The recovery may be rocky at the moment, but when it picks up steam, confidence will increase, jobs will return and the Great Recession will become an unpleasant memory (and perhaps a useful subject from which to draw policy lessons).

Even so, some industries will never recover because they're destined to go the way of milkmen and carriage makers. Which ones? Market research firm IBISWorld Inc. recently combed through a trove of data to determine the answer to this question.

I’m probably going to get in trouble for this post because the answer to the title question is yes and no. I am employed by the University of Queensland which prides itself as being the most successful commercializer of research in Australia. However, I have never been convinced by the simple argument that universities matter because they produce groundbreaking research that can be patented and sold to commercial interests. While many academics believe this to be the case, the evidence shows that this is possibly the least important thing that a university can do for the business community.

In a survey of firms in Brisbane, Australia we found that universities were relatively unimportant as sources of innovation. Customers, suppliers and competitors are far more important as sources of innovative ideas. That doesn’t mean that the three universities in Brisbane are doing a bad job or that Brisbane businesses should be trying harder to work with universities because it is similar to the results from other surveys around the world. The following table from a study by Cosh, Hughes and Lester (2006) is typical of this. When firms were asked about valuable sources of ideas for innovation, universities appear down the bottom of the list.

Durham, N.C. — Better trained and educated workers – especially engineers – along with faster technology transfer from public labs to the private sector and an immigration plan to help foreign students to remain in the U.S. headlined the shopping list of ways the government could help boost entrepreneurship and create more jobs. Slideshow President Obama speaks at Cree Obama visits Cree

So said a collection of nearly 40 private sector executives and entrepreneurs who met in Durham with Austan Goolsbee, chair of the Council of Economic Advisors to President Obama, and members of the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness

“We want to hear from you,” said Goolsbee, who chaired the meeting at a packed conference room in the headquarters of advertising and marketing firm McKinney.

It's a tension that dates to the founding of the country: In our representative democracy, should those who make the laws reflect the entire citizenry, or should they be chosen from an educated elite?

Or to put it in terms that matter in the pages of The Chronicle: Should lawmakers be people who have seen the inside of a college classroom?

In Federalist No. 10, James Madison debated the merits of republics and democracies, arguing that delegating government to elected representatives should "refine and enlarge the public views, by passing them through the medium of a chosen body of citizens, whose wisdom may best discern the true interest of their country." That sounds like a point for the ivory tower.

Many startups struggle with how much money they should raise. There are a lot of factors that you need to think of, and those factors vary depending on what you’re trying to launch.

If you are a biotech startup, you may need a lot more capital than, say, a mobile app startup. There are two schools of thought when it comes to raising money for a seed stage startup: Raise as little as possible to avoid early dilution, or raise as much as you can as soon as possible.

There is no one right answer, so let’s review both scenarios to see which may be a good fit for you.

ModernRussia spoke with Victor Sedov, the president of the U.S.-Russia Center for Entrepreneurship about the organization’s role in helping Russia develop an entrepreneurial economy. The brainchild of the U.S.-Russia Investment fund, the center was intended to spur entrepreneurship education in Russia at a time when this concept was just starting to catch on.

Mr. Sedov sees the role of entrepreneurs in the economy as being crucial to Russia’s economic growth and social development. In his estimation, the opportunity for Russia’s entrepreneurship is “basically incredible” with the center working to foster this potential through programs focusing on networking and more hands-on training to help business-owners successfully manage growth.

Running a business while raising a family has quickly become the optimum choice for many mothers. When corporate life would leave limited time for family, mompreneurs are embracing flexibility. Recent statistics show an increase in the number of moms choosing this way of life.

Statistics Canada estimates that women account for 80 per cent of new business owners, and a large percentage of these women are moms. Industry figures show 70 per cent of mompreneurs are under the age of 40, while one in ten are in the 40-49 age bracket. Mompreneurs aged 50 years and older are the second largest demographic and account for 20 per cent of the segment, increasing at a rate of four per cent per year.

