[LINK] Some Future Directions for the Australian Digital Economy

[Tom Worthington]

The Australian Government has invited input for a Digital Economy 
Future Directions Paper 
<http://www.dbcde.gov.au/communications_for_business/industry_development/digital_economy>. 

It listed six consultation topics. Here are my recommendations for them:

---
1. Open Access to Public Sector Information:

The Australian Government should adopt the US Government's policy of 
open access to Public Sector Information (PSI). This can be 
implemented using the Australian Creative Commons licence 
<http://creativecommons.org/international/au/>. The Commonwealth 
Library Deposit and Free Issue Schemes (LDS) should be changed to 
encourage electronic distribution, with the paper option retained for 
the few items where this is not suitable 
<http://www.finance.gov.au/e-government/service-improvement-and-delivery/publishing-information/lds.html>

    2. Digital confidence:

The Australian Government should continue to follow European practice 
with use of the OECD privacy principles 
<http://www.oecd.org/document/18/0,2340,en_2649_34255_1815186_1_1_1_1,00.html>.

    3. Developing Australia's knowledge and skills base:

The Australian and State governments should increase funding for 
Education Network Australia (edna) <http://www.edna.edu.au/> and the 
Australian Flexible Learning Framework 
<http://www.flexiblelearning.net.au> encourage further such joint 
state/federal initiatives. The distinction between secondary, 
vocational and the higher education sectors for funding of the 
development of e-learning content, tools and training should be 
removed. A condition of public funding for the development of tools 
and courses should be free open access. The federal government's 
Digital Education Revolution, should incorporate e-learning and 
e-literacy 
<http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2008/02/digital-education-revolution.html>.

    4. Ensuring Australia's regulatory framework enables the digital economy:

Australian should support international copyright principles and 
avoid making exceptions to support US publishing interests.  As 
Professor Geoff Walsham argues it is a "Non-Flat World" and Australia 
can benefit from being part of a wider culturally heterogeneous 
environment 
<http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2009/01/icts-and-global-working-in-non-flat.html>.

    5. Digital economy and the environment:

The Australian Government should adopt a realistic CO2 emissions 
target of 25% to 50% reduction by 2020, in accordance with the 
Garnaut Report <http://www.garnautreview.org.au/>. The Australian 
government should implement the recommendations of the Personal 
Computer and Monitors Energy Efficiency Strategy prepared for the 
Environment Department 
<http://www.tomw.net.au/technology/it/pcmees/pc-report-10.html>. The 
Australian Government should fund its senior ICT staff to undertake 
the ACS Green ICT course, or equivalent training in ICT energy 
reduction 
<http://www.acs.org.au/cpeprogram/index.cfm?action=show&conID=greenict>.

    6. Measuring the digital economy and its Impacts:

The Australian Government should restore previously cut funding to 
the Australian Bureau of Statistics to allow the suspended ICT 
statistics to be again collected 
<http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2008/04/government-statistics-cutbacks-threaten.html>.
---

Also, while the consultation paper was good, the consultation process 
was poor: 
<http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2009/01/future-directions-for-australian.html>.

More in my blog at: 
<http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2009/01/some-future-directions-for-australian.html>.



Tom Worthington FACS HLM tom.worthington at tomw.net.au Ph: 0419 496150
Director, Tomw Communications Pty Ltd            ABN: 17 088 714 309
PO Box 13, Belconnen ACT 2617                      http://www.tomw.net.au/
Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Australian National University