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January 1, 2011
This is a visual representation of The Australian's picture of the Gillard Government. What is surprising is that the national broadband network is missing from the cartoon. This is surprising, given that the NBN is central to the Gillard Government's understanding of national politics and that 2010 was the year of the NBN.
No matter. The editorial---A New Year wish: more digital visionaries---plugs the hole. It acknowledges that the internet/digital revolution is transforming the economy, that this revolution will affect the jobs and economic wellbeing of Australians, that digital technology destroys and creates, and that this carries huge economic potential as well as challenge.
It argues that instead of the Government trying to protect us from the forces of globalisation the job of government is to put the macro settings in place to give business the flexibility to respond to rapid change.The market will determine the direction.
Then the hammer comes:
The $35 billion NBN is seen by Labor as "important infrastructure" that "will change our way of life", yet it is being rolled out without proof that it will improve productivity. The government touts the health and education services to be delivered by the NBN, but the project is not commercially viable and it is far from certain that it will generate the new businesses its advocates claim. Labor has put all its policy eggs in the NBN basket, but it is at best a risky response to such a huge challenge. Australia needs more digital visionaries, not cable-laying nerds, to truly exploit the digital revolution. We need broad thinkers, not just more broadband.
Surely it is up to business and the market entrepreneurs to respond to the disruption of the media industry with innovation---new entrants offering a mix of telephony, broadband and video services? After all, that Hayekian idea is a central meme of The Australian's conception of a market society, despite it's determined attempts to try to block the building of the NBN.
In The Australian's own words "the job of government is to put the macro settings in place to give business the flexibility to respond to rapid change." This is a central tenet of The Australian's defense of classical liberalism and free-market capitalism against what it claims are the horrors of socialist and collectivist thought that lead us to the road to serfdom as sure as night follows day. In Hayek's view:
the role of government should be limited to ensuring that markets work, and to providing a parsimonious level of welfare. Governments which intervene in markets are heading down what Hayek described as the slippery slope of totalitarianism, for the only freedom worthy of the name is market freedom. The only institution to be quarantined from the market is the family, though Hayek gives no justification for this view and his definition of ‘family' is confined to a small group separated from the wider world. When we step outside the white picket fence we leave behind values such as compassion, friendship and solidarity. All transactions are market transactions; there is no point in doing anything for anyone else, unless it's part of a market exchange.
So it is the entrepreneurs in the self-regulating market who are the visionaries. Entrepreneurs are often at the forefront of innovation. They possess a unique set of skills that lends itself to inspired invention and driven change. Innovation is the driving force of capitalism and economic growth and entrepreneurs are the heroes of capitalism.
Consequently, the finger can be pointed at The Australian for its lack of vision. But The Australian is not noted for self-criticism is it.
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The Murdoch empire's objection to the NBN is consistent with their stake in existing high-bandwidth infrastructure: foxtel.
Bandwidth (like diskspace and freeways) only have one capacity: 95% full, and one of the key class of providers of that bandwidth would be competitors to Murdoch.
Those competitors of news analysis and entertainment will meet with similar strident attacks as bloggers have, but Murdoch realizes it's easier to prevent the formation of the competition by blocking the infrastructure that would allow it.
Note: the NBN is about the only significant difference between tory and alp policies these days. Short of complaining about poor management of policy implementation, what else can the Oz attack the ALP about?