Scottish business must learn to love the shock of the new way of the world

Saturday, May 10th 2008 at 11.41pm (The Sunday Herald)

"What is innovation? It's not just about new ideas, it's not just about inventing, it's about succesfully exploiting the new inventions that we make. Read more »

Digital Scotland Debate: Next event on the starting blocks

The Sunday Herald's events team finally succeeded in nailing me to a chair for long enough this week to get the ball rolling on the next stage of our campaign to create a national technology strategy for Scotland.

The first event revealed broad agreement that any such strategy should be broken down into three distinct areas: Innovation, Infrastructure & Education. In light of this the next debate - scheduled for April 24 at Glasgow's Lighthouse - will focus on the category of innovation.

It's a broad title, and one that could encompass anything: Encouraging innovation amongst entrepreneurs, fostering technical invention, marketing Caledonia as a top rank location for business & investment or simply coming up with innovative ways to implement, nurture and sustain such strategies.

To avoid turning our campaign into yet another pointless talking shop, the plan for this round of events is to invite both an expert panel and audience members to submit proposals for inclusion in our putative strategy document. On the day itself, we'll debate as many of these as time allows.

Using transcripts of the debate, I will then attempt to lace together a draft strategy paper. This will be presented online for a period of consultation and wiki-style peer review which, though fraught with possible complications, should produce something approaching a representative document.

The jury's out on what to do after that and I'm open to suggestions, but when all three events have been completed we should have a trio of documents drawn from the best minds in the business and, hopefully, some form of popular technology mandate for putting them in front of the Scottish Government.

That's the plan so far, but I'm calling upon the entire geek diaspora to pitch in and tell me where I'm going wrong or what could be done better. Although ambitious, I believe this is a campaign that could ultimately actually achieve something, but only if we work together.

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Campaign for a national technology strategy underway

The Shaping Scotland's Digital Future campaign got off to an excellent start this week with a lively debate at Glasgow's Royal Concert Hall. Video highlights of the debate are available via the Sunday Herald. Presented with the perspectives of the heavyweight panel, a 120-strong audience appeared to broadly accept our call for the creation of a far-reaching national digital strategy for Scotland. The tone was informal but distinctly businesslike, and it quickly became clear that my concerns over Caledonia's lack of future planning are shared by many in the great geek diaspora. I'll be publishing transcripts and proposals for further events shortly, but the discussions ultimately identified three critical areas to be addressed by our proposed digital blueprint: Education, Innovation and Infrastructure. I'll publish my proposals for separate symposiums on each of these in the new year, but please do let me know if you've got any ideas or suggestions as to how we should move matters forward. Printer Friendly Comment

Plan Now, Prosper Later

Some of Scotland's most senior business figures have warned that the country must plan for the future or risk economic obliteration in the face of intensifying foreign competition.

"In terms of technology infrastructure Scotland is beginning to slip behind some of its competitors and the government must take a long term approach to combat this slide. We must have a national framework to guide development of a globally competitive ICT industry by nurturing local enterprises for expansion and growth abroad," said Polly Purvis, chief executive of the technology industry body ScotlandIS.

"This is not something we can leave to chance. If we find ourselves without the technical capacity we need in the future then we won't be able to compete and the consequences could be dire."

On the eve of a major debate aimed at tackling the issue, Scotland's major technology players have joined up to call for the establishment of a national digital strategy capable of delivering a 21st Century infrastructure upon which they believe the country's economic future depends.

Purvis, Microsoft Scotland director Raymond O'Hare, BT Scotland's Brendan Dick, economist Neil MacCallum, Graham Technology's Steven Thurlow, Cisco chief Gordon Thomson and digital media mogul Steve Leach have identified the country's lack of long-term planning as a critical strategic flaw.

Currently, ScotlandIS estimates there are 70,000 Scottish ICT jobs contributing £4bn a year to the economy.

"Across the globe, small countries are realising that technology represents a major opportunity, and they're prepared to invest in far-sighted strategies to create business, government and public cultures geared up to grab that chance. Scotland must either follow suit or prepare to suffer the consequences," said Leach, CEO of digital marketing specialists Bigmouthmedia.

