17th September 2008, 01:54 PM
Quote:quote:Originally posted by bob
lets throw another one in...
I hadn't intnded this to become an 'us against them debate' but while we're at it... Perhaps this needs another thread, but I was surprised so few commercial archaeologists reacted to the article in British Archaeology, which could have been read as 'I'm from Oxford University for for fricks sake, how dare these oiks dig next to my site without my permission and without immediately giving me unfettered access to their results'. I'm paraphrasing of course, but Bob's comments are spot on. Why do we have to spend ages coming up with research aims costed on a shoestring because of the risk of being undercut, when any undergrad can put together a proposal with minimal experience.
Ultimately it doesn't matter who is doing the work or research as long as they produce something decent at the end, but it is a further part of the problem for commercial companies. The time spent writing up large projects is time not spent winning new ones and making much needed cold hard cash. Academics in the mean time get funding for research without particularly having to worry about where it comes from (my somewhat simplistic understanding of the situation, sorry), and then take 20 years to publish it without anyone suggesting that they might be fired as a result.
What would be nice would be a bit more working together.