crazy idea but not so crazy: a research fund

[waynakyo]

Guys it is becoming clear that "cloning" or hair multiplication is going to be the way to go in the future.
The japanese, german, plus Christiano (as of yesterday) have all proved this concept.
The more money these guys have, the more they invest in this, the faster we will get to the bottom of this, which is likely going to save us from lifelong baldness.

Think about it: we can easily with some coordination start a hair-loss-research-fund that would invest in these serious folks on the condition that they report to us in detail their progress. We can even create incentives for these researchers to cooperate with each others (something academia doesn't do a good job at).

All it takes is starting this fund (we need a lawyer to help us set this up, any of you is?) and donations. There are at least 10000 baldies on these forums and obviously thousands more who would care to donate but not on forums.

This has been done with other diseases.

cheers

 

[hellouser]

I've proposed this idea a long time ago. I'm more than prepared to tackle all the marketing and design elements of such a project (I'm a 12 year veteran in advertising and marketing specializing in graphic design), and while there was some movement with another forum memeber here by the name of Axel, I haven't heard back from him in weeks as both him and I have more or less decided on a logo, name and website design. I'd need help with web development.

 

[XXXXXXX]

Is funding an issue for someone like Jahoda and his team ? I know it isn't for the Japanese.

 

[maher]

This researchers, scientiests they are financed by this huge pharmaceutical lobbys. and the question is: do they want to find the cure??? there is so much money they can milk from us by reinventing treatments and useless suplements. theres a whole industry in balding. just like diabetis and other diseases..

 

[Deadman1]

There will never be a cure. Too much grant money given away to "find a cure". Why find a cure and lose the grant money along with your job?

 

[DesperateOne]

I think this is going to go nowhere.
Here is my personal opinion, why not fully fund Kane, from thekaneshop. We trust him, if we send him a lot o money for research and development, he should be able to come out with something really fast for the consumer. Any money that goes to the private sector you can be asure that those greedy badtards will try to give themselves bonuses on it.

 

[karankaran]

profits fuel innovation ! i am not some socialist idiot who thinks i am "entitled" to hard work of others !

 

[hellouser]

There will never be a cure. Too much grant money given away to "find a cure". Why find a cure and lose the grant money along with your job?

Just like with all the billions of dollars poured into cancer research. How far have they come along with all that money and effort they've received? NOWHERE. It's like theyre accepting all the money in the world to keep themselves employed.

 

[XXXXXXX]

The reality is though, there's more money to be made by offering the people something that actually works.

They say that only 7-8% of men treat their hair loss. Its not cause they don't care, its because there really
aren't any viable safe treatments as of right now. If hair multiplying was the gold standard, you can bet
that 90% of guys would be in line to get their hair back, no questions asked.

There will be a surgical cure, it will most likely be in the form of hair multiplying/consistent donor regeneration.
The *Ultimate* cure will be gene therapy, but I doubt we will see that in our lifetime.

 

[odalbak]

I'm having good results with dermarolling so far. I may take part to this fund idea but only if dermarolling eventually fails on me which I hope won't happen.

 

[karankaran]

I am going to just say it and it might OFFEND some people (coz most ppl here are irked by dissenting opinions), so be it - your views on how science functions is so utterly misguided...scientists take all the grant money and keep the cure to themselves, i wonder if there is some science secret society fueled by those "ugly capitalists"!!!...baldness is related to our genetic predisposition - has any "cure" for any genetic diseases found? No. It is only lately that research on regeneration and stem cells have leaped forward! and if scientific research is so resistant to finding any "cure", why is any progress being made now,,, and FYI , a lot of progress has been made on cancer... may be there is not some "cheap universal" cure , yet...but survival rates have increased and it all happens in increments... "Scientists accepting money to keep themselves employed and deliberately not find a cure" - ... do you know how much recognition and money scientists will earn if they find a cure.... Creationists use the same argument ...btw

-

 

[waynakyo]

Yes this idea has been suggested before by many, including me back in 2008 or so. The main criticism I hear from you is: what will it do? There are investors out there with more money.

As a background: this is my field, I am an MBA and work in a big corporation in the US and know quite a bit about investors attitude to these things. So here I have some further thoughts for you.

