The fanfare surrounding the announcement was a bit like the release of the nation's budget -- the information being treated with great secrecy and embargoed so that none of the media could jump the gun.

Now don't get me wrong -- there's little wrong with the government's declared goal of boosting our involvement and performance in hi-tech markets through the promotion of our own innovation and talent.

There was little substance in the announcement however -- certainly nothing that merited the theatrics surrounding its release. Perhaps the PM's obsession with the performing arts has meant that such drama os to now be a part of all government decrees?

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It seems that there are three key areas that will be focused on in future: bio-technology, IT and communications, and "creative" industries.

Unfortunately I see some problems with bio-tech.

I wonder exactly how the government are going to fend off the strong objections of the Green Party and the anti-GM brigade while also fostering an industry in which genetic engineering and genetically modified organisms are becoming an increasingly important component.

IT and communications are areas where we've already excelled and proven ourselves capable of competing with other countries. What's been missing of course is the investment capital that these industries need to turn good ideas into commercial success.

Although yesterday's announcement defined the goals fairly clearly, it made little attempt to define the methods for reaching those goals.

The PM more or less ruled out the chances that personal tax rates would be lowered but the Finance Minister did hint that changes to the rates of business tax were not out of the question -- albeit they will probably be focused on attracting overseas companies to our shores.

Given the self-imposed limits on taxation reform and the need to maintain a center-left position, the current government has a very difficult task ahead if it is to reach those lofty goals announced yesterday.

I can't see how it would help us if we were to give foreign companies a preferential tax rate to local ones in order to attract them to our shores. This would simply encourage local entrepreneurs to spend US$399 to set up an LLC (Limited Liability Company) in Delaware, USA -- or even worse -- take their innovation and talent offshore to a country that offers even better tax rates to foreign companies.

Likewise, the philosophical aversion to bringing NZ"s rates of personal tax into line with those of other key players in the IT and communications industries means that even if the corporate tax rate is dropped, it will still be hard to keep our brightest and best individuals from jumping ship to Singapore, the USA or other low-tax countries.

If I issued a press release saying that my goal was to put a Kiwi on Mars by the year 2006, would I get as much press coverage?

Would my announcement be given any credibility without some proof that I had a pretty good plan for reaching that goal and was prepared to make the hard decisions required to do so?

Probably not.

Maybe this explains the reason why the government chose to try and dramatise yesterday's launch. However, I have to say -- let's have more steak and less sizzle eh?

Linking To Trouble
The BT hypertext linking case hasn't gone away yet -- and the media are still intrigued with the possible outcome.

However, infringing BT's patent isn't the only way that linking can get you into trouble.

Take the case of this page on the ClearNet website.

Looks harmless enough doesn't it?

However, unless they've fixed it already, clicking on the link titled "American Race Fan" will take you to a porno site (The Best Teen Sex Review Site). You have been warned.

Was this intentional? Are revenues so tight that ClearNet has signed up to an affiliate scheme to pay the rent? Is this a new Telstra-inspired policy?

No, it's simply one of those things that happen if you're not totally vigilant about manually checking every link on your site with regularity.

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