Summary of Digital Britain live blog and panel sessions

The afternoon of the Digital Britain Conference saw the group split into four two for a total of four sessions:

* ‘Content is King’, chaired by Marc Reeves, editor, Birmingham Post
* ‘Infrastructure for a Digital Britain’ chaired by Chris Price, director, Digital Birmingham
* ‘Staying ahead of the game’, chaired by Tom Loosemoore, head of 4IP, Channel 4
* ‘Empowering people for a digital age’, chaired by Stephen Dodson, director, DC10 PLus

Here are the summaries of the sessions that I went to, followed by the transcript of the live blog for the morning session, where Lord Carter and Paul Tilsley spoke. That session was chaired by Adrian Goldberg.

Staying Ahead of the Game panel session

This session, chaired by Tom Loosemoore of Channel 4, discussed “Staying Ahead of the Game”.

Considering that this was so late in the day, there were quite a number of people at the session and none of the lacklustre questioning that you sometimes hear towards the end of conferences.

Birmingham’s creative industry was a key topic in the discussion, and it was acknowledged that it is a great asset to Birmingham. Issues that cropped up were around educating graduates so that they have the skills that employers want; monetising content so that people can make a living from what they produce; developing, attracting and retaining talent; and mapping Birmingham’s creative industry so that it is clearer to everybody how strong it is.

To round off the session a member of the audience representing BusinessLink broke the encouraging news that there is support and money for emerging businesses — so everyone over to BusinessLink!

Infrastructure for a Digital Britain session

This panel session was chaired by Director of Digital Birmingham Chris Price (i.e. my boss!). Chris opened by asking the audience what messages they would like to communicate to the audience, adding that he would advocate using the public sector to aggregate demand for next generation broadband.

Encouragingly for anyone interested in digital inclusion, the session often crept towards discussion of social issues — skills, reaching the final third of people who don’t currently have access, and selling the importance of the internet (whether accessed through digital TV, mobile or even games consoles) — which really made it clear that technology is about enabling people to improve their lives and is a means to an end. This is in stark contrast to debates that centre on technology and ignore how it can be used to promote social inclusion, improve people’s lives and help the public sector deliver services better.

Issues raised included:

* developing long-term business models that view next generation access as a utility, which would allow for longer pay-back periods on up-front investment
* how to get around the ‘chicken and egg’ problem of developing business cases for infrastructure when the content to justify it can only be created when the infrastructure exists and likewise the demand for it
* the commitment to a 2Mb universal service obligation
* ‘fibre to the home’ (i.e. the provision of very high-speed connections to peoples homes and not just to the cabinets in their streets which are then connected by copper wires to houses)
* the importance of a mix of technologies in achieving universal coverage — satellite, wireless, mobile and fibre-optic cabling
* working together to ensure that individual cities don’t ‘reinvent the wheel’.

Transcript of live blog

Lord Carter has been presenting his Digital Britain report, hosted by Digital Birmingham in the ICC. The event is being broadcast live to the Fazeley studios, and you can watch it live on the Digital Birmingham website at http://www.digitalbirmingham.co.uk/news/watch-live-as-lord-carter-launches-digital-britatin-at-the-icc.

The event was kicked off by Cllr Paul Tilsley, Deputy Leader of Birmingham City Council, who announced a digital district for Birmingham.

Lord Carter delivered a comprehensive overview of the report, published yesterday, prompting speculation on what ‘local loop unbundling’ means. As well as infrastructure, Lord Carter spoke of the importance of reaching people who don’t have access to the internet either at home or at work.

Here’s a transcript of the live blog that is going on at the Birmingham Post website, which Simon Whitehouse from Digital Birmingham is contributing to (apologies for inconsistent formatting):

10:51

siwhitehouse:  Following Adrian we have deputy leader Paul Tilsley who chairs the Digital Birmingham partnership.

10:52

[Comment From Anna Blackaby] Adrian Goldberg underlines the power of new technology as witnessed by the events in Iran

10:53

Anna Blackaby:  Lord Carter, the report’s author, is due to start speaking at five past eleven.

