NO TO SLASHING 6PM NATIONAL NEWS
News half-hour an option for TVNZ
Television New Zealand is looking at radical solutions to trim $30 million to $40 million from budgets - including halving the 6pm news hour. It is understood that TVNZ has sounded out TV3 advising: "If you go half an hour, we'd go half an hour too." "It would be a question of who blinks first," said a TVNZ source who would not be named. The idea of halving the news hour - creating a 30-minute bulletin followed by Close Up or Campbell Live - has been considered plenty of times. Publicly TVNZ and TV3 are not talking. But the TVNZ source said: "It makes a lot more sense now than it did in the past."
The Duopoly wins again, TV3 and TVNZ cutting deals between one another to slash our national news service back to a mere 30minutes. My God who would've thunk it? 17 minutes of news is all we will get on our TV channels as they demolish intelligent debate of the days events for cost cutting measures so TVOne can afford American TV shows about a man with a large penis.
That they have colluded together is bad enough, but the net effect of less news will be dumbing down a product already near braindead. It is an extraordinary damaging attack on the medias role to hold the powerful to account, our news media will now finally be the empty joke it has been moving towards ever since corporate interests trumped democratic interests.
And who benefits from a weakened news media? The powerful elites who want as little scrutiny to their re-writing of the rules that determine the matrix we all live in, that's who benefits. It is an extraordinary demise in the quality of our democracy, and this happens right when National want to damage Radio NZ.
Unbelievable, well funded public broadcasting is essential to our democracy and that TVNZ have cut a deal with TV3 to damage our national 6pm news service defeats the point of public debate in the public sphere. I never thought for one minute in NZ that I would see such a crass and obvious betrayal of the media's role to inform citizens.
Will Campbell Live also be moved to the mornings to replace Sunrise as a further cost cutting measure?
NO TO SLASHING 6PM NATIONAL NEWS facebook group
posted by Bomber @ 7:04 am
26 comments
26 Comments:
But more often than not its 1.5 hrs of shit (including Campbell and Close up). Last night on campbell - a dog makes his super 14 virtual picks! What the fuck?
I do agree with you bomber, but the product as it stands now is shit. Problem is though, 17 mins of news, less say 4 for sport, 3 for the weather gives you 10 mins. By the time the markets have been covered, what is there left to do?
Oh look, sweet jesus I think we all agree the current news service is a product that is near braindead (which is why I called the facebook group 'No to slashing 6pm national news' as opposed to 'save 6pm national news' because there is very left to save. But it is CRUCIAL for our democracy that there is a broad based critical news service that conducts public sphere news and every broadcaster in NZ fulfill that obligation first before infotainment pap.
The fact the buggers are colluding with eachother is detrimental and borders on a duopoly.
I don't really watch the 6pm news anyway. If I do, it would only really be the first 15-20 minutes. I get most of my news from online sources, print or on the 24 hour news channels. So I don't see how this is really such a big deal.
Prime do a half hour news service.
"crucial for our democracy"...are you for real? most people read news on the net anyway. and, i hope you realise and are trying to be funny, but here is no such word as "thunk".
Isn't it also illegal? Surely this is one for the Commerce Commission. What's the difference between this and Caltex, BP and Shell colluding over free car washes?
TV news is garbage, I'd rather read your blog, it's that bad.
It would be good for people if they were subjected to less of it.
Maybe people would get on the internet more and find news there where they can investigate what interests them rather than be fed trivial nonsense.
Tbh the news is so shit on tv I am not actually sure they even perform their duty of keeping politicians honest. If you want to be informed go online, dont watch 1 hour of populist crap.
I dont know, I reckon it would backfire anyway, expensive to make but also their most lucrative 'product'.
If you have to watch anything on TV then you're basically a moron.
Online print media rocks.
I haven't watch TV or listened to the radio for 5 years and have never regretted it.
Leaving the masses to the braindead world of TV isn't the answer, but I'm glad you are doing well anon, it seems that is where your focus is.
The problem with TV and radio as a media is that there is too much focus on the way the commentary is delivered as opposed to the information itself. It's therefore an issue of style over substance, presentation over understanding.
Reading enables you to confront an issue at your own pace instead of having information thrown at you with little time for comprehension.
Therefore I for one will feel nothing for the demise of TV news shows.
And your rational anon plays into the hands of the elites to minimize news to the masses so that the quality of democracy fails. Most astoundingly your position lets TVNZ and TV3 completely off the hook for acting as a duopoly.
If people are forced to think through read a newspaper instead of passively watching crappy TV news then that's a good thing in my book.
TV retards people intellect so to advocate it as a medium that people should go to plays into the hands of the elite through dumbing down the masses.
Except of course Newspapers are barely better than tv news.
