Mediawatch

2021 - media in the year of the vaccine; NZ news media in Oz-style ideological drift?

In this week's edition of Midweek Mediawatch, Hayden Donnell talks to Bryan Crump about a sympathetic story on the plight of the unvaccinated, a new doco from TVNZ, and anger and anxiety directed at a caller to Newstalk ZB.

The recent death of entrepreneur Jake Millar - at the age of 26 - prompted an angry backlash against the media - over coverage of his failed venture Unfiltered. Some in business cited tall poppy syndrome and claimed the media scrutiny of risk-takers and innovators must change. But what sort of coverage should they expect?

In this week's edition of Midweek Mediawatch, Hayden Donnell talks to Karyn Hay about style over substance in the coverage of Chris Luxon's first question time as leader, a Stuff column for the ages, and some new hires at Sean Plunket's online talk station.

Opponents of the bipartisan bill aimed at enabling housing blitzed the media over the past few weeks. Many of the reports failed to include relevant context and balancing opinion.

RNZ's previous plan to reach younger people collapsed in early 2020 after opposition to RNZ Concert cuts - and pushback from commercial broadcasters. This week RNZ fired up Tahi - a more modest effort for the under-served youth audience. What's the plan this time?

In this week's edition of Midweek Mediawatch, Hayden Donnell talks to Karyn Hay about the barrage of tough questions that met Chris Luxon upon his ascent to the National leadership, a media acquisition, and the launch of a new youth service.

Groundswell took over about 70 centres nationwide - briefly and pretty peacefully - in last weekend's Mother of All Protests. But the picture the media painted of who they really are and what they really want was confusing - and overlapping anger about the government and Covid-19 made the mix more murky.

The umbrella group representing locally-owned news media wants to negotiate with Facebook and Google for "fair payment" for the local journalism appearing on their services. Australian news media have struck substantial - but confidential and individual - deals with the tech titans - but a former news boss in both countries tells Mediawatch it may be a bad idea.

Late on Wednesday night's not prime time for political news to break, but Judith Collins' late-night kneecapping of rival Simon Bridges kicked off the chain of events that left her on the backbenches - with the media following every step.