Nearly two years ago, I wrote a post about how the Canadian digital economy strategy seemed to be taking shape. The government had moved on several legislative issues including copyright and spam, it was bringing together federal and provincial ministers to discuss the issue, the open government initiative was on the way, and telecom policy was beginning to emerge as a major concern. All that was missing was an announcement, identification of some targets, and the signal that this was a priority. While I’m told that some in government also saw it this way, then-Industry Minister Christian Paradis let the moment slip away and the entire digital strategy become little more than a punchline.
Yesterday’s federal budget marks the revival of the Canadian digital strategy. The government will undoubtedly still point to past accomplishments (the budget references reforms that date back to the 2006, so digital economy activities from several years ago are surely fair game), but this budget provides many of the remaining ingredients for a digital strategy (Mark Goldberg offers a similar perspective). Once again, all that is left is missing is the official announcement from Industry Minister James Moore. So what will the Canadian digital strategy contain? Based on this budget, it would seem to include:
