Taxpayers fund ABC web tilt

May 25 2009, 6:06am

The Federal Government’s budget hand-out to the ABC to build regional websites has understandably upset newspaper publishers. Competition is usually is a good thing, but is it in this case. Most country towns are well served by commercial content providers, bloggers and niche community sites covering sport, music, etc. Not to mention Facebook, Twitter and other social media that are built on communities, often geographical. No doubt the cost of developing ABC websites is much higher than what a smart community-minded individual would pay to start up a portal. The ABC should focus on its core business, continue doing a good job with regional radio, and forget about soaking up public funds to compete online with commercial services and community activists.