First, ask yourself, why does the government invest in cancer research and not investors? Because there is under-investment in cancer research by the private sector. Why? The answer is simply statistics. Tech companies have a very high chance of failure and quite frankly even if I had 10 Million dollars I would not put a lot of money in a single tech company. Our advantage is that we CARE about this, it is not for the money, and each of us will put a small sum, which amounts to a month or so of drug supply. Investors to solve this problem by diversifying their portfolio between many tech companies, but it is not that easy. There is a second BIG problem, which investors know well, companies and researchers tend to lie, they want to inflate their stock prices (or if not listed general expectations). That is the old problem of asymmetric information. Investors do NOT have the time to look into the details of each company, it is too costly. The result: there are good projects out there that do not get the financing they deserve.

We are not investors (not-for profit), we CARE about this deeply, and some of us are impressively curious about the details.

Imagine this: one of us (not me) can go and meet these people and tell them they have potential research money for them if they open up and treat us as their shareholders. Christiano or other would have to put a presentation together to tell us why SHE should get the money not the Japanese or other. We can give them incentives to coordinate too. We can put a board of 10 members or more who will vote on which company will get funding.

10,000 "donors" , 500 lifetime donation (not in a single payment of course), that is 5 million. Just an idea of the potential. But a good website and good advertising can get us up to million donor. This has been done in other areas, and opens up a world of possibilities.

There is so much time wasted on this forum because information has been lacking, because promising companies ran out of funding, or because they lied to us for years, and so on. With enough money one might be even able to finance trials in cheaper countries with less regulatory bureaucracy.

If you think it is a good idea, let us know.

 

[maher]

Yes this idea has been suggested before by many, including me back in 2008 or so. The main criticism I hear from you is: what will it do? There are investors out there with more money.

As a background: this is my field, I am an MBA and work in a big corporation in the US and know quite a bit about investors attitude to these things. So here I have some further thoughts for you.

First, ask yourself, why does the government invest in cancer research and not investors? Because there is under-investment in cancer research by the private sector. Why? The answer is simply statistics. Tech companies have a very high chance of failure and quite frankly even if I had 10 Million dollars I would not put a lot of money in a single tech company. Our advantage is that we CARE about this, it is not for the money, and each of us will put a small sum, which amounts to a month or so of We are not investors (not-for profit), we CARE about this deeply, and some of us are impressively curious about the details.

.

Buddy.. where did you get your MBA? Baghdad uni??

US goverment is powered by corperate lobbying. it's been like that since Eisenhower. and getting worse with Clinton.. Its been a while since your representatives in congres reflected peoples interests. Don't fool yourself. even i know that and im not from US.

I've got better idea. You can run for congres and represent the interests of bold..or bolding people in your state. Since like 20% or more are loosing hair, even more are bold. I would say you have a good chance!
Or we can form.. how do you call it??? a Tea party movement ?! finding cure for baldness will be our only goal.


ps: I DO think it's a good idea. just outside US. independant lab, personnel. from scratch.

 

[waynakyo]

Maher, or my buddy from Baghdad, you make an excellent point: there are morons on this forum who can't tell their arse from their elbow and they like to troll any conversation just because they think they have some vague idea about a vaguely related issue.

Nothing in what I said relied on government or politics, it was purely a private initiative. But I won't waste my time any further.
sincerely,
your ivy league buddy

 

[odalbak]

your views on how science functions is so utterly misguided...scientists take all the grant money and keep the cure to themselves, i wonder if there is some science secret society fueled by those "ugly capitalists"!!!. (…) "Scientists accepting money to keep themselves employed and deliberately not find a cure" - ... do you know how much recognition and money scientists will earn if they find a cure.... Creationists use the same argument

Your view about today's scientific research is excessively idealistic. Sure, the perspective of future profits has always fueled discoveries and innovations. But that process, as effective as it is, also produces recurrent excesses and problems that derive from its very nature. First is the corruption of scientists establishing fake solutions based on flawed studies. This has always existed in science history and today statins are a good example of this kind of scientific fraud. Second is the establishment by scientists of problems as actual pathologies when they're not, in order for companies to sell unnecessary products (with often potential side effects). Today's DSM V is full of that. Third, in order to find a cure, or to establish it officially as a valid solution through the obligatory process (FDA and all…), and make that solution available as a medical product, one has to find at least 250 million dollars — that's generally the minimum amount of money needed but it often goes higher—, and that has to be found from big investors that don't put their money into something that doesn't bring back profits to them, quite understandably. Problem happens when there's no high profitability that can be expected from the cure… I'll give one recent example. Scientists at the university of Oxford have found a compound that's a synthetic version of a ketogenic element found in coconut oil. Coconut oil has been experienced by many people as very effective at stopping the progression of Alzheimer disease, and putting weakening neurons back to normal — dead neurons remain dead. That product found by Oxford is much more powerful and would be less costly for buyers. Problem is in order to put that thing on the market you need to spend the big money I mentioned, and so far no one is interested in spending it for something that's already obtainable in food stores, although in a more expansive form.

