australia 2020

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Topic 9 website finally launched!

01 April 2008 in Blogging, Politics by Stilgherrian | No comments

I’ve finally launched the website for my adventures to the Australia 2020 Summit and beyond: Topic 9 at topic9.com.au.

It’s pretty sparse to begin with, and I’m not quite sure exactly what I’ll be doing there — so suggestions are more than welcome. Some thoughts so far are:

  • Gathering links to everyone else’s writing about this topic area for the Summit.
  • Articles on people or ideas on how government could work in the future.
  • Interviews with the delegates before they hit Canberra.
  • Act as a central point of contact for whatever media coverage we can generate out of the summit, whether I go or not.

I certainly need to spice up the design a bit. I’ve kept the Tarski theme as used on this website and Skank Media for consistency, but it needs a tad more differentiation. soon, my precious ones, soon…

Any other ideas?

[Update 17 February 2010: The website at topic9.com.au has been killed. For the moment, I've linked to the pages at the Internet Archive.]

I’ve decided to go to BarCampSydney 3 this weekend, at least the Sunday session anyway. What sort of things could I usefully contribute? I’m thinking a discussion on internet TV, given my writing about ABC Playback this week, or perhaps try to figure out wt we can do about the Australia 2020 Summit.

01 April 2008 by Stilgherrian | No comments

What should I do about Australia 2020?

30 March 2008 in Personal, Politics by Stilgherrian | 14 comments

OK, so I didn’t make the 1000 “best and brightest” going to the Australia 2020 Summit. Nevertheless I’m still very interested in Topic 9, “the future of Australian governance: renewed democracy, a more open government (including the role of the media), the structure of the Federation and the rights and responsibilities of citizens.” What should I do?

There’s still the possibility of getting media accreditation, or perhaps connecting to the themes of the event in some other way. Here’s a brain-dump of my thoughts on this sunny Sunday morning… comments appreciated!

Read the rest of this entry »

The full list of delegates to the Australia 2020 Summit has been announced. For some reason undoubtedly related to the relative efficiencies of government and media, it was published on The Australian‘s website before the official one. And due to some oversight they seem to have left my name off the list. I’ll follow that up when I’m not wrapping up at a client’s office.

28 March 2008 by Stilgherrian | 3 comments

My invitation to the Australia 2020 Summit has yet to arrive. I guess it’s been a busy week, so I’ll be patient. However the 100 delegates to the 2020 Youth Summit the weekend before have been announced.

27 March 2008 by Stilgherrian | 2 comments

Yesterday I said I write follow-ups to my recent pieces on housing affordability and the Australia 2020 Summit. I decided to relax last night instead, and today I’ll concentrate on some client work and the gym first. Meanwhile, you can always read part 2 of Possum Comitatus’ housing policy analysis and Guy Rundle’s negative perspective on the summit.

24 March 2008 by Stilgherrian | No comments

Chairman Rudd has announced that the 1000 “best and brightest” have been chosen for the Australia 2020 Summit, and confirms that the attendees will receive their invitations this week. There’s only “a handful” of household names, he says. I’ll list the 20 names he released today in another post later today, or you can read the pieces in The Age or at the ABC. I have household things to do first.

23 March 2008 by Stilgherrian | No comments

Invitations to the Australia 2020 Summit will be sent out next week. “The Government has reserved a right to make some appointments of their own and they can be people who either didn’t apply or people who did apply and we left out,” says Steering Committee member Tim Costello. “With the Prime Minister saying we want the brightest and best there, anyone with any sort of healthy ego felt compelled to apply, so it’s attracted absolutely brilliant people.”

20 March 2008 by Stilgherrian | No comments

Australia 2020 Summit “destined to fail”

17 March 2008 in Politics by Stilgherrian | 2 comments

Another negative piece about the Australia 2020 Summit, this time from geneticist Michael Lardelli in The 2020 Summit — more hallucination than clear vision. He reckons it’s “destined to fail”.

Let me quote a couple more lines from the [ALP policy] website:

“The Australia 2020 Summit will examine… How we best invest the proceeds of [current] prosperity to lay the foundations for future economic growth.” And “How… we plan future population growth at a national and regional level, given the constraints of water shortages and sustainability?”

The trouble with these statements is that they assume the possibility of future economic growth and the inevitability and even desirability of population growth. But economic growth requires energy. A clear, objective view of the facts shows that by 2020, Australia and the rest of the world will be deep in an energy and food crisis of epic proportions.

Lardelli reckons that not even the Greens can openly suggest that future economic growth is impossible or that population growth is undesirable.

I don’t think we should write off the Summit just yet. These are Australians we’re talking about. If the Steering Committee tries to shut down true ideas-generation, I reckon our “best and brightest” will fight back with vigour.

Australia 2020 News, 14 March 2008

14 March 2008 in Politics by Stilgherrian | No comments

Summit deputy chairman Professor Glyn Davis reckons Australia’s universities should be run like the American higher education system.

Professor Davis will argue in a speech today that America’s higher education system is more stable than Australia’s because it is more decentralised, with legal and financial responsibility primarily in the hands of the states. Universities are also given more power to set their own tuition fees, and students are offered a wide range of institutions from which to choose.

Well, “he will have argued”, because this was this morning’s newspaper reporting something that hadn’t actually happened yet. Newspapers know the future.

Apart from that, nothing much new to report. Everyone is presumably busy going through nominations. Tomorrow I’ll look to see what the blogosphere is saying.

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