Well, Australia is not a country unfamiliar with long running tent city protests. There's been one in Canberra for god knows how long. Decades? 1970's and on I think from memory and is still there. Here's a
wiki link all about it.
Whether it's really helped or not I guess is hard to say. Would the changes made in legislation happened if it hadn't been there. I would say most likely, but it's true that the tent embassy has probably influenced a lot of people's thoughts on aboriginal issues and rights. At the same time, I would guess that there are a huge number of Australians who don't even know it exists, let alone what the issues are.
My point is, these protests could go on for years and show very little discernible change. When the aboriginal people first made camp outside parliament house here, it was in the news every day, but after a couple of years, it just wasn't reported anymore, and yet some of the very issues it was started for remain.