TV CAN retard the way people think, it can also be used as part of the public sphere necessary for a healthy democracy, I'm not suggesting what we have on current offer is brilliant, I am attacking further dumbing down of what little we have left. Denying the role TV can play in healthy democracy by claiming it can only retard people plays into the hands of the elites.
Most astoundingly your position lets TVNZ and TV3 completely off the hook for acting as a duopoly
I can see your point Bomber, but I have to say that it hasn't been all that long since TVNZ added the extra 1/2 hour to make it a "news hour" and in that time what have we had? More sports, more celebrity bullshit, more cats stuck up trees, more Dom whats-his-name live in L.A....
If they cut that shit out and just have the very little news that actually happens in NZ, we won't be any poorer for it.
What role can TV play in a healthy democratic country that print media can't?
I say that TV has resulted in the degeneration of the democratic process. Just look at the first TV president JFK. Despite the fact that he nearly started a nuclear war and was responsible for the Vietnam war people thought he looked great on TV so he was the man. Obama's the same - stirring speeches but he's really in the pay of the corporations and Wall st.
Don't even get me started on Regan. All these people are creature of TV and look where it got America.
"Most astoundingly your position lets TVNZ and TV3 completely off the hook for acting as a duopoly"
Umm, aren't you anti-capitalist? This would mean you are against competition which is the essence of capitalism. If so why are you complaining about a duopoly?
You're right, absolutely.. It'll be 10-17 minutes... and all so we can see the ghastly American sitcoms and reality shows! We are little America already, we don't need more!
Umm, aren't you anti-capitalist? This would mean you are against competition which is the essence of capitalism. If so why are you complaining about a duopoly?
Your total lack of comprehension of the word anti-capitalist and inability to connect concerns about duopoly are educational gaps you need to work on Anon, I don't run a remedial service here.
Just look at the first TV president JFK. Despite the fact that he nearly started a nuclear war
No, that was Russia who forced that issue, you can't blame television for that.
and was responsible for the Vietnam war people thought he looked great on TV so he was the man
And yet it was the images of war beamed into peoples homes via TV that made people stop supporting the war.
I don't think you can lay any of that at the feet of television.
"I don't think you can lay any of that at the feet of television."
I actually can. He was the first politician who was made for TV. He was an absolute disaster for America and the world yet all that in our minds is his image on TV as if that really counts for anything.
John Key is another prime example. Very smiling and personable but who is he really, I have no idea and NZ simply votes on the basis of image.
"Except of course Newspapers are barely better than tv news. "
Some newspapers are not of course but its the passive mode of TV which detracts from critical thinking and engagement that I'm consider here. Look at talkback radio people get attracted to a particular presenter and then begin parroting off Michael Laws arguments. It is truly inane.
If you think TV is good for democracy what do you think of all those uber republican teaparty activists in the US fueled up by fox tv attacks on Obama and insane conspiracy theories. Was that what you had in mind?
I actually can. He was the first politician who was made for TV. He was an absolute disaster for America and the world yet all that in our minds is his image on TV as if that really counts for anything.
Forgive me, but wasn't it Nixon's performance in that tv debate that cost him the election as opposed to JFK's ability? Does it follow that we can thank TV for halting Nixon? As bad as you may think JFK was, he was an angel compared to Nixon.
John Key is another prime example. Very smiling and personable but who is he really, I have no idea and NZ simply votes on the basis of image.
Agreed but I think blaming TV for that is simply too simplistic.
Some newspapers are not of course but its the passive mode of TV which detracts from critical thinking and engagement that I'm consider here. Look at talkback radio people get attracted to a particular presenter and then begin parroting off Michael Laws arguments. It is truly inane.
Again agreed, and TV can be used as a baseless passive medium, but programming that intends to make it much more engaging CAN be a positive.
If you think TV is good for democracy what do you think of all those uber republican teaparty activists in the US fueled up by fox tv attacks on Obama and insane conspiracy theories. Was that what you had in mind?
Of course not, there are abuses, Fox News is the most obvious abuse, but again I think it's simply too simplistic to write TV off as an entire medium.
The role of broadcasters in a democracy is SUPPOSED to be to help formulate the public sphere that Habermas was so fond off. Now while there are se holes in his theory, the importance of his conclusions can't be missed. Cutting national news from an hour to half an hour rather than demanding better news service will have a dramatic and negative impact on the quality of information available for citizens to make decisions. It plays to the elites who want a stupid electorate and once again I point out the utter unacceptability of TVNZ and TV3 colluding with one another to cut the news programmes down to 30minutes
I agree that online and print in some ways are the best means of news or opinion intake. What they can't do is allow you to look into the eyes and judge in real time the person being interogated. Steven Joyce last night although poorly interviewed doesn't benifit from moving pictures, John Key perhaps does. Acknowledged in New Zealand we have a woeful record of television news and current affairs but that isn't a reason to ditch it it's a reason to fix it!
