A review of Stuart Cunningham. 2013: 'Hidden Innovation: Policy, Industry and the Creative Sector'. Queensland University Press. ISBN 9780702249556

Both the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) are being subjected to close scrutiny, but from different quarters. During the lead up to the British general election in 2015, the Cameron Conservative government issued a Green Paper, BBC Charter Review, July-October 2015, which broke new ground in terms of the scope of such an enquiry for its level of institutional criticism. Whilst ostensibly the document only purported to raise options for future change, and invited public submissions for consideration, there has been widespread concern about the possible serious intentions of the government for the corporation’s future. Though the ABC appears to be subject to much less vitriolic attack than its British counterpart, it too faces a range of threats and abuses. Paradoxically, such aggressive scrutiny comes at a time when both broadcasting corporations enjoy record audiences, continuing high levels of public trust, and on-line market leadership as a result their successful development of new digital platforms.

In March 2015 Australia became the 50th country in which US video streaming company Netflix had set up a local operation to supplement its planned global expansion in 200 countries. Newcomers Presto and Stan also joined in to further add to the extraordinary rate of growth of all forms of video traffic in Australia, now over half of Telstra’s Internet business. So who is Netflix, and how well might it expand its business in addition to those customers in Australia who are already using virtual private networks (VPNs) to access and pay for their programmes? The company began as a DVD on-line mail rental service in the US over fifteen years ago, but its management always saw the huge potential to use the Internet as –“direct mail on steroids”– for the on-line delivery of movies to homes. Whilst Netflix commendably offers more choice of programmes for Australian viewers, an examination of its business model could hardly support the notion that the established commercial television networks now face a fundamental existential threat. Nor should the notion of “mass digital connectivity” be taken for granted – not only because Australia still has so far go to reach ubiquity of the connection of homes to high capacity broadband, but also because of the serious lack of affordability of direct user pay services for so many Australians. The most likely future scenario is the on-line streamers will be welcomed by a growing number of paying customers, but as a complementary sector to the strong network television incumbents.

Cunningham gives a succinct historical sweep of how economic growth can be attributed to innovation as far back as the industrial revolution of the nineteenth century.However, my let down as I read towards the end of this book was my hope of a big take away about bright prospects that we all might somehow build, and all agree upon, constructive national innovation policy for the future.I guess I was hoping for the policy leadership of Paul Keating to be applied here.That is, to somehow grab a hugely imaginative public policy idea, do the tough homework on its development, sell it publicly to get it really well understood, be prepared to take the flak from all sides and above all, stay the course.We need a kind of innovation policy equivalent of Paul Keating's brilliant national superannuation scheme so widely heralded today.But it's grossly unfair to Stuart Cunningham alone to expect him to carry the load alone in a field with generally limited public understanding of the complexity of issues related to the creative industries and Australian innovation policy.Yet surely in the context of the debates that Australia has an urgent need to diversify its economic base because of its narrow dependence on the mining and resource sector, we must all look to the remarkable opportunities innovation can bring as part of our necessary re-think.As I put down this valuable book I thought again of Dave Warren of the black box flight recorder fame who was listed among the 'Top 100 living geniuses' in 2007, (he died in 2010 aged 85), compiled by a panel of experts on creativity and innovation.Warren, who struggled for so long to get his work recognised, might well have said of this fine work by Stuart Cunningham 'I've seen this movie before!'But we should all read the book.Highly recommended.

There are many forces for change confronting the well-established institutional arrangements underpinning Australian media industries, with commercial television, in particular, likely to be most challenged during the next five years. New distribution and delivery models connected to the proposed high capacity National Broadband Network (NBN), along with new content providers and changing viewer preferences are likely to drive major changes to existing television arrangements. In a rapidly changing environment, this article seeks to relate established concepts of innovation and creative destruction, disintermediation and disruption to the impact these new NBN mediated opportunities may have on existing TV arrangements, both free-to-air (FTA) and subscription (STV). It seeks to explore the extent to which TV-like services over the NBN might disrupt incumbent TV broadcasters; the extent to which changing consumer preferences and practices might disrupt current business models; and how incumbent TV broadcasters might be responding to these threats with their own innovations.

