Originally published in Magill Magazine, March 2002

In the light of recent developments, one could easily be forgiven for thinking that the
digital media sector in Ireland has come of age. Yet despite living under the spotlight
of significant investment, the digital media sector is more like a child prodigy in need
of careful grooming than the mature performer the Government seems to think it is.

If the Digital Media District becomes the global hub of the digital media sector
within the next few years, then the Irish clients it intends to target have a lot of
homework to do before they take to the world stage.

The digital media sector definitely has potential but it is ill defined, unproven and
turbulent. This is not unique to Ireland, as the rest of the world will testify.
Sustainable business models have been slow to emerge. It is widely accepted that
digital media is a hybrid of traditional media, technology and content.

Yet many people are still confused as to what the digital media sector is. Certain
Government agencies have even started referring to it as the digital media
environment, allowing the loop to be widened to include software, e-business,
customer relationship management and a whole lot more that has blurred the
distinction with the IT sector.
The digital media sector is definitely worth fighting for but poor definition does not
help. Neither does the apparent juxtaposition of “Digital Media Sector: The
Blockbuster” and “Digital Media Sector: The Understudy”. The Blockbuster is the
multinational approach whereby international media giants such as Bertelsmann will
be lured to Ireland by a package of incentives not unlike those offered to IT
multinationals in the 80’s and 90’s.

The Understudy is the careful nurturing of the indigenous digital media sector,
characterised by skill, creativity and technical know-how. The bulk of the money
seems to be on The Blockbuster but if The Understudy is not groomed in parallel, the
chance to develop a truly indigenous sector with world beating potential may be
wasted.

The Blockbuster Model The Understudy Model

Invest in state-of-the-art infrastructure aimed Invest in local talent aimed at developing a

at attracting the best internationally – within a strong indigenous base - starting now.
few years.

Offer tenancy deals which will appeal to Focus on subsidised bandwidth, the currency of
research facilities and multinationals and tie the digital media sector, allowing companies to
them in for the long term get on with what they do best – making content

Target established media companies with Target riskier independent digital media
digital media departments – film companies, companies who often tend to be involved in
advertising agencies etc. more groundbreaking work.

Create an international hub for the creation, Create a knowledge base where new forms of
storage, localisation and distribution of content are being created, new delivery
content techniques developed and new business models
tested.

Rely on creating an instant community by Grow a digital media community organically,

adopting a “build it and they will come” by consulting with companies and providing
philosophy. opportunities for networking and resource
sharing.
The Government has decided to commit significant resources to developing the
digital media sector, including an allocation in the region of €130 million to the
Digital Media District. It has done this on the basis of estimates that the Irish digital
media sector will be worth €625 million by 2005,

The Digital Media District will eventually transform The Liberties and has already
been referred to as the only large-scale economic project of real, comprehensive
vision in a decade. There is little doubt that the Digital Media District is a major
project and that it is being planned in a major way. Legislation, real estate and
infrastructure are significant elements.

The scale of the proposed investment together with the ambitious implementation
plan might imply that a digital media sector can be clipped into place like Lego,
rather than groomed from the ground up. This may have worked for the IT sector but
digital media is more organic and more unpredictable. The Digital Media District
could also turn out to be more of a Mecca-project than a mega-project. Positioning
itself as the focal point of a fledgling industry while still some years from
completion, it may give indigenous digital media companies the impression that they
have found the Promised Land.

Companies expecting an instant fix may be disappointed however. They may have to
look elsewhere for the type of assistance that will help them sustain their businesses
in the interim. The development of an indigenous digital media sector needs a
grassroots approach to leverage the talents of entrepreneurs, experimentalists and
established players. In this respect, the inaugural National Digital Media Conference
on 1st May is being organised by Perfect World on behalf of the digital media sector
in order to explore what types of support are needed.

Independent digital media companies in Ireland, that is, companies established

exclusively for the purpose of creating, managing or delivering digital media are
often characterised by their size. Some are very small, in fact so small as to be off the
radar in some cases. To help give these companies some sense of collective identity,
the term Creative Micro-Enterprises (CME’s) can be used.
 Ireland has a culture of SME’s supporting bigger industry at home and abroad. When
the localisation industry sprung up to support the software industry, it was a typical
SME/larger client relationship. With the growth of e-business and electronic
publishing, indications are that large corporations outside the entertainment industry
are going to have a major requirement for digital media services, which could be
outsourced to CME’s.

Apart from their size, CME’s also have other unique characteristics. As rigorous
early adopters of new technology, they are well qualified to act as catalysts in the
development of tools, software and standards that will enable new forms of
expression and interaction. They also need a particular form of advice. Recent
analysis of the needs of a cross-section of CME’s revealed five main areas in which
advice is needed.

1. Investigation of what NEW CONTENT and types of content can be and what will
really take advantage of and work on new platforms and technologies, specifically
creating original 'made for the medium' not versioned content.

2. PLATFORMS / TECHNOLOGY - understanding the platforms and tools, the

systems, and the skills needed to develop for them in the most creative way. Costs
involved are often prohibitive for small new companies.

3. INTERNATIONALISATION - The need to work with systems and technologies that

work across national boundaries. Issues to be investigated include language
versioning, the internationalising of product, the consistency of technology standards
from region to region, testing issues, different types of system and content for
different audiences.

4. NEW BUSINESS AREAS in terms of funding, markets and distribution. All the way
from finding out who from/how to get funded/commissioned to suggesting business
 models and helping potential commissioners/distributors to understand possibilities.
Also understanding their perspectives, markets and strategies both domestically,
transnationally across Europe and the world.

5. All aspects of DEAL-MAKING including IP, rights, contracts, etc. Existing

print/TV/film people understand these in terms of their own media which is not
necessarily conducive to production of original 'interactive' content and because they
are big and established, creative micro-enterprises are having to learn their languages
and adapt to them in order to deal.

In conclusion, the digital media sector in Ireland can have the best of both worlds as
long as the development of the infrastructure and the talent takes place in parallel.
Right now we have talent without infrastructure, buildings but no bandwidth, ideas
without business models.

By grooming the talent and developing the business models while others build the
hubs and the linkages, within a few years the two sides – the talent and the
infrastructure – can merge into a global showcase for digital media.

One where local firms work hand in hand with multinationals who have the
autonomy to roll out Irish innovations across the world.