ACS Week in Review: 18 January 2013

• Hudson Report: Employment Trends
• Australian Government Workplace Gender Equality Agency Gradstats Starting Salaries report

ACS in the news

• IT bosses want to hire this quarter: Hudson
• 2013 iAwards open for nomination
• CenITex scandal sparks calls for IT ethics training
• The value of deconstructing roles into skills
• Female IT graduates earn more: study

Topics in the news

• Digital Economy:  R&D investment paying off for big tech, ASIC urged to relax rules on crowd-funding.
• Cyber security:  new Cyber bullying guidelines released, Victorian police chief meets Facebook executives
• Telecommunications:  Digital dividend auction deadline looms
• Government: DPS appoints new CIO

News for ACS newsfeed

Digital Economy

• Investment in R&D is paying off for tech companies, according to a global scorecard conducted by the European Commission.
• NASA is partnering with a commercial space company on a US$17.8 million project to create new ‘balloon like’ habitats for the international space station. NASA is expected to install the 10-foot-diameter, blimp-like module by 2015.
• According to former Tasmania premier David Bartlett, Australian businesses are unprepared to take advantage of the roll out of the NBN. The answer is for business leaders to understand how ‘digital disruption’ will change the nature of their industries, he says.
• Entrepreneurs have urged the Australian Securities and Investments Commission to relax the rules on crowd-funding, saying that the start-up community risks an exodus of talent to the US.
• ICT is changing the way we speak, with tech related words dominating new entrants into the Macquarie English dictionary. In 2009 the ‘word of the year’ was ‘Tweet’ and in 2010 it was ‘Googleganger’. Voting for 2012 word of the year opened January 7^th.

Skills

• With companies and their CIOs under increased pressure to be more productive in 2013, it is expected that there will be an emphasis on collaboration skills and tools.
• Amazon Cloud Services has made three high-profile hires as they gear up to expand in 2013.

Cloud

• Social media and data analytics will be central to IBMs strategy to scale Tennis Australia’s cloud infrastructure during this years Australian Open – with the aim of avoiding any downtime during peak demand times.
• With Cloud becoming increasingly ubiquitous IT managers are now facing the challenge of ‘Rogue Clouds’ being implemented by non-IT staff within their organisation. Symantec research also indicated that 43% of IT managers globally had ‘lost’ data stored in the cloud.

Cyber Security

• The New South Wales government is looking to stop the use of electronic devices for recording, taking photos, and even tweeting in New South Wales courts in a move designed to prevent potential mistrials.
• Prime Minister Julia Gillard has called upon Twitter to join social media companies Facebook, Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft in agreeing to work within cyber bullying guidelines set by the government.
• Victorian Police Chief Commissioner Ken Lay will meet with the head of Facebook Asia to discuss concerns about privacy, ethics and the risk that Facebook undermines the criminal justice system.
• Identity thieves are taking advantage of Apple’s online financing to defraud victims and purchase the latest Apple products.

Government

• The Australian Department of Parliamentary Services (DPS) has appointed Eija Seittenranta from the Department of Human Services (DHS) as the permanent DPS chief information officer.
• Coalition MP Paul Fletcher argues that the government must offer a universal electronic ID in a Fairfax IT Pro opinion piece.

Telecommunications

• Telstra and Optus have until January 24^th to decide if they are willing to join the digital dividend auction, which will see the spectrum previously used for the broadcast of analog television sold off.
• Bush fires are affecting Australia’s telcos, causing power outages at Optus mobile sites in NSW, and destroying a Telstra exchange in Victoria. Vodafone has also been warned it could face problems.

Government Announcements

• Social networking sites to cooperate with Government on complaint handling
  Social Networking Sites have agreed to continue promoting user safety as well as undertaking education and awareness raising about antisocial behaviour online under new guidelines announced by the Prime Minister.


• Gillard Government launches NBN training services for Adelaide
  Federal Member for Adelaide, Kate Ellis, today officially opened an NBN Digital Hub and Enterprise in Adelaide, which provides local people, small-to-medium sized businesses and not-for-profit organisations free expert advice on how to make the most of the National Broadband Network (NBN).


• Malcolm Turnbull right: 'extraordinary' NBN deserves 'admiration' for exceeding target
  The Acting Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Kim Carr, today welcomed the announcement by NBN Co that it had exceeded its target of having NBN fibre construction commenced or complete for 758,000 homes and businesses by the end of 2012.


• R&D tax incentives drives investment
  Australian small and medium sized businesses have received around $500 million in direct payments during the first six months of the Gillard Labor Government’s new R&D Tax Incentive.
• Siding Spring Observatory affected by fire damage
  Minister for Science and Research, Senator Chris Evans, today recognised the efforts of the New South Wales Rural Fire Service who spent last night fighting fires surrounding the Siding Spring Observatory. 

Opposition Announcements

• Gillard government misleads again on NBN rollout
  There are three key questions about the NBN’s rollout – how many premises the network passes, how many premises it’s connected to and what it’s costing to get to them.