This paper essentially deals with innovation related to Internet Television, not Internet Protocol Television (IPTV), which is so widely seen as a major new application for NBN Co. It constructs four business models of Internet television related to the recent innovation offered by four American based corporations, each of whom is relatively new to television. It offers an analysis of Netflix as the aggregation model, Apple TV as continuing its iPhone walled garden business model but this time for television, Google TV where convergence for television would be free, and also of movies becoming available on Facebook, the progressively more ubiquitous social media site. None of these players are original television content creators. All are highly dependent for content on the established commercial television networks in the USA, whose management face complex dilemmas as to whether it embraces the opportunity to make more programming available to new outlets, but at no risk to their programming rights, or to their lucrative advertising base. The development of Internet television, and how it comes to compete or co-exist with IPTV, may be a broadband game changer, not only in the USA but also eventually for Australia.

Australian Economic ReviewVolume 43, Issue 2 p. 187-193 A Broadband Services Typology Trevor Barr, Trevor Barr ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation, Swinburne UniversitySearch for more papers by this author Trevor Barr, Trevor Barr ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation, Swinburne UniversitySearch for more papers by this author First published: 01 June 2010 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8462.2010.00592.xCitations: 5Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL References Autorité de Régulation des Communications Électroniques et des Postes 2009, ‘ The electronic communications services market in France in the 4th quarter 2008’, ARCEP, Paris , viewed October 2009, . Axia 2008, Harnessing the SuperNet Advantage, Axia, Calgary . British Library 2010a, Homepage, viewed January 2010, . British Library 2010b, Turning the Pages, viewed January 2010, . Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation ICT Centre 2008, ‘ The Australian National Collaboration Network’, CSIRO, Sydney , 2 May. Stutchbury, M. and Maher, S. 2010, ‘OECD queries cost of new broadband network’, The Australian, 5 February. Warren, T. 2008, ‘ Broadband issues’, CommsDay Summit, Sydney , 16 May. Weiser, P. 2008, ‘ A framework for a national broadband policy’, in Report of the 2007 Aspen Institute Conferences on Telecommunications and Spectrum Policy, Aspen Institute , Washington , DC . Citing Literature Volume43, Issue2June 2010Pages 187-193 ReferencesRelatedInformation

The debates in Australia about national policy and operational complexities of the Rudd government's bold National Broadband Network (NBN) plan have recently shifted focus towards issues about end users. Many questions arise, such as what services might be offered, by whom and who is likely to have access to the new broadband services at what cost. A continuing examination of different case studies of international broadband experiences to see what best practices might be applied to Australian circumstances could be valuable. This paper offers a case study of one of the most successful broadband companies in Europe: Free in France. Three major factors seem to be behind the success of Free: its remarkable founder and financier, Xavier Niel, its contribution to the implementation of constructive changes to the telecommunications regulatory regime since 2001, and the creation and development of widely accepted consumer services. So might any of its experiences be transferable to Australia's NBN challenges during the next five years? Copyright 2009 Trevor Barr. No part of this article may be reproduced by any means without the written consent of the publisher.

The vexed issues currently surrounding broadband policy in Australia remind us that the public sector has a great track record in building valuable telecommunications infrastructure. One lesson from the past 150 years is the constructive role played by the public sector by providing the vision and seeding capital for the creation of three major communications platforms: Australia's overland telegraph in the 1870s, communications satellites funded by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) from the 1950s, and the early internet, funded by the US government from the 1960s to the 1990s. But times have changed and new policy models have emerged. Australia's telecommunications public policy decisions during the past decade have locked us into having few choices for broadband. The sad irony to date is that the introduction of the open competition model in July 1997, its associated regulatory framework and the full privatisation of Telstra have actually made us less efficient in investment and impeded the development of the broadband networks we need. We might just benefit from revisiting some lessons from history.

Australia needs a fundamental re-think of its USO policy in view of the 10 years of experience with competition policy in telecommunications and the need to ensure equity for consumers in national broadband policy. The changes proposed here would provided benefits for consumers, supplies and government. A new USO policy could be financed from the annual interest accrued by the Future Fund, currently estimated to be of the order of $3.8 billion. Such interest returns would be transferred to fund two major components of a new USO policy continuation of the existing obligations related to voice and pay phones, as well as the provision of capital towards new infrastructure commitments for new high speed broadband services. Australia simply cannot afford NOT to have an imaginative national high speed broadband policy including workable policies to ensure access and affordability for all Australians.