Wow. This is all rather exciting, isn't it?
For me personally, the past couple of months have been pretty full-on, moving down to the region after ten years in Scotland and finding myself involved in 4iP - one of the biggest and most exciting projects to be happening in the UK right now. We have an opportunity to do something really special here.
Perhaps the biggest of these opportunities is to create and drive forwards an agenda of Digital Social Responsibility - or DSR. We're all now familiar with Corporate Social Responsibility. CSR is embedded in pretty much every industry and in companies big and small the world over. But what do we mean by Digital Social Responsibility? Well ... DSR can mean a number of things - for example serious games that promote social or educational messages, child protection online, raising awareness of moral issues relating to illegal file sharing and how this affects individual artists and investment in new talent, commissioning digital projects that encourage active participation in the real world rather than passive consumption of screen-based media etc.
Basically, digital media is growing up. We've had the precocious teenage years when it's been all about showing off new tricks and capabilities with reckless abandon and we're getting into an age when the question is not what can we do with digital media, but what should we be doing with it? That's what DSR is all about - and 4iP fits into that perfectly.
4iP is such an amazing opportunity for businesses to develop some really ground-breaking digital projects and the West Midlands is perfectly positioned to capitalise on this. Everything is in place - a hotbed of phenomenal talent across all screen sectors and supported by a network of agencies - including Screen WM, Advantage WM, Business Link, Arts Council, Skillset and others - that are all in absolute alignment and ready to help take the region to the next level. I really feel the West Midlands is ready to explode right now and take its rightful place at the heart of the digital revolution.