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But how many geeks do we have? And should we encouraging more kids to forsake their Playstation, Xbox or TV in favour of taking an interest in science and other geeky things?

The reason I ask is that I believe we really need to encourage kids to take an interest and get involved in science at an early age if we're going to compete head-on in a knowledge economy.

Millions of dollars are spent every year encouraging kids to participate in sports -- and that's a good thing -- but where's the funding designed to wake kids up to the exciting world of science?

When I was a kid (and dinosaurs walked the earth), science was a very hot and exciting topic. Man was edging ever-closer to walking on the moon, nuclear power was still "trendy" and there were even science programmes such as "Mr Wizard" on TV that entertained, educated and encouraged kids to take an interest.

Remember that last century saw NZ boxing well above its weight in the world of science, with a Kiwi even being first to split the atom -- but can we maintain this level of performance now that marketers are spending so much money trying to attract them to other activities?

The popularity of personal computers gave geekdom a good boost in the 1980's, but now that the PC has become just another "appliance", most kids seem to be more interested in using them to play games or surf the web than they are in finding out how they work.

Even geeky pastimes like HAM radio seem to have lost a lot of popularity in the face of email, instant messaging and web-surfing, so what can we do to boost the number of amateur scientists in our ranks?

I've noticed that Prime TV recently screened a science-oriented kids programme at around 4pm on weekdays and, while it was fairly good, I never saw it promoted anywhere so I suspect it rated poorly.

Although there's probably still a national science fair system (I hope), might it be time to give science the boost it appears to need if we're going to be turning out kids with a passion for the subject?

Will TVNZ's charter provide scope for a locally produced "science for kids" programme that might help foster the next generation of very smart Kiwi scientists?

I wonder how much greater our profile in the global knowledge economy might be if we'd spent just half the money invested in our young athletes on fostering an amateur interest in science?

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