10:55

siwhitehouse:  Cllr Tilsley emphasises the importance of the creative digital sector in Birmingham.   The new Creative, Performing and digital Academy is due to open in 2011 and Birmingham is a designated “Science City”.   Mathew Boulton a national leader in digital technology studies.

10:56

Anna Blackaby:  Cllr Tilsley has just announced that Birmingham will create a ‘Digital District’ that brings together the innovative, learning and creative sectors enabled through a next generation hi speed broadband infrastructure.

10:56

Anna Blackaby:  He says this will span several hundred acres from Digbeth, Birmingham Science Park and Eastside, and will provide an exciting environment for creative industries and young entrepreneurs.

10:57

siwhitehouse:  The new digital district will provide a digital infrastructure that captures the ambitions of Digital Britain.

10:57

Anna Blackaby:  Cllr Tilsley said the digital district will act as a showcase and business demonstrator to attract new businesses and inward investment and offer a strategy for economic recovery.

11:00

siwhitehouse:  Cllr Tilsley enthusiastic of the prospects for Talk About Local and Help Me Investigate digital projects being funded by 4iP

11:03

Anna Blackaby:  Adrian Goldberg is just introducing Lord Carter

11:06

siwhitehouse:  Lord Carter is speaking with out notes for his keynote speech today

11:06

Anna Blackaby:  Lord Carter said he would keep it brief as he wants it to be more a Q and A session

11:07

[Comment From Andy_R] Pirate Party UK responds to Digital Britain Report: http://pirateparty.org.uk/PR_PPUK_160609.pdf

11:07

siwhitehouse:  Primary aim of Digital Britain is to put the digtal and knowledge economy at the centre of the countiy’s economic and industrial policy

11:07

Anna Blackaby:  He believes the UK is uniquely placed to benefit from this

11:07

[Comment From cyberdoyle] NGA cannot be delivered to 90% of uk land mass through obsolete copper technology

11:07

[Comment From @briannoonan] http://www.rhubarbradio.com/listen/?v=95205c69-5356-444a-acb1-c03bc7480d75 courtesy of @cyberdoyle

11:08

siwhitehouse:  Where does Britain want to position itself for the next 5 – 7 years and what are the social and economic consequences of this

11:08

Anna Blackaby:  Secondly the report tries to analyse the infrastructure capabilities of the UK

11:08

[Comment From cyberdoyle] government has a role to make bt use half empty ducts and get fibre out to rural areas

11:09

abbycorfan: oh dear sound gone at #dbuc09 just as Lord Carter started to explain why the digital britain report was important. Guess we won’t know now.

11:09

kasperbs: Another stream worth monitoring is #dbicc09 from the ICC where Lord Carter is now unveiling the report #dbuc09 http://ff.im/-44ZRj

11:09

siwhitehouse:  Emphasises the importance of extending the Universal Service Commitment but that it is a separate piece of work to Next Generation Access

11:09

exsanguinator: Streaming Lord Carters Digital Britain Report back, www.aquila-tv.com #dbuc09

11:09

aquilatv: RT @exsanguinator: Streaming Lord Carters Digital Britain Report back, www.aquila-tv.com #dbuc09

11:10

Anna Blackaby:  Network capability, reach and range are all more acute questions the further out you go from London

11:10

[Comment From Andy_R] Mac compatible video stream here: http://events.digitalbirmingham.co.uk/digitalbritain/video/

11:10

[Comment From cyberdoyle] the further you go from cities the less access you have

11:11

Anna Blackaby:  There will probably be a million homes that you will bring online using next generation capability

11:12

Anna Blackaby:  The clear analysis that we have seen that is there is virtue and value to individuals and businesses in seeing the deployment of new network capability

11:12

Anna Blackaby:  The market, analysis and international comparison tells us that if left to its own devices that deployment is unlikely to go beyound 60 -65 per cent of the country in geographical reach

11:13

Anna Blackaby:  That posess a very simple question – are we happy with that?

11:13

siwhitehouse:   Extending the network to the last third is a social question.

11:13

[Comment From Andy_R] How much of Birmingham isn’t near a big city, exactly?