How many times have you missed a visitor or package because you did not hear the doorbell ring? Laurence Rook’s mom faced the same problem. At only 13 years old, he has designed a unique doorbell that will call you when someone rings it, reports The Tech Herald.

When rung by would-be burglars, the Smart Bell’s internal SIM card instantly connects with the owner’s mobile phone, allowing them to create the illusion of being at home and providing them with a little more peace of mind while out and about.

The Rotherham area will soon have a higher profile on the international stage, thanks to a new project that aims to both support foreign businesses locating into the region, and also help existing local businesses to take their first steps to develop business opportunities overseas.

Building on two decades of successful delivery of incubation programmes and inward investment, Rotherham Investment & Development Office (RiDO), the regeneration arm of Rotherham Council will manage the ‘Soft Landings Zone’ (SLZ) project that aims to embed additional international business into the area, and help existing businesses to grow in global markets.

The SLZ project will help overseas companies looking to establish operations in the UK, explore the UK market or to use the UK as a base for further European activities. Potential investor companies from overseas will be offered a comprehensive array of services, including; fully equipped modern office facilities, available on flexible easy in/easy out terms, and with full reception & admin support. Assistance will be provided to access relevant specialist help and advice, linking to appropriate support organisations and trade bodies.

People with primary insomnia may be able to find relief by wearing a cap that cools the brain during sleep, suggests a research abstract that will be presented Monday, June 13, in Minneapolis, Minn., at SLEEP 2011, the 25th Anniversary Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies LLC (APSS).

According to the authors, a reduction in metabolism in the brain’s frontal cortex occurs while falling asleep and is associated with restorative sleep. However, insomnia is associated with increased metabolism in this same brain region. One way to reduce cerebral metabolic activity is to use frontal cerebral thermal transfer to cool the brain, a process known as “cerebral hypothermia.”

A decade ago I didn’t pay much attention to the VP of HR position. Today, I view it as a key role if you are growing headcount at least 50% year over year and have more than 20 people in the company. And, title inflation notwithstanding, I prefer to call it “VP of People” since we are people after all, not “human resources” or “HRs”.

Over the past five years, I’ve had the privilege to work with a handful of amazing VPs of People. And, as several of our portfolio companies continue their incredible growth rates, I’ve been involved in recruiting a few new ones to these companies. I have three basic principles for each of them.

1. The VP of People must be part of the executive team and report to the CEO. Many companies that I’ve been involved in have viewed the VP of HR as “key recruiter and HR administrator.” This is not very useful and – in a startup that is growing quickly – dramatically under positions the VP of People as you’ll see in my next principle. If the CEO isn’t willing to have the VP of People on his executive team, I think it’s worth asking the question “why not – aren’t people the most important resource you are adding to your company?”

The innovation engine that powered the U.S. economy over the last century seems to be slowing down and dying, threatening not only local opportunities, but the economies all over the world. The $30 billion trade surplus in advanced technology products that America enjoyed just one decade ago has now become a $56 billion deficit.

More and more people, like Henry R. Nothhaft, in his new book “Great Again: Revitalizing America's Entrepreneurial Leadership” are already calling these last ten years the “Lost Decade.” Nothhaft has put together a challenging but small list of things we have to do to revitalize our innovation leadership, and I’m supportive:

Liberate entrepreneurs from regulatory shackles. Startups in the U.S. face the highest combined federal and state tax rates in the world. At 39%, it’s more than 50% higher than the European Union countries average of 25.5%. Rates around the world are still going down, while U.S. rates have remained fixed for the last ten years.

Combine a challenging job market with youthful creative spirit and you get a crop of recent college graduates contemplating the entrepreneurial life.

Some experimented with self-employment while in college. According to the Youth Entrepreneurship Study by the Young Entrepreneur Council and Buzz Marketing Group of more than 1,000 college students and recent grads, more than a third of them (36%) were side-preneurs -- they started businesses while getting their degrees, and about 1 in 5 (21%) started businesses after college because they couldn't find a job.

