Europe's competitive position in the Internet-based economy
The European Commissioner for Education and Culture, Viviane Reding, promised to ensure Europe is a leading player in the Internet-based economy while ensuring that the values of society at large are maintained, in a speech given at the European Internet Summit in Madrid on 11 January 2000. The Information Society presents 'major challenges ranging from our economic competitiveness to our cultural identity,' she said. 'You can personally count on my determination to assemble them [Europe's heritage, knowledge, resources and talent] to allow Europe to be a leading player and to work towards an Information Society which is in keeping with its values and its vision of society.' In her speech Ms Reding outlined what had already been achieved in audiovisual policy under Romano Prodi's Commission. Digitisation has resulted in a huge increase in the amount of information available, and has opened up the arena to a wide range of new operators. As a result, last December a communication was adopted by the Commission on new principles and guidelines needed for Community audiovisual policy in the digital age, while the Commission has put forward proposals to renew the Media programme (to be known as Media Plus) to support the audiovisual industry better. Commissioner Reding pointed to the need for a legal framework to guarantee the freedom to provide audiovisual services and appropriate support mechanisms. She said a recent debate on the Commission Green Paper on technological convergence highlighted the need for self regulation, principles of necessity and proportionality, separation of transport and content regulation, and technological neutrality. The Commissioner said the Community must further develop policies to support the audiovisual industry, utilising existing support mechanisms at Community and Member State level. She said efforts towards coordination with other Community instruments such as the research Framework Programme and Mr Prodi's eEurope initiative should be encouraged. Towards the end of her speech Ms Reding warned that the eEurope initiative must build on European strengths such as mobile communications and digital TV rather than encouraging non-European industries such as manufacturers of personal computers. 'We must be careful to avoid a pitfall which would be disastrous for European companies, namely the inadvertent creation of a European demand for non-European products,' she said. 'My opinion is that the eEurope initiative must build on these [European] strengths and advances rather than endeavour to make up for lost time which is difficult.'