11:13

[Comment From cyberdoyle] no we are not happy with 35% not getting NGA

11:14

[Comment From cyberdoyle] well then government has to sort out duct access, not give in to the telcos

11:14

[Comment From cyberdoyle] and wasting money on patching the copper to get to the 1.5 million homes is scandalous

11:14

[Comment From cyberdoyle] stop the debate on copper, just get the fibre out there

11:14

[Comment From Katie] where can we see Paul Tilsleys speech?

11:15

siwhitehouse:  The UK is not going to run roughshod over the regulatory framework which has developed around digital technologies

11:15

Anna Blackaby:  The consequence of that would reduce the competition benefits that have been built into the market

11:15

Anna Blackaby:  We as a government have decided it is not required to spend public money at the scale as other countries have done – for example in Australia

11:16

Anna Blackaby:  But if you talk to the Australian government part of the reason they are doing that is that they do not have the competitive market we have here in the UK

11:16

[Comment From Andy_R] Agreed, fibre is the real issue. Copper by 2013 is a promise to give us yesterday’s technology tomorrow.

11:16

[Comment From cyberdoyle] BT made billions of profit and not reinvested

11:16

Anna Blackaby:  We have proposed I think a relatively forensic and relatively proportionated levy – the so-called phone tax

11:16

[Comment From cyberdoyle] our legacy copper is a white elephant, it is holding us back

11:16

siwhitehouse:  Indicates a limit of 7 years to the “phone tax”

11:17

Anna Blackaby:  You have to also have an equal passion for wireless networks

11:17

Steve Wollaston:  Apologies for the problems with the Live Streaming from the event…

11:18

siwhitehouse:  But there has been little if any analysis of the spectrum reworkings that are in the report.   This is there to give a route map to universal 3G coverage as well as priming 4G access

11:18

Anna Blackaby:  There is an unashamed portion of the report that seeks to address infrastructure but we equally try to look in detail and the content questions

11:19

Anna Blackaby:  The real flowering of 1,000 opportunities comes from having that capability off which you can see the development of services.

11:19

siwhitehouse:  Infrastructure is there for people to create new industries and opportunities.

11:20

[Comment From Andy_R] whole report is pretty shameless

11:20

[Comment From cyberdoyle] all the digital britain report does is cover up a major fail in the infrastructure

11:20

Anna Blackaby:  We believe there was a case for keepign CHannel 4 in public ownership but expand the role of Channel 4 to be a driving force for innovation

11:20

[Comment From Katie] Isn’t Digbeth already the creative sector of Birmingham?

11:20

[Comment From cyberdoyle] the content and applications and services won’t be delivered to 90% of uk land mass

11:20

[Comment From cyberdoyle] 47 hours to download open office via 3g in most areas round here

11:20

siwhitehouse:  C4 to be a driving force for innovation in the digital content market

11:21

Anna Blackaby:  We lay out clearly a regime change for radio and we make a proposal about the future of the BBC licence fee

11:21

Anna Blackaby:  We do not believe in annual settlements but we beleive maintaining the BBC in a government structure that is impartial

11:22

Anna Blackaby:  We identify a gap in news in the regions that we need to guarantee

11:22

Anna Blackaby:  We have already have fantastic contributions to local news but these are not guaranteed to be there. If a shareholder or owner decides not to publish that site or newspaper, they disappear

11:22

siwhitehouse:  BBC licence fee to remain a hypothecated tax but that there is a News gap in the Nations and the regions which should be guaranteed and that may not be necessarily delivered by the BBC

11:23

Anna Blackaby:  The point we make is that we don’t want a situation that the monopoly guaranteed provider on any platform was the BBC

11:23

Anna Blackaby:  If you take that view you have to find a funding mechanism so we recommend you take a portion of the licence fee

11:23

Anna Blackaby:  We make very clear recommendations on how that portion of the licence fee can be shared

11:23

[Comment From cyberdoyle] the tv companies are big enough to sort out their own problems, government job is to sort out the Next gen access

11:24

Anna Blackaby:  The reason why we we wish to take people’s view is that we recognise that that is a subject of public debate

11:24

siwhitehouse:  This is not death by a thousand cuts as it explicitly states in the report that any further slicing of the BBC licence fee needs Parliamentary approval

