For both that and the presenters. The last I saw them together on a weekend NBN News bulletin, Jane Goldsmith and Sam Djodan were weeknight bulletin quality presenters for news and sport respectively!
It’s also weird how there isn’t a national weather outlook during NBN’s weekend forecasts.
At the very least, I think NBN should include a mention of the forecast for Sydney & Brisbane during the weekend weather segments because I’m sure there are many Northern NSW residents who have connections to either (or maybe even both) of those two cities!
There is also a joint Mid North Coast and Far North Coast forecast on weekdays and a separate one on weekends.
My assumption for separate ones on weekends is that Gavin was unable / didn’t want to record more weather forecasts on weekdays, for example because of the workload and that the weekend presenter doesn’t have this issue.
The workload has also increased now with the addition of Southern NSW forecasts, which are also combined: Illawarra/Canberra and Riverina/Central West.
I thought Kate Haberfield wasn’t too bad either. Mitch Hughes is also pretty good as the sports presenter. What I don’t think is too good is the weeknight newsreaders. Both sound really cheery and not serious enough.
I have noticed how there’s a combined North Coast forecast on weeknights and separate segments for the Mid North Coast and Far North Coast on weekends.
Yeah, I couldn’t imagine Gavin (or any other weather presenter for that matter) wanting to present ten different forecasts for Regional NSW, the ACT and the Gold Coast on weeknights. They’d probably have to start recording from 3 or 4 in the afternoon, which means that the top temperatures for the day for some locations mightn’t always make it onto the full forecast especially during the Summer!
Yeah, from what I’ve seen Kate Haberfield is a great reporter but I haven’t really seen her present sport before - although I can imagine her being a good presenter. Mitchell Hughes’ sport presenting style is fairly middle of the road.
Paul Lobb reminds me of a presenter you’d expect to see on It’s Academic or some other kids quiz show! Natasha Beyersdorf’s presenting style is comparable to Georgie Gardner’s IMO, some might really like that style of newsreading but I find it to be a little on the cold side TBH.
Paul is definitely too cheery, Natasha just lacks personality and sounds like she has a permanent cold.
I do agree Jane Goldsmith is a better weeknight presenter than both of those, but I don’t know that there’s any other NBN presenter that is worth pairing her with… Samuel Djodan could be an option down the track, but I think he’s too “green” and doesn’t have enough experience for that role for that role right now.
As for the weather reports, if Gavin doesn’t have enough time to do localised weather reports on weeknights, NBN may just as well not bother with the weekend ones… It makes no sense doing it for only 2 out of 7 nights a week.
For the first time in a few years (I think the last might’ve been the penultimate bulletin with Mike Rabbitt on Sport in December 2014), I watched NBN News Central Coast tonight.
As far as I can tell, there were only three local Central Coast RVO news reports (one of which was a “Developing Story” which would’ve been shown in all markets) and two local sports stories (Mariners in the A-League and something about a local golfer, from Steve Allen) in tonight’s bulletin with the rest being from Newcastle and elsewhere.
A side effect of being sandwiched between the large (by regional standards) Newcastle TV market and the massive Sydney TV market? Possibly, but I still would’ve expected a bit more local content. Certainly for a region with around 300k residents (the Illawarra/South Coast with perhaps a slightly smaller population, has two local news bulletins on TV), there should be enough room for at least one proper local TV news service on the NSW Central Coast IMO.
If this level of local content is a regular thing, I really wonder how many Central Coasters watch NBN News over Nine (or Seven) News from Sydney and/or if introducing the newer “Nine News Regional” format to the NSW Central Coast would increase the level of content covered.
On a more positive note, I think the “new” (or repurposed from Nine News) set has improved the presentation of NBN News compared to the last time I saw it. Also, Kate Haberfield was a great fill-in Sports presenter - I can see a very bright future in the media industry for her!
Unfortunately, local content isn’t great on NBN News Central Coast, tonight was not an uncommon occurrence.
My thoughts would be that NBN need to get the product right eg. more local news and less Newcastle centricity, and then look at rebranding or ramping up promotions.
I’m sure some Central Coasters would have sampled NBN News Central Coast at times, but may have been turned off by the Newcastle centric flavour of what is supposed to be a local bulletin and gone back to the Sydney bulletins as they probably have a stronger connection to that city eg. as commuters, and/or because they are more slickly presented bulletins or for legacy reasons prior to aggregation and UHF translators.
