Davos Newbies

If anyone else has been waiting for the first really senior politician to come out as an excellent blogger, I think we can declare a winner with UK foreign secretary David Miliband:

Here’s what I didn’t know before attending my first European Council for Heads of Government and Foreign Ministers last night.

People smoke.  Three on cigarettes, one cigar and one pipe.  Everyone thanks everyone else for their excellent contribution even when they disagree.  It seems to be ok to do a lot of texting and even to read a book.  And a bit like a basketball match all the excitement is in the last five minutes when huddles of tired people stick to their guns or make compromises to get a solution.

There’s even a full-text RSS feed.

Eye-opening statistic in today’s Financial Times:

In 2005, the 17 countries of the Arab world together produced 13,444 scientific publications, fewer than the 15,455 achieved by Harvard University alone.

But James Wilsdon argues that change is visible. A number of Arab countries are now pouring vast sums into research facilities. That’s all to the good, but without a deep-rooted culture of open, inquiring minds there is a danger that these countries will end up with magnificent complexes of buildings, a number of highly paid imported minds, and little else to show.