11:24

Anna Blackaby:  Finally the report starts with one thing and finishes with another. It starts with a central question around participation

11:25

siwhitehouse:  Digital engagement and digital smarts has to be a part of the Skills Programme, core to Home Access Programme

11:26

Anna Blackaby:  Asks the audience how many people have an internet connection at home – 100 per cent

11:26

[Comment From cyberdoyle] if you want people to digitally participate the essential step is to get universal next gen access to all the people, not just those who live in cities

11:26

[Comment From cyberdoyle] copyright and all that stuff, nothing to do with government, the rules are outdated and will sort themselves out.

11:26

[Comment From cyberdoyle] wait for it, pirates will be next

11:26

Anna Blackaby:  Asks whether they have it at work – almost 100 per cent

11:26

siwhitehouse:  Access at work is an indicator of whether people have Internet access at home.   This is deepening the “Digital Divide”

11:26

Anna Blackaby:  But says there is a portion of society that doesn’t have that connection and that gap is growing every day.

11:27

siwhitehouse:  and that portion of society most likely to use public services

11:27

Anna Blackaby:  The bit we finish with in the report is what does it al m ean for government – what it means for procurement and delivery processes

11:27

Anna Blackaby:  We talk about what it means for the way the government itself conducts its business

11:27

siwhitehouse:  Digital Switchover is about moving services online and procurement

11:28

Anna Blackaby:  Those two pillars which start and finish the report – increasing participation and using the power of government to drive that are deliberately the two bookends of the report

11:29

siwhitehouse:  There are limits to the report and the questions which it asks

11:29

:  Within a year we have sought to address as many questions as we can and give a programme of delivery

Anna Blackaby:  Some people have suggested the consultations are a symptom of rampant indecisions but we are required to consult to change primary legislation.

11:30

siwhitehouse:  changes to primary legislation needs to follow due process

11:31

siwhitehouse:  It is important to have a Digital Birmingham. We need to have regions knowing how to push digital opportunities that are available to them

11:31

[Comment From cyberdoyle] it is important for rural areas to have a decent connection

11:31

Anna Blackaby:  I believe technology takes down heirarchy and allows people to take decisions about their lives

11:31

Anna Blackaby:  We have to recognise that there are signficant international issues – much of the framework for the rules is decided by Europe

11:32

Anna Blackaby:  And increasingly many of these issues are decided internationally not least rights and patents

11:32

[Comment From Andy_R] He claims to be liberal and progressive, but he tows the old content monopoly line 100%?

11:32

[Comment From cyberdoyle] he speaks well, but hasn’t addressed the issue of the areas outside cities

11:33

Anna Blackaby:  Many people believe that the British make outsanding laws and are very good at public administration and by and large we are – adds you would be forgiven for forgetting that

11:33

Anna Blackaby:  This will inform the debate about how piracy is addressed

11:33

siwhitehouse:  Britain can inform the debate around Intellectual Property Rights and piracy

11:34

Anna Blackaby:  For the British government not to take a view on that would send a signal around the world

11:34

siwhitehouse:  The debate around IP is a subtle and nuanced one which this report does not seek to end, it must be an ongoing one

11:35

siwhitehouse:  and the speech is over. Q&As next

Now it’s Q&A time:

siwhitehouse:  What is the role for providers of alternative services in Next Gen Access and can they bid for the levy money?

11:40

siwhitehouse:  Carter: The Network Design and Procurement Group will run the fund for NGA.   Unconnected homes should go to NGA asap where possible, not just a move to 2Mb. The Digital Britain report does not state who would be eligible to bid for NGA funding, deliberately.   We can imagine consortia bidding for NGA funding

11:40

siwhitehouse:  Q.   BT is a tethered giant.   Will it be unleashed?

siwhitehouse:  Carter:   BT have made significant announcement about upgrades on their network.   This report is announcing items that will accelerate competition and that will spur BT.   This was the case with Local Loop Unbundling.   We set a target for 3.5 million lines unbundled and we beat that target by 2 years.

