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| Europe@50: least said, soonest mended |
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| Monday, 02 April 2007 | |
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It has survived 50 years in its various expanding forms, but now the powers in Europe need to learn that actions speak louder than posturing.
So it’s all a single market from Lublin to Dublin. 25 nations coalesce in the European Union. Our love-hate relationship with the EU takes in all our perceptions, misconceptions and preconceptions where regulation and big government are concerned. In terms of technology policy, the EU oscillates between a ‘dead hand’ and the ‘Midas touch’. Just now, so long as you are not a mobile operator (or accompanying crony), you will salute the attempts by Europe to end the rip-off of business and vacationing travellers in terms of roaming charges. But the EU also sees the need to pontificate on mobile TV, a moribund and technologically schizophrenic service. It is also striking poses on RFID; that technology sums up why we all need European oversight and why we all worry about it, too. You might like Europe or you might not. It not hard to find its detractors wherever you look, from far right to far left and much in between. Sometimes, you need to take a neutral and de-politicised view in order to look at what Europe actually does. The report card is mixed. Europe may trace its roots back 50 years but it’s only in the last two decades or so that its pivotal role in shaping European and global technology policy has come to the fore. Importantly, it took issues beyond the limited scope of earlier European talking and technology shops staffed by government appointees and laden with narrow and vested interests. In the shape of the European Commission, it has developed a unique voice. That voice has eschewed consensus and compromise and has therefore repeatedly brought it into conflict with national governments, monopoly interests and industry champions from within Europe and from without. Two-faced and two-paced? The result can be that the EC has something of a split personality. It consistently bangs the drum for European interests on the global stage, in particular styling itself as a natural counterbalance to the might of the US in the world’s technology markets. On internal issues, in contrast, it tends to back the views of consumers and enterprises, even when these are to the detriment of the European technology industry. This approach might be described as two-tier protectionism. Europe’s lengthy battle with mighty Microsoft can be said to have been waged on behalf of all software users but it does quite a few favours for Europe’s indigenous software developers as well. So both tiers were happy. In contrast, the EC spent much of the 1990s driving through measures to open up communications networks and services to full competition. This was resisted by network monopolies and their state paymasters, not least because it diluted the competitiveness of European operators in global markets. Europe fell back on the need to protect its first tier of stakeholders: the EU citizens and businesses. Much the same basic philosophy can be seen in the current battle with the mobile sector over roaming charges. Over the years Brussels has put its weight behind the wireless sector, albeit with mixed results. It helped push European 3G standards in the hope of building on the worldwide success of GSM. It failed, however, to block Europe’s 3G auctions, which nearly ruined the industry it had helped to nurture and support. There is no such dithering in its hardline position on roaming. Its stance in favour of lower charges in order to benefit consumers and enterprises brings it into direct confrontation with Europe’s wireless industry and many of the national regulators, including Ofcom in the UK. The denouement in this case is fast approaching: expect the row to get noisier before its end. Tag, and tag along Then there are those subjects where the EC feels obliged to comment. Recent examples include RFID and mobile TV. On RFID, which would see tiny ‘tracking’ chips inserted into everything from products and banknotes to people, is a case in point. Big Brussels is watching you? Perhaps. In fact, it looks like taking consumer and privacy issues as its starting point for policy formulation in this area, although it does see a certain degree of potential for the advancement of European economy, society and industry. Much the same applies to mobile TV on the face of it. The difference here is that consumers have rejected this for some years, yet Brussels is happy to push a ‘made in Europe’ industry solution. Let Viv (aka Commissioner Redding) do the talking: “To fully reap the benefits of this market and to export a European model for Mobile TV as we did with GSM for mobile phones, industry and Member States must work more closely together to devise a common approach, compare technologies, look at possible legal obstacles, make spectrum available throughout Europe and choose together the best way to ensure a quick and large take-up of Mobile TV by Europeans, preferably based on a single standard.” This is where Europe may be overdoing it. Act against anti-competitive behaviour of course. A bit of economic/technology pump-priming is fine, too. Throwing hundreds of bureaucrats at new technologies is a waste of time and (our) money. Jim Chalmers |
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