Continuing the “Local Content Count” for NBN News Central Coast during my short stay in the viewing area with last night’s (14/11) bulletin:
Small bushfire on Woy Woy Peninsula contained (short RVO)
Construction begins on new NDIS housing project in Gorokan (full report by Jacinta Lee)
Mariners vs Reds A-League match lead-up (full report by Samantha Long)
Central Coast Cycling Club training for Junior Track Open on Saturday (full report by Jacinta Lee)
Meanwhile on tonight’s (15/11) bulletin…
Results of Marriage Postal Survey in local Central Coast electorates (full report by Jacinta Lee)
Regional Youth Support Services takes out top honours at Youth Action Awards (full report by Samantha Long)
Preview of tomorrow night’s Mariners vs Reds A-League match (full report by Samantha Long)
Aside from the content mentioned, the rest of the local windows were made up of stories/RVOs from Newcastle and even in a couple of cases, the Mid North Coast!
Yes, it is not unusual to see NBN use content from the North West Slopes, Mid North Coast or Northern Rivers to fill the void in the Central Coast local windows.
By my estimate, the average amount of actual Central Coast content is about 5 minutes out of the 10 minutes that the news and sports windows go for in total.
Yep, I noticed that. Only one Central Coast report made it into the shared Newcastle/Central Coast 1st segment of the bulletin:
Body of missing kayaker found near Berkeley Vale (Full report by Samantha Long)
But the Central Coast did break away from Newcastle for a Sports Report and a post-Sport colour piece:
Central Coast boxer to make professional boxing debut on Saturday night (Full report by Samantha Long)
Central Coast Grammar School Maths teacher shaves offs moustache for Movember (Full report by Jacinta Lee).
I personally wondered how many people on the Central Coast really cared about how Newcastle CBD businesses are affected by the construction happening there when that report aired!
Yes, there are too many irrelevant Newcastle reports that are aired on the Central Coast.
It’s also odd that NBN opted to air a local sports window, but not a local news window… If anything, it should have been the other way around, as it meant Central Coast viewers had to wait nearly 50 minutes to see a 2nd local news report tonight.
Yep I agree. Content wise, I actually think the NSW Central Coast (and probably most non-Newcastle regions that get NBN News) might actually benefit from having the much criticised Nine News Regional format!
Aside from that point, surely I’m not the only one who thinks the generic 20 Second Promo for NBN News is a bit odd? For those who haven’t seen it, the promo is basically a bunch of shots of the presenters on the set (I think Paul, Tash, Mitch, Gav, Jane, Sam and Kate all have at least one scene in this) set to music and a “NBN News: Nightly At Six” endtag and voiceover.
While it looks good visually particularly in native HD (if only I could say that about NBN’s actual news bulletin!), IMO it’s as odd as a promo for Nine News Sydney just having footage of Pete, Cam, Amber, GG, Erin, Belinda and Deb set to music with a “Nine News: Nightly at Six” endtag and voiceover!
NBN News and Nine News Regional are the same format, just with different skins. If NBN News became ‘Nine News Regional’ and was still produced from Newcastle, it would probably suffer the same Newcastle slant across the whole broadcast area. If it was produced from Sydney, it would likely then suffer a Sydney slant and NBN/Nine would probably lose a lot of ground in Newcastle.
I think the only solution to either problem is more reporters on the ground to provide more stories for each local window, and also looking for stories affecting the whole broadcast area. Unfortunately unlikely to happen.
Not while they’re the only game in town. Until WIN and Prime7 start a locally produced bulletin serving the Hunter that is produced in the Hunter that’s actually good, they’ll keep doing what they’re doing.
They could dedicate 60 minutes to live footage of actual shit being cooked in a microwave and still win. That’s how sad it is. It’s 2017…not 1962, and they’re still the only proper TV news in town.
There was a playout error on NBN News Central Coast tonight… at the end of the prerecorded local weather window, the system failed to cross back to the live bulletin for the sign off and closer, so we got the NBN News title card for 3 seconds, the following graphic for 3 seconds (which is incorrect since it was Central Coast weather), and then a black screen and silence until “Family Food Fight” started.
.