Australian Computer Society

Report on visit to West Australia by ACS President

Introduction

This is to report on my visit to West Australia 23 to 25 May 1996. The original purpose of the visit was to chair the Annual General Meeting of the ACS. The AGM is a brief and formal affair. To take advantage of my visit to Perth I gave some talks, ran a workshop and met some WA IT policy people:

Networking the Nation

Kerry Smith, Lecturer, at the Department of Information Studies, Curtin University of Technology read of my visit on the LINK mailing list and invited me to talk to her students about my work with the Internet at Defence. Information Studies is what hi-tech librarians study now and there is increasing convergence between the work which IT people do on making information accessible and what librarians do.

After the talk to Information Studies I dropped in on Dennis Moore, Head of the School of Computing and chair of the WA Government's Information Policy Council. Then was interviewed at Radio 6NR Perth, which is located on the Curtin Campus and Kerry took me for coffee and cake by the Swan River.

Kerry Smith
Jan Partridge reading the ACS WA Magazine.
The crowd at the talk (no really its the people in the very small library lift, trying to get out afterwards).
Quick visit to Dennis Moore.
Being interviewed at Radio 6NR Perth (6NR is located on the Curtin Campus).
Cake after the talk.
The view the cake had of the Perth skyline.

Serious Business on the Internet

Before leaving Canberra, I issued a media release "Internet, not sackings, to cut government costs", suggesting that the Internet could be used for more efficient Government and business in Australia. The ACS WA Branch arranged for me to give a workshop on Friday morning, so I could expound my views on using the Internet for business. Also I attended a breakfast meeting of the ACS WA Marketing Subcommittee.

Barry Houghton, ACS WA Professional Activities Manager
Breakfast meeting of the ACS WA Marketing Subcommittee

In the afternoon I met with Bjorn Gillgern, Director, State Telecommunications Management Unit, WA Government and staff. They are charting an interesting path for the state's IT, under the direction from Dennis's policy council. This has some differences to the South Australian model.

Accessing the Networked Nation

The AGM took about ten minutes and Tony Lightman, ACS WA Chairman opening the Branch Meeting, introduced my talk. To demonstrate that the ACS doesn't just talk about on-line technology for the benefit of the Australia, but actually uses it, I issued a media release via the Internet "live on stage" about our involvement in SEARCC96.

One of the topics I covered in my talk was Internet regulation, however this is not as topical in Perth as it is in Sydney, where a March Against NSW Proposed Legislation is being held tomorrow.

Dennis Street, ACS VP
Three senior ACS members at the AGM
Tony Lightman, ACS WA Chairman opening the Branch Meeting
The audience applauding the speaker.
Lunch at the beach the next day

ACS Management Committee meeting

On Saturday morning I chaired an ACS Management Committee meeting (any volunteers to formulate the ACS position on the future of Australian IT R&D?) and had lunch at the beach. My plane left for Canberra at 6:30am and I am typing this in mid air. Its been a busy few days, but worthwhile, for the ACS and myself. West Australia has a very active ACS branch and vigorous IT industry.

Tom Worthington MACS
President of the Australian Computer Society
26 May 1996

About the ACS

The Australian Computer Society is the professional association in Australia for those in the computing and information technology fields. It was established in 1966. The Society has over 16,000 members and on a per capita basis is one of the largest computer societies in the world.

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