Some wonderful colours showing up all over the Sky Free channels right now.
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Aforesaid channel changes, on 29 January 2026, early hours… according to Freeview.
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Good Idea for Sky Free to close Two Timeshift Channel to save money, is a Merger of Sky Open and Eden Coming?
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If that’s the rational, they might as well close all their plus one channels down.
Some sort of encoding issue? DTV is unwatchable on all their channels, live streams cutting in and out. There will be plenty of advertisers wanting compo! Interestingly, the streaming only channel I tried (Men and motors) is working fine.
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They say “Occasional audio or picture glitches,” but all I’ve been getting was a big black screen.
I guess different devices treat this early Xmas Present differently!
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The Voice Australia grand final aired on TVNZ recently. Cassie Henderson made it to the grand final but lost to Alyssa Delpopolo.
What do you think of the result? Could you see more Kiwis auditioning for shows like Australian Idol (I think the upcoming season will have 1 or 2) and The Voice in the future?
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It got burned off at 10:30pm at night here, so hard to know what impact it had.
Also Cassie Henderson was already well known in NZ prior to this so she was doing it purely to try and crack Australia to get her name out there.
I suspect it will depend on the artist as to whether they audition but it’s unlikely there’ll be any more NZ Idol/Got Talent versions here so that may be their best avenue - whether it actually helps their careers long term though, I’m not sure.
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Australian comedy series Sunny Nights, starring Will Forte and D’Arcy Carden, premieres on TVNZ+ on Friday, January 2, with double episodes weekly.
Two-part documentary Australia’s Most Identical premieres on TVNZ 1 on Thursday, January 8 at 7.30pm. Hosted by Scott Cam (The Block) and Dr Jana Pittman (former Australian Olympian), both parents of fraternal twins, this unique series will see Australia’s most alike twins vie for the title of the nation’s most identical pair, showcasing their uncanny similarities, in the name of science and a bit of friendly competition.
CRC Motorsport does not seem to be on the 2026 radar for Three. The advance Q1 rate cards for 2026 do not list the show right through to the end of March 2026. That show must be one of New Zealand’s longest running shows, certainly for Three. It begs the question whether live and on demand MotoGP and Nascar will also disappear from ThreeNow, perhaps being absorbed by Sky Sport. That would be a shame really.
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I suspect it’s been on borrowed time for a while - probably has only survived by CRC sponsorship.
Not sure there’s much room for sports so delayed these days, while many of the smaller Motorsport categories have found alternative delivery methods (ThePits live streaming etc)
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Shaun’s last sign off (Back in Early December) certainly sounded like the last one. I get the feeling it will be pick ‘n mix in terms of what we see motorsport-wise on TV from now on.
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On another note - was interesting to see Sky Sport advertising an upcoming show to Three Now during the cricket the last few days.
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Speaking of cricket, I did enjoy the little ‘Over n Out’ mini marathon during the rain delay the other day.
Not many shows have a producer so actively involved on-air. Quite innovative. I’m not sure whether I’ve ever seen anything like this before.
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Have been watching +HR=E News after the Cricket each evening, it’s still glitching (showing artifacts). Other content on 3 Now seems to work fine, so the problem still isn’t 100% resolved.
Any word on what the problem was/is?
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I think TVNZ is confused on how to offer its news? It advertises on + and features bits on + but then there’s the 1 news website which is barely updated anymore honestly you’d think there was absolutely no one in their newsroom ever.
Should tvnz 1 simply become tvnz?
tvnz news? Have their website entirely focused on on demand offerings but also user friendly so can still offer video along with text report?
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Remember they were going to shut 1News.co.nz about a year ago but changed their minds.
The 1News website just doesn’t drive enough traffic so they’re hoping TVNZ+ can fill that gap with video news.
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Their website has never been a strength I would argue, always left in the dust for breaking news or even regular news across the day by Stuff and NZH sites. 6pm bulletin is their priority, I can see why though as it still rates strongly.
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