The media industry focuses on providing the public with the best selling stories and the current events. Since its inventions, the media industry has improved the living standards of millions of individuals. Sometimes, the media industry conflicts with the law for not adhering to existing governing objectives, rules, and regulations. In a bid to improve the efficiency of the media industry and ensure that it abides by the law, UAE’s government drafted a strategic electronic framework, which was to be used between the years 2011 to 2013. The UAE’s strategic framework states how digital media will contribute towards achieving efficiency and reliability within the government.
In formulating the first step towards mapping digital media in the country, terrestrial media has been mandated to broadcast for one hour in a week without imposing any fee. This broadcast focuses on national guidance, education, culture, and tourism. To transform government services, ICT infrastructures are to be geo-designed under the watch of the Abu Dhabi Spatial Data Infrastructure program (AD-SDI).
Through the strategy, the government has embraced the use of social media. The government has used social media as an avenue to encourage citizens’ participation in the government’s delivery of service. Despite its popularity, policy guidelines on the usage of these social media sites are lacking.
In the UAE, digital media has found its way in the transport sector, and this has brought efficiency in the sector. Notably, the customer service department of Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) has developed a digital map. Some of the services provided by the RTA have been uploaded to Google Maps to advance daily travels. The Google maps portal is readily accessible and it enables users of public transport to plan their journeys at any hour and at their convenience.
The e-Government strategy has been implemented to improve government operations by engaging the citizens, failure of which would lead to failure of the e-Government process. To build trust and confidence in the e-Government strategy, the country has adopted the use of national identity management systems, which makes use of smart identity cards.