Interesting take. Could be beneficial. Didn’t Today simulcast onto one of the NZ networks around 2008?
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Yes when Nine owned Prime.
For example Nine could link with Three, and use Auckland to broadcast a “state based service” for New Zealand like it does for every Australian state with local reporters and other stories from the national feed. Australia would end up with some extra NZ stories too which would be good too.
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News First at 5:30pm has an interview with Mike McRoberts and some shots of the meeting with Patrick Gower standing up speaking
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I know people here in Aus are used to news minimum requirements, but we didn’t have them in Aus until SCB and Prime ransacked their news operations around the turn of the millennium.
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While we’re are at it, make NZ a state of Australia? 
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I am here for the headline strap graphic.
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Tonight’s 6pm bulletin kicked off with just one story that shocked the media landscape of New Zealand and it’s democracy from today’s announcement.
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An interesting question about “leaving it a bit late” considering there is still another four months to go for employment. If they announced it in the last week or two of June I could understand… Heck, good they didn’t just terminate it from today.
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Not taking anything away from the talent at Today FM but its closure feels like a small ripple now compared to this. Poor Lloyd Burr this happening again so soon after yet again landing the dream job.
Sad day for nz media.
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Here is the recording from both Newshub and 1 News 6pm bulletins discussing the announcement
Newshub
1 News
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Can’t believe it, an absolute bomb on drop on Three, their staff and pretty much decimated the operation. So sad for the workforce as this seems like it will impact most of the WBD team and what a loss for NZ media and democracy. We thought the Today FM closure was a big deal…
This is the white flag or death nell for Three as it looks like it will be run along the lines of WBD’s other channels in NZ now, imported content of varying quality and they will be left wondering why nobody is watching. They don’t offer a strong enough streaming product in this market for that to take off just yet and local content would have been their major standout compared to other streamers.
The Mark Weldon era would be considered a golden era now in comparison, the changes to the newsroom back at least still produced news. Glen Kyne in a terrible position though, I don’t think you can say WBD under his leadership haven’t tried to make it work, they have invested in programming and talent but like many before them, the numbers didn’t work. The US bosses have no attachment to NZ so an easy decision for them to cut their losses.
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In some form yes. However the risk is, the NZ offshoot to any Australian business would still likely be unprofitable. NZ is a tiny market, population of Melbourne.
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Hopefully Sky TVNZ can buy the News operations, and sell back the content to WBDNZ & anyone else who needs video footage. Certainly a change is needed in NZ News Media. Too much talent to be lost, but also good opportunity to look at what is presented to viewers, the format, the culture. Best wishes to all at NH!
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Yeah, I’ve heard Glen is well respected there and you could see it in the meeting and interviews how affected he is by it. He pushed some innovations there - going hard on local reality etc. He tried hard.
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Just found out about this (living on the other side of the world these days). All I can say is… fucking hell. So sorry for everyone losing their jobs (some of you will probably be reading this forum - aroha nui, and I hope you all find new jobs very soon!).
I suppose once you’re in the state of perpetual cutbacks, eventually you run out of things to cut… so you get rid of the whole thing! It’s an absolute joke, a very sick one at that. Can’t help thinking that TVNZ-RNZ merger should have happened after all…
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Melbourne sustains three local TV news services and bureaus for a handful others.
The missing link in NZ’s media puzzle is public funding. Removing ads from TVNZ would immediately inflate the value of spots on TV3. And the lack of any public funding in such a small market makes NZ very vulnerable to the whims of the ad market.
It is remarkable from an outsider’s perspective. In Australia the commercial viability of local news on the nation’s third rated commercial service is a hot topic - in NZ its the survival of a second national service.
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You have to feel for Mike Morrah. Being told you and your colleagues are losing your jobs is bad enough… but having to make a news report about it is something else.
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