Surely the Creative & Digital Economy is important to BU

Guidance

As BU seeks to position itself as a university that engages in research centred on the ‘big questions’ facing our society, it was a surprise to see that of the 10 proposed key themes, the Creative and Digital Economy has yet to gain any traction amongst BU researchers in terms of shaping the future research agenda of the University. Surely, this can’t the case?

As a former Liverpool FC manager once said “lets look at the facts”:
• Creative Industries contributed 5.6% of the UK’s GDP in 2008
• Exports of services by the Creative Industries totalled £17.3 billion in 2008
• There are approximately 182,000 businesses in the UK Creative Industries Software and electronic publishing are a significant sector
• The RCUK Digital Economy programme provides support for research into how digital technologies can contribute to the economy and society.
• The Prime Minister argued that the Creative Industries is an important growth area in the UK economy.
• The European Commission reports that Creative Industries are among the fastest growing sectors in the EU and account for 3.3% of total EU GDP.

These figures suggest that BU needs to be engaged, and at the forefront of research in the Creative and Digital Economy…there are many big questions to be answered and many opportunities for us to get involved.

We know that this theme has run a series of successful networking events across BU over the past year or so. These have sought to encourage cross school collaboration and generate research and enterprise outputs. We also know that the Creative and Digital Economy theme has previously been defined by BU as “a multi-disciplinary approach to researching information communication technologies, computer games and animation, software development and smart technologies and the rise of intellectual property law in digital media”. Going forward we need to ensure that this focus is fit for purpose.

So I’d like to put a call out to all BU researchers interested in shaping the agenda of the Creative and Digital Economy Theme. Please come along on Thursday 16th June, 10am-12 noon in Room W242.

Dr John Oliver
Head of Research (Acting)
Media School

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