Institutes of Technology are very good at producing a highly educated elite, but run-of-the-mill colleges are often of poor quality. The result is graduate unemployment of 17% at a time when the high-tech economy is booming. ___________________________________________________________ To help you stay safe and secure online, we've developed the all new Yahoo! Security Centre. http://uk.security.yahoo.com