| Home > Govt > Is there any action the Australian digital interactive media industries can take to stand down their state of crisis? |
| Is there any action the Australian digital interactive media industries can take to stand down their state of crisis? | | Date Created: 12 May, 2005, 10:19 AM |
 The Digital Content Industry Action Agenda group comprises the key thought leaders from throughout the Australian media and technology sectors. All its (unpaid) participants are focused on how to ensure Australia remains digitally creative, efficient - and competitive with overseas players. The group has hunted far and wide for survival clues - even analysing successes from the pharmaceutical, wine, tourism and biotech sectors. All those industries enjoyed serious structural intervention by the Government with incentives and stimulants. Could those work for Australia's ailing digital media industry? The group's Chairman, Tom Kennedy, talks about how our digital media industry can compete on a level global playing field. Our problems are numerous: limited access to capital, a shortage of needed skills and a trend towards outsourcing outside Australia. And then there are the underlying problems such as our modest population size and its consequent lack of market scale. Kennedy considers whether it harder for contemporary hi-tech companies to become the new Looksmarts and Sausage Softwares of the boom times in the late 90s. And if it is harder, he describes what he thinks should be done to help. Issues covered include: Did our digital industries enjoy any wins under the Free Trade Agreement with the United States? And will the Group's efforts help ordinary Australians conquer the "digital divide"? The result of the Group's work will be a report that is tabled to Cabinet in August to advise the Australian Government on the best way forward. Watch the Quicktime version for Mac users here, and the Flash video version for Windows PC users here. The H264 version for video-capable cellphones can be right-click downloaded from here. The Windows Media version can be right click downloaded from here.
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