Digital content to play greater role as ITAC supports Candian Heritage funding bid

The Information Technology Association of Canada (ITAC) is calling for a $50-million funding boost at Canadian Heritage to pay for the digitization of cultural content. The business lobby group, which has traditionally focused on hardware and software industries, may seem an unlikely booster for Canadian culture and the Heritage department. But VP of policy, Bob Crow, says ITAC has a long history in dealing with database companies, and that it’s membership has expanded to include more content providers. In its pre-budget submission to the Standing Committee on Finance September 7, ITAC wrote that "the Department of Canadian Heritage and others have documented a large opportunity for Canadian creators of art, music and other forms of cultural expression to transform their analog talents to digital form and therefore to participate in the emerging global marketplace for electronic content," it writes. "As with their SME counterparts, we believe that a targeted program of assistance to make the necessary investments would yield great dividends." Besides urging the feds to devote $50 million to Heritage in the next federal budget, ITAC has also called for a re-confirmation of the government’s commitment to achieve a 2004 deadline target to put itself online. It has also asked for a one-time investment of up to $100,000 in hardware, software and services to build e-business capability between budget day and the end of 2001. Meeting sparks ITAC interest The request for further Heritage funding stems from an August meeting between ITAC executives and senior department officials including former ADM Michelle d’Auray (now Canada’s CIO) and new deputy minister Alex Himelfarb . "ITAC is supporting Canadian Heritage’s strategic direction," says Crow. "We’re not quite sure what the initiative is yet, but we’ve certainly agreed to work with them. We’re talking to them as they get themselves organized. It’s clear that our membership has the tools and the business models and the business savvy that need to be brought to the table to help Canadian Heritage and the artistic community accomplish what they wish to accomplish." Crow says ITAC’s involvement with content dates back to the association’s merger 10 years ago with the Canadian Association of Data, Professional Services and Software Organizations. Since then, content has become a more important part of the organization’s activities. "It’s increasingly, of course, part of the picture of our members. Our members are BCE and Rogers and so forth. Clearly, they’re very interested in that. It’s a natural evolution and broadening. The other thing that’s happened is we have broadened our membership criteria to include more of the Internet economy. Anybody other than a straight retailer is now welcomed in as a valued partner in ITAC." The decision to open the organization to new media companies was taken in August, says VP of membership Winston Kinch. He says new members will now include representatives from portals, auction sites, ecom sites and others. "We didn’t think of them as being part of the IT industry, but rather users of the technology…. The thing that became very clear is that, however you choose to define it and segment it , the whole nature of the industry is changing and the dividing lines between the concept of a provider-of and a user-of is getting very difficult to sustain." To date, no digital media producers have joined ITAC, something Kinch chalks up to summer doldrums and the relatively recent decision to broaden the definition. He expects ITAC will approach several new media companies to join later this fall, and says a potential chair for a new forum of Internet intermediaries has been identified.

Digital content to play greater role as ITAC supports Candian Heritage funding bid

News | 10/04/2000 4:00 am EDT

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