What we should have is a Hard Talk that allows the public broadcaster to robustly interrogate and debate with the people who make the decisions in our society, in real time, with moving images. This is as important as printed media but needs to be independent of the pressures of selling advertising. Although, perhaps a half hour news bulletin could allow for a more robust Close-Up or Campell?
"As bad as you may think JFK was, he was an angel compared to Nixon."
Depends. If you were black and living in the South in the 9160s you'd be pretty chuffed with Nixon.
http://hnn.us/articles/5331.html
Cutting national news from an hour to half an hour rather than demanding better news service will have a dramatic and negative impact on the quality of information available for citizens to make decisions.
Depends really. If you actually put news in the news and less sports and fluff then maybe it could possibly be better. Bigger is not necessarily better. But probably not. Since I don't watch it I can't say.
But I still assert that the public sphere is best served by being dominated by writers and not broadcasters. There is no way in hell you can communicate a complex idea in a series of soundbites in between commercial ad breaks. TV news is good for the shock value of having blood and gore footage. It lack any kind of intellectual depth.
Firstly @ Anon of 11:06 - theoretically a good point - EXCEPT that a Commerce Commision that is supposed to ensure a competative business environment and that allows duopolies that collude and dictate to their suppliers what goes, is as week as gnats piss anyway. IF they had any balls they would have turned down all those mergers and takeovers that have occured in recent times - you know the ones: Food distribution and supermarkets effectively in the hands of two (only) PLAYERS - vertically and horizontally integrated such that anyone who tried to compete on the same scale is effectively pushing shit uphill getting started. The very same ones that do their best to put small food business suppliers and outlets out of business (such as by demanding unrealistic volumes of goods).
Amazing how they all professed to laud the "freemarket" and "competitiveness" as a natural leveller, but then sought through takeovers and "vertical and horizontal" integrations to create a duopoly situation. AND if they could get away with it, they'd try going for a monopoly. If the Commerce Commission had any balls, it would force the 3 brands currently owned by one chain to separate. It would force a separation of retail and distribution activity. Ahhhh, I can hear them bullshitting now about how "competitive" the industry is because of the "franchise" concept in place!
And a Commerce Commission that allowed Prime to be taken over by SKY? As I said (anon 11:06), good idea but unfortunately the Commerce Commission ain't up to it.
But as for Television News -
when you now get the pair of them effectively "creating" news about themselves its really time to give up on the whole pretense. I mean to say! - just check out all that 3 "Business News" contrivance!.
Somehow "the most popular stories on our websites" is of critical importance, whilst they can't even provide the goings on in our Pacific Island neighbours.
Look people!!: "a majority of NZ's audience think this is what you should be reading/hearing/watching". What a scoop!
If they don't agree to the 30 min bulletin, prepare yourselves for things like "What the papers are saying" (which might be OK if it included what the P.I papers were saying).
It's time we solved a couple of problems whilst complying with that burnt out, failed bullshit
"efficient and effective" ideology we've had rammend down our throats for the past 20 or so years: Have TVNZ outsource news gathering, editorial activity, and perhaps even presentation to Radio NZ.
We could get the autocue readers, a few journalists and others to shift across to RNZ; solve the RNZ underfunding problem by having TVNZ pay RNZ for the news service, raise the level of remuneration for a few RNZ people whilst at the same time get rid of the overpaid so called "stars", and get something that at least half resembles news and current affairs back.
But no....this is the environment where such competition and competence should tender for the provision of public service style broadcasting on a programme-by-programme basis. And if we can't get away with that notion, we'll just say that Maori Television is effectively providing it, so we don't need to worry anyway.
What short memories people have!
Prepare yourselves for things such as children's television to vanish again; for the only genuine and analytical current affairs programmes to be provided by overseas broadcasters; for NZ stories told from a NZ perspective to vanish; etc. etc. etc.
Fuck all those minorities and special interest groups; fuck diversity. What we need is one homogenous load of kaka to be pumped out by all free-to-air telecasters. Why we can model it all on the Rugby World Cup proposals.
Tv is crap anyway, I no longer own one!
Anon said: Tv is crap anyway, I no longer own one!
The most solid argument out of the entire 25 above!
TV is an Ideological tool for Capitalism and the Elitists that run the show - The Internet is the upcoming "next" in line for the title of "Crap" as it becomes eroded by Conservative Politicians working for their Corporate Masters & Murdoch et al- media owners and controllers who make fortunes by regulating consumers to desired behaviour and desired belief systems. ALL media's have been bastardized and aim to dumb down and control global societies! Unfortunately, the Internet is the last frontier...
Bomber you complain about collusion in TV media, but it happens constantly in all industries that have an interest in influencing the consumer. This isn't something new, it's been going on since Corporate- Sensationalist advertising was allowed as the prime revenue source for funding news broadcasts, and all other programming - so it goes directly to the heart of Capitalism - it's all about "money"...and control of your wallet!
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