From nntpusr@festival.ed.ac.uk Fri May 19 04:11:41 1995 Return-Path: Received: from mx4.u.washington.edu by stein2.u.washington.edu (5.65+UW95.05/UW-NDC Revision: 2.33 ) id AA23756; Fri, 19 May 95 04:11:41 -0700 Received: from hitl-new.hitl.washington.edu by mx4.u.washington.edu (5.65+UW95.05/UW-NDC Revision: 2.31 ) id AA03094; Fri, 19 May 95 04:11:35 -0700 Received: from ben.britain.eu.net (ben.Britain.EU.net [192.91.199.254]) by hitl.hitl.washington.edu (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id EAA29169 for ; Fri, 19 May 1995 04:11:33 -0700 Received: from haymarket.edinburgh.ac.uk by ben.britain.eu.net via JIPS with SMTP (PP) id ; Fri, 19 May 1995 12:11:20 +0100 Received: from festival.ed.ac.uk (festival.ed.ac.uk [129.215.128.24]) by haymarket.ed.ac.uk (8.6.10/8.6.10) with SMTP id MAA14319 for ; Fri, 19 May 1995 12:11:17 +0100 To: sci-virtual-worlds@britain.eu.net Newsgroups: sci.virtual-worlds Path: rych From: Rycharde Hawkes Subject: UK VR Research Centre X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2] Message-Id: Organization: Edinburgh University Date: Fri, 19 May 1995 11:09:49 GMT Lines: 45 Sender: nntpusr@festival.ed.ac.uk Status: OR This appeared in the UK Computing Press (Computer Weekly) yesterday: Centre aims to spearhead VR research ==================================== Salford University is bidding to become the UK's main centre for research into virtual reality (VR). The university has teamed up with the VR division of Intelligent Systems Solutions (InSys) to form the National Centre for Virtual Environments, based on the Salford campus. The centre is now lobbying to have government funds for research, distributed by the research councils, channelled to Salford instaed of being spread across departments at several universities. "At our national centre industry will drive academic research," said Professor Peter Brandon, pro-vice-chancellor for research at Salford University. Earlier this year the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council awarded Salford a grant of more than 320,000 pounds sterling to buy the latest VR hardware. ------- This concerns me more than a little. Whilst the notion of a VR research centre is good, I feel that one *national* centre would be detrimental to research within the UK. In addition, certainly *some* research with industry ties is needed but to have *all* VR research driven by present or near-future commercial viability is constrictive. Can anybody from Salford/InSys shed more light on the matter? Rych ===================================================================== Rycharde Hawkes Virtual Environment Laboratory email: rych@hagg.psy.ed.ac.uk University of Edinburgh Tel : +44 131 650 3426 Fax : +44 131 650 6534 WWW : http://hagg.psy.ed.ac.uk/ "Rome wasn't built in a day, but if they'd just worked harder..." =====================================================================