MURDOCH TO AUSSIES: EMBRACE TECHNOLOGY
By Glenda Korporaal
The Australian
November 8, 2008
Original LinkNews Corporation chief Rupert Murdoch is urging Australians to move out of their comfort zones and embrace new technology.
In his second of five Boyer Lectures, The Challenge of Technology, which will be aired on ABC Radio National at 5pm tomorrow, Mr Murdoch says people should stop whingeing about the challenge of new technology and "get out in front of it".
He says new technology, such as the internet, is destroying business models that have been used for decades, particularly those with a "one size fits all" approach to their customers.
The US television networks are finding their audiences shrinking every day, he says. "People suddenly have a growing multitude of choices -- and they are rightly exercising those choices," Mr Murdoch says.
The near monopoly of classified advertisements that newspapers once enjoyed is being threatened by websites retailing cars and jobs and consumer sites, such as Craigslist in the US.
The chairman and chief executive of News Corporation, owner of The Weekend Australian, says new technology is "ushering in a new golden age for human kind". It is becoming easier and cheaper for people to buy and sell.
People can do more of what they want at a cheaper cost and the disadvantaged now have greater access to information than at any time in history, Mr Murdoch says.
Technology is also "allowing the little guy to do what once required a huge corporation".
Mr Murdoch cites the Drudge Report website run by US columnist Matt Drudge, which mainly alerts readers to content on other websites and articles he finds interesting.
"Even those who don't like him click on to his website every day," Mr Murdoch says.
"Drudge has succeeded in challenging all the leading media companies of our day -- including mine. And he has done it with minimal start-up costs: a computer, a modem and some space on a server."
Mr Murdoch says that as technology levels playing fields, the "human factor" is more important.
"If you run a business, you need good people more than ever," he says.