I dont know much about him, but I added it because I agree to a degree.
I donāt think so. It just needed time and a reason for people to tune inā¦ I think they needed to hire (more?) investigative journalists - to break the news, as they say. It should have become MWās flagship brand, but instead itās closure has reminded everyone of the ongoing problems MW has had.
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I spoke to a friend who was a today fm fan and is sad of its demiseā¦he was a duncan garner fan and found him refreshing as opposed to kerre on zb
He thinks its sad there is no
Choice in the talk back genre and all we get now is 1 opinionā¦
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Donāt you also have RNZ talkback/news stations? Just curious as to what alternative to ZB they offer?
Mitch Harris is a failed radio programmer. Why Stuff reporters go to him to comment on radio is bizarre. Heās the reason RadioLIVE didnāt work.
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Yeah, I take Mitch Harrisās comments with a grain of salt to be honest. That initial RadioLive format wasnāt great. Devlin seemed like a good idea in theory, but didnāt have the news nous to deliver the product. That Kerry Smith era was bizarre, had forgotten about that and the every changing drive hosts didnāt help either.
As for Today, no I donāt think they started too hard and fast. They needed to differentiate themselves from the previous MWorks Talk iterations (even if it just sounded like a RadioLive redux sometimes).
In so far as judging the project which was clearly meant to be a 5 year plan plus after a one year period, I think they made a couple of crucial errors.
I would have put Mark Richardson with Tova at breakfast as a sounding board/voice of dissent and also able to lead interviews. Tova and Mark rather than just Tova (I get why they went Tova solo (bar the Mark Dye era) and marketed it around her, but I just donāt think the show was compelling enough). A strong 2-headed breakfast would have also been a point of difference (I donāt count Morning Reportā¦because itās not the same style).
I think Lloyd was perhaps too young to be given the drive show too. Not saying heās not talented but HDPA and Lisa Owen are both so good and connected with their audiences it needed maybe an older male to differentiate itself.
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He wasnāt the only reason. Mark Jenningsā lack of willingness to engage with radio as HONCA at TV3 was also a stumbling block. Very restrictive on letting his talent appear.
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Bit out of left field hereā¦ but John Campbell? He has the life experience to relate to the audience AND he is about as far removed from your typical ZB raconteur as it gets. Of course itās all academic at this point but itās an interesting thought.
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RNZ isnāt talkback. Itās much more of a news and discussion station (a bit like ABC Radio National or BBC Radio 4). If you want talkback in NZ it really is ZB or bust.
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If you could differentiate enough from Checkpoint not a bad idea.
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Ah ok. I thought it might be more like ABC Local.
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Although having said that - Jennings was responsible for giving Kamahl Santamaria a shot too - and we all know how that ended.
By the way, what happened to that guy, anyway? Is his case going to employment court or something?
Edit: Also, just saw this too: Controversial broadcaster Sean Plunket permanently suspended from Twitter | Newshub
Cue the whining from Plunket about ācancel cultureā, not like he has his website/stream/Youtube/pocast anymore is itā¦ 
An extraordinarily long bow to draw given Kamahl was in the industry for about 20 years before his downfall.
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That is a good point, and I guess Jennings isnāt responsible for what he did after he left TV3 as well. Point taken.
100%, needed that grumpy boomer voice in there to bring over some of the Hoskās audience and for some difference of opinion. Also just someone for Tova to bounce off, it always seemed to come to life a bit more when Garner joined at the end of the show for debate club.
Such a move though would probably have been seen as āthe same old names doing the same old thingsā .
Trying to shake up the talk model to a younger , centrist station (at least for breakfast and drive) sounded good in theory but one of the main reasons it didnāt work out imo
FWIW Guyon Espiner for drive would have been my pick
The MediaWorks board has broken their silence over taking off Today FM, the moment they went off air last Thursday.
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āThe view of the Board was that Today FM wasnāt commercially sustainable and it was in the best interests of MediaWorks as a whole to close the station,ā the statement said.
So there we have it. But would it have killed them to give the staff some warning beforehand?
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Good luck killing a radio station full of journos and expecting them to go down quietly! lol
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Mw certainly didnt do this by halves hell of a way to tell an organization you are being closed down
I doubt few of the affected staff would have had it any other way with how it was announced on air. An honest statement about what was going to happen to the station without stock-standard company PR getting in the way. Perhaps the only difference was that the station was taken off air a few hours earlier than what management had planned.
What is a bit surprising is that the expected revenue vs station costs werenāt as bad as I thought they might be.