I agree. There could’ve been other solutions around this. They could’ve done a restructure of their regional news operations where they finally scrapped the NBN brand and folded Darwin into NBN as a news model similar to SCA.
As I’ve mentioned in this forum previously, it seemed like the bulletin was neglected and the quality wasn’t great of recent. I’m not surprised by this news but the way they’ve completely swung the axe at one of their longest running news bulletins in Australia instantly is nuts - not even a statement has been released to the viewers online. Most people are probably tuning in tonight wondering why QLD news is being shown.
Lots of reasons for this. Journos were required to file two stories a night, cammos had to edit the packages themselves when they got back. Hiring freezes across Nine Entertainment also meant they couldn’t recruit for replacements when staff left. Again, all decisions made by management.
Quite simple really. Nine is the licencee holder for Darwin TV1 and Imparja has the rest of NT. Why pour resources into a bulletin into regions you don’t control? A joint venture bulletin was probably off the cards because Imparja wouldn’t fund it.
Darwin is a small television market in relative terms. There simply isn’t the economics of scale to make it work in this day of age.
No more than a couple local stories are shown most bulletins, and cammos editing stories has been a standard procedure at Darwin and all regional newsrooms.
You wouldn’t have had to do much more really. A lot of the political stories filed by NTD had relevance to Alice Springs. Likewise Nine News Darwin did a lot of stories on crime in Alice Springs and Katherine, typically interviewing people via Zoom.
Darwin’s bulletin would’ve been far more relevant to Imparja’s audience than whatever nonsense QTQ serves up.
It’s not the first time. They had to shift the bulletin from Darwin to Brisbane in 2017. Too many changes in a too quick manner. Channel 9 should slow down in making changes all the time.
I’m still surprised they didn’t try something different first before axing it completely. They could have had Darwin news at 5:30 meaning they don’t have to make a full 1 hour bulletin and then take Adelaide or Brisbane news at 6pm or have local inserts into the Adelaide or Brisbane news similar to how NBN News is done. It’s a bit of a slap in the face to NT people.
Not just “rest of NT” but the Remote Central license area.
So that’s why they’ve always prioritised the Brisbane or Sydney bulletin on Imparja North and South as there’s probably more viewers outside of NT via VAST watching.
Does Nine respond to any of this. I mean if everyone is giving it to Nine - and not just on here for once - do they act, instate a similar GC style bulletin or just go quiet?
Theyre allowed to, because ACMA are a pack of useless and the pollies are enabling them because they won’t give ACMA teeth, and they lack the political will to do anything.
Sad to see Nine News Darwin go but the production quality in the end just wasn’t up to scratch for a Capital City bulletin, it was a miracle if they could keep the sound balanced correctly for a whole bulletin.
AFAI understand you’ve said the pollies not enabling ACMA has led to weaker media rules and in turn gives the pollies less scrutiny due to less bulletins and news meaning that they can do more of what they feel rather than what’s by the people because of this
what an absolute sad day for local news - it’s absolutely disgraceful what Nine is doing.
now more than ever local voices are important and that won’t be served properly by a bulletin in another state, regardless of Nine thinking just a reporter and a camera operator is enough.