There will be an accelerating effect upon infrastructure build out

11:46

siwhitehouse:  Q. Mary Matthews, games industry: Pleased with level of recognition in report. Want is the thinking about tax breaks for “culturally British” products.   Will that be   alimiting factor?

11:49

siwhitehouse:  Carter: Tom Loosemore from C4 described the report as having good nuggets.   This is one of those nuggets. We were seeking to give a “ringing endorsement” of the video games industry and put it on an equal footing with other creative digital industries.Carter’s advice to the video games industry s to run “very, very hard” with the culturally British ball

11:49

siwhitehouse:  Q. Zulfiqur Khan from community radio. Finding it very difficult to compete

11:50

[Comment From cyberdoyle] Video games can’t work in rural areas on 2meg connection, so 90% of uk land mass won’t be able to join in

11:51

siwhitehouse:  Carter: As you create a national DAB and then local DAB layer it creates a space for “Community Radio Plus” on the FM band and so the report is “unashamadely good news” for community radio

11:52

siwhitehouse:  Q. Will Perrin: Talk About Local: Thank you for recognition of TAL.   Report is about top down regulation. Is there a role for hyperlocal in the new news consortia envisaged by report?

11:52

[Comment From cyberdoyle] i have run a community website since 2000, but most people round here can’t contribute photos and stuff to it cos they are on dialup

11:55

siwhitehouse:  Carter: Don’t think that the report deals from a top down regulatory approach. This should be “manna from heaven” for the sort of participatory services that you talk about, making them more widely used and more powerful.The report does not say that ITV will get some of the BBC licence fee, but that consortia will be able to bid for these Contestable funds.Re-emphasises that this is not a top-down report.

11:56

[Comment From HF] Cyberdoyle – local communities have been laying their own fibre and running their own networks for some time. The problem is they are ghettos – the big ISPs (remember there are only 5 real players) wont work with them because it is expensive to deal with small networks and manage exceptions. So the residents are forced into an ISP monopoly, a local monopoly sure, but excluded from competition.

11:56

siwhitehouse:  Q. Lucy Hooberman. Independently Financed News Consortia: wrt the 3 pilots, there will be one in the English regions.   How ill they be chosen? If you use incumbents to choose new players then it can make it difficult for new companies to come through.

11:57

jonhickman: I love the whole giving FM to community radio thing, but still unsure that the DAB switch for national radio needs more thought #dbICC09

11:59

gabysslave: RT @jonhickman: I love whole giving FM to comm radio thing,but still unsure that the DAB switch 4 national radio needs more thought #dbICC09

11:59

siwhitehouse:  Carter: A good point. The Gov should set aside some procurement rules in order to address this point and the mitigation of innovation that can result.   We also talk about the hard investment through for eg the Technology Strategy Board, which can be a voice for SMEs.   They are the part of Gov “that likes to say YES”

11:59

jonbounds: #dbICC09 Ld Carter: “investment in Tech Strategy Board is investment in innovation – route in is to talk to these” & keep shouting

12:01

siwhitehouse:  Q. Lin Glover – City TV: We are getting slightly mixed messages from the regulators. Where do us small guys fit in?

12:03

siwhitehouse:  What we put in the final report was a marker that we think small local TV has a future but we did not find that this became a focus for many in our consultations.

When we talk about consortia do not assume that this is necessarily consortia of large companies, they can be SMEs equally well

12:04

siwhitehouse:  Q. Are you supportive of the Cave(sp?) Audit on spectrum liberalisation?

12:05

siwhitehouse:  Carter. Yes

12:07

siwhitehouse:  Q. Helen Milner – UK Online: Disappointed by superficial media reporting. People have said that they would be happy to pay a £6 tax to get everybody online. 15million people offline: how will the consortia work and what does good look like?

12:08

Anna Blackaby:  Have gone quiet as I try to get my own question in to Lord Carter on what this report means for those businesses outside the “digital media” sector such as the West Midland manufacturing sector – no luck yet

12:12

Anna Blackaby:  Ok, that’s all from Lord Carter – we’re going to say goodbye now. Thanks for following the live blog

12:12

siwhitehouse:  and it’s goodbye from me also

Share Posted in Digital Birmingham by John Heaven