Many, however, go into it essentially relying on instinct. According to the study, 73% of those surveyed did not take classes in entrepreneurship, and 70% of those who did called their classes "inadequate."

In San Francisco, being an Entrepreneur puts you at the top of the food chain and failing is worn like a badge of honor, so most people can’t wait to jump into a pool full of startup Kool-Aid. Even the non-swimmers.

The problem is they think it’s all about working at coffee shops, raising a lot of money and speaking at conferences. If they get funded, they act like they’ve made a sound career decision, one that led to a promotion. Trouble is, it isn’t true. Most entrepreneurs are like artists: passionate and starving

I’m not sure when being an entrepreneur turned into a career but it’s a dangerous way to look at it. It’s like waking up one day deciding to become an artist. You don’t decide to become an artist, it comes from a passion to create.

WASHINGTON, June 13, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Leaders from nearly three dozen top universities and national laboratories say that America must make radical changes in its manufacturing policy to maintain its innovation leadership, in a report released today by the Council on Competitiveness. Ignite 2.0: Voices of American University Presidents and National Lab Directors on Manufacturing Competitiveness calls for a stronger partnership between research and manufacturing - especially manufacturing at scale, improved vocational and STEM education and a commitment to supporting higher education and science.

The report's findings were unveiled by the Council's leadership at the Detroit Economic Club, and reflect the views of America's premier research university presidents, including Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson and Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Dr. Susan Hockfield. Directors of five national laboratories were also surveyed for the report.

George Haines is a 36-year-old former gym teacher at St. Philip and James school in Long Island. A few years ago, Haines started a technology course to teach PreK-8th grade students all about entrepreneurship.

"Being a gym teacher isn't really that different now than it was in 1980. But technology changes so fast. It's even different between now and April," says Haines.

The technology class isn't an elective. All students take it, but the curriculum is different for each age group. Younger children are taught computer basics and play games, many of which have been created by startups.

So many of my company’s clients want to brand themselves–to be known in a sea of competitors as the best. And while this is certainly possible, it takes deep pockets and lots of time — something most small businesses don’t have.

And so I say that branding is a luxury.

What I mean by this is that there are many other things that will bring in sales more quickly than branding. I define branding as anything done to make your company stand out in a sea of non-differentiated brands, and that includes everything from your logo to sponsoring events locally and nationally.

Climate change, energy, health and SMEs will form the centre of European Commission proposals for research funding within the new Common Strategic Framework (CSF), which will be renamed today (10 June) at a 700-strong stakeholder event.

The CSF will follow on from the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) after it expires in 2013, but the new funding pool will be the subject of heated debate as the Commission mulls over a White Paper to be released later this year.

The White Paper will outline how the research budget should be allocated under the new programme, which will roll together several existing structural and cohesion funding mechanisms under a common umbrella.

University associations, national research institutions, government officials and business leaders will all mingle at the conference, during which in the Commission will unveil the new name of the programme after holding an open competition to settle the matter earlier in the year.

Australian private equity and venture capital continued to generate attractive returns over one-, three- and five-year periods as of the year ended December 31, 2010, when compared with the S&P/ASX 300 Index.

Performance for the same periods was mixed when compared with the S&P/ASX Small Ordinaries Index, which performed stronger over the one-year period, according to the Cambridge Associates LLC Australia Private Equity and Venture Capital Index.

"Despite its relative underperformance during the fourth quarter of 2010, the Index performed favourably over the medium- to longer-term, when compared against the domestic public market and domestic bond market indices," said Eugene Snyman, Managing Director at Cambridge Associates' office in Sydney, Australia.

Although he lives in a world where he is shunned by pop song lyricists, grandmothers, big-box shoppers, house cats, classic rock radio programmers, and all left-brain-thinking people, Doubt continues to throw dynamite at history and use his outlaw thinking to move us all forward. Some love him. Others hate him. But nobody ignores him.

In the following excerpts from Doubt: Unconventional Wisdom From The World's Greatest Shit Disturber by Paul Lavoie, the cofounder and chair of ad agency TAXI, we learn why that all too common emotion can lead to uncommon results.