 

[Armando Jose]

...

As a background: this is my field, I am an MBA and work in a big corporation in the US and know quite a bit about investors attitude to these things. So here I have some further thoughts for you.

....
There is a second BIG problem, which investors know well, companies and researchers tend to lie, they want to inflate their stock prices (or if not listed general expectations).....

lies, lies and lies, real and good point but the time is over.....

 

[karankaran]

This thread has taken off in a complete new direction. I gave up a well paying job to pursue scientific research so that I can help burn victims tomorrow or help people who do not have limbs... ..but looking at this thread makes me think that people think science is a web of lies concocted by greedy researchers .. those same "greedy scientists" brought you vaccines that might explain why you can walk without a crippled leg...they are the ones why enabled you to use computer and internet to propagate your sickening conspiracy theories....when every finding of yours is verified multiple times, how can you fool people!! when you guys here have to prove your "regimen" is working , what do you do? Post pictures! and sometimes cite research to show a possible pathway for action or know why something is working ! scientific research works on the same premise - showing proof by evidence and models! anyways, i am not going to come back to this thread....people say only right wingers are anti-science, but i always knew that people who conform to any sort of conspiracy theories and a false sense of entitlement are equally dangerous..

 

[hellouser]

Yes this idea has been suggested before by many, including me back in 2008 or so. The main criticism I hear from you is: what will it do? There are investors out there with more money.

As a background: this is my field, I am an MBA and work in a big corporation in the US and know quite a bit about investors attitude to these things. So here I have some further thoughts for you.

First, ask yourself, why does the government invest in cancer research and not investors? Because there is under-investment in cancer research by the private sector. Why? The answer is simply statistics. Tech companies have a very high chance of failure and quite frankly even if I had 10 Million dollars I would not put a lot of money in a single tech company. Our advantage is that we CARE about this, it is not for the money, and each of us will put a small sum, which amounts to a month or so of drug supply. Investors to solve this problem by diversifying their portfolio between many tech companies, but it is not that easy. There is a second BIG problem, which investors know well, companies and researchers tend to lie, they want to inflate their stock prices (or if not listed general expectations). That is the old problem of asymmetric information. Investors do NOT have the time to look into the details of each company, it is too costly. The result: there are good projects out there that do not get the financing they deserve.

We are not investors (not-for profit), we CARE about this deeply, and some of us are impressively curious about the details.

Imagine this: one of us (not me) can go and meet these people and tell them they have potential research money for them if they open up and treat us as their shareholders. Christiano or other would have to put a presentation together to tell us why SHE should get the money not the Japanese or other. We can give them incentives to coordinate too. We can put a board of 10 members or more who will vote on which company will get funding.

10,000 "donors" , 500 lifetime donation (not in a single payment of course), that is 5 million. Just an idea of the potential. But a good website and good advertising can get us up to million donor. This has been done in other areas, and opens up a world of possibilities.

There is so much time wasted on this forum because information has been lacking, because promising companies ran out of funding, or because they lied to us for years, and so on. With enough money one might be even able to finance trials in cheaper countries with less regulatory bureaucracy.

If you think it is a good idea, let us know.

We should talk... im a 10+ year veteran in graphic design, marketing and advertising. A collaborative effort could really push things forward.

 

[DesperateOne]

Maybe if we go for something topical, we should just pass it off as a cosmetic and not go throughout FDA

 

[waynakyo]

I get discouraged and I guess you too Hellouser, when I see how the usual discussion evolves on these forums. You get so much nonsense thrown at you that you wonder whether it is worth the effort to start any collaborative effort. Fine for me to stay on the side for now, but if you come across more people who are interested in the idea in the future let me know and we could talk more.