It seems to me that Gershenfeld is missing the other half of the equation: the actual environment. Not just the access to expensive tools and smart people, but the relative social seclusion and coddling that MIT and other think tanks engender. Ref Anathem.

MIT is a patron in the old-school sense of the word, and that to me has always been just as important as the laundry list of benefits that Gershenfeld mentioned.

You can be the smartest person in the world with access to everything you could ever need ... but if you're working 40 hours a week as a fry cook at McDonalds, you're probably not going to solve the world's problems. Sometimes, you just need someone to say "don't worry about it, you go do your thing" so that you can get stuff done.

RE: Is MIT Obsolete?