MacCallum, head of policy and strategy at the Scottish Chambers of Commerce, said: "Globalisation is not going to go away. We need to improve competitiveness and efficiency on a national scale, and that will not be achievable unless the very best systems are not in place and ready to go."

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Future of BBC’s iPlayer in doubt

Saturday, December 1st 2007 at 8.09pm (The Sunday Herald)

Better the devil you know than the devil you don't. Traditional rivalries are one thing, but when you find yourself trekking into an indeterminate future in which you will face competitors unknown in scope and scale, sometimes it's better to forget old differences, circle your wagons and stand back to back against the howling of the storm.

Britain's terrestrial broadcasters have got the message. Read more »

Losing the plot

Sunday, November 25th 2007 at 2.25am (The Sunday Herald)

IT COULD have been prevented for £65, but this was a disaster waiting to happen. However shocking and catastrophic the Inland Revenue's security breach may seem to the families left wide open to the threat of identity theft, last week's debacle came as no surprise to the UK's top technology experts.

With the estimated cost of the data disaster standing at more than £200 million and millions of British households now squarely in the sights of international organised crime gangs, the incident has exposed a fundamental flaw in the public sector's approach to IT that many experts have long recognised.

"The most shocking aspect to the loss of 25 million records is that for £65 the data on the two CDs could easily have been stored on an inexpensive and easy-to-use encrypted USB drive. Read more »

Blog officially launched

After much messing about, I've finally and somewhat belatedly launched my personal website.

Over the years a lot of people have told me that someone who's spent the past couple of decades banging on about the implications of the internet age really ought to have his own web presence. They argued that refusing to do so was enormously contradictory, and ultimately I had to agree.

So I've built a site, loaded up a small selection of past articles and started a blog. Over the next year I plan to use the site as a testing ground for a variety of journalism and technology experiments and a discussion platform for some of my theories on journalism 2.0.

From where I'm sitting now this all seems easily achievable, but given the realities of newspaper life I'm equally prepared for the execution of my grand schemes to go badly wrong.

Please do pop in now and then to see how the project is getting along. Even if you're disappointed by what you find, you can always use the site's contact page to express your contempt ...

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Digital Scotland Debate: First event fixed

The effort to draft a far-reaching blueprint for Scotland's approach to the digital age has stepped up a gear.

The response has been extremely encouraging. Thanks to the efforts of Clare Walshe and Christine Crawford from the Sunday Herald's events team, Microsoft have agreed to sponsor the inaugural public debate, which will be held on Wednesday December 12th in Glasgow's Royal Concert Hall from 9.00am to 11.30am.

I've meanwhile assembled a panel of Scotland's top technology players to get things rolling. Headlining on the day will be Raymond O'Hare (Regional Director, Microsoft Scotland); Gordon Thomson (Director of Scotland & Ireland, Cisco Systems); Steve Leach (Founder & CEO of Bigmouthmedia); Polly Purvis (Executive Director, ScotlandIS); Brendan Dick (Director, BT Scotland); Steven Thurlow (Technical Director, Graham Technology) and Neil MacCallum (Head of Policy and Strategy, Scottish Chambers of Commerce).

A senior representative from the Scottish Government will also be participating and I'll confirm their identity very soon. Google have also done their best to contribute. Unfortunately a combination of factors means they won't have someone on the panel first time round, but their support and encouragement for the project has been most welcome.

All and all it should amount to a very interesting start to the campaign, so please come along and participate in the first of what will become a major series of discussions and conferences.

To book your free ticket, call 0141 302 7407

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Shaping Scotland's digital future

Must-have message is the secret of Apple’s success

Saturday, November 10th 2007 at 7.50pm (The Sunday Herald)

ONCE UPON a time, the zeitgeist was something you chased. Billions of marketing dollars were poured into pursuing the alluring, fast-moving and almost imperceptible curve that remained just out of reach for all but the hipper-than-thou few. Read more »