Former WIN News presenter and Seven News reporter, Natassia Apolloni, now a reporter for Nine News Illawarra
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Iâm genuinely interested in this - can you give me examples of actual stories youâre seeing? This means the Newcastle team is making some very odd choices.
The seemingly âoddâ choices all come back to economics.
NBN and Nine Sthn NSW can only work with whatâs available to them on the network news feed (outside of their own local news).
Nine only have a few overseas based journalists, and the type of news I think you want Nine to air in Sthn NSW just isnât available, or the network simply isnât prepared to put the resources into doing this.
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My friend, news wires provide HOURS of news content from around the world direct to Nine everyday. Reuters, CNN, BBC, you name it! I am not for a moment suggesting Nine flies a journalist around the world to fill in gaps on NBN news.
Scripted news packages come in on the satellite, the voiceover is then recorded by a local journalist (Chief of Staff or whoever is free) you might add file footage to link it to a previous story if itâs a follow on and perhaps get a grab from the Press Gallery in Canberra if there is a political element.
And voila - 3.5 minutes on whatâs happening in Syria, Manchester, with Donald Trump or whatever.
*Update
Here is an example of what Iâve described, from Nine.
Back in the day, it wasnât unheard of to hear a BBC or ITN journalist on the news everynight when the packages where taken as was. I for one would rather be hearing about world affairs for an extra 4-5 minutes per night than a bus service problem in Sydneyâs Western Suburbs.
There was a piece on this process on ABCâs Frontline for anyone who remembers. Iâll see if itâs on You Tube. Update It was âOffice Moleâ, SE02EP04.
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In that case, it seems like neither Nine Sth NSW or NBN are running these items, so it would seem to me that (for whatever reason), itâs ânot available to themâ. Otherwise, youâd think they would use it⌠.
That would probably be a question for Nineâs head office, and not a fault of NBN or the producers of Nine Sth NSW (which I know is produced by Nine).
Years ago, NBN used to run some news reports from ABC or CBS America in their 6pm news. I havenât seen them do this for a long time.
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From my recollection, NBN has used fillers from both GTV and QTQ for a very long time. Certainly since before they were Nine O&O.
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That is correct.
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I have to agree with @CTC7-9-10 on out of area local vs international stories.
Nine may not want to show ABCNews (USA) & ITN reports & would rather maximise use of their own/original content but theyâre wrong to foist irrelevant local stories upon viewers.
They really need to get over it, change their approach & replace the irrelevant 9News stories with international content that may be if interest.
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I donât disagree, lâm just saying that Nine most likely have their reasons for not using other content most likely to do with $$$$.
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Realistically any international news not already being shown in the metro bulletin is going to be of fairly limited appeal aswell - and even more so in regional areas where the average viewer is less wordly and more interested in more local news.
While a hyper-local item from the nearest capital city may not be particularly relevant in regional areas, itâs probably no less relevant than some internation piece that the rest of the country isnât getting. Some people might prefer the internation items, while others would prefer the capital city news, but whatever they put in will not be particularly relevant. It really come down to a problem with trying to fill an hour long news buletin for an area that doesnât have an hour of relevant news - even some of the capital stuggle at times to fill a full hour - think of the ACA style reports that Brisbane are regularly getting.
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I think the BEST solution to all of this is for NBN and Nine regionals to do MORE local news⌠doing 10 mins of news/sport as they do now in my opinion isnât really enough and is barely adequate. I think that option would please more viewers than anything else.
But as we all know, thatâs highly unlikely to happen.
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If the additional media reforms are passed (increasing local content requirements), how much news would the regional stations be required to broadcast (itâs evident that no other form of local content will be taken on in the forseable future).
I think more resources would be needed for regional news at Nine/NBN (more reporters and camera crews, etc.) if you wanted to boost the amount of quality local news stories. Of course that probably wonât happen anytime soon.
To fill a full half hour bulletin, some of the other regional networks often rely on âgeneric regional itemsâ filler pieces and local news stories which probably should be left to the free weekly local newspapers. Do we really want to see that type of content on Nine/NBN?
While I obviously couldnât say exactly what ACMA would do, I personally think it would be fairly reasonable to expect regional networks to do at least 30 minutes of locally relevant news, sports & weather on weeknights + 15 minutes on weekends and public holidays. Under such a proposal, at least half of the required local content (15 minutes on weeknights, 8 or so minutes on weekends/public holidays) would have to be presented during a news bulletin which airs between 5pm and 7.30pm.
Incentives would also be provided for regional networks who produce and present their regional news services from within the relevant broadcast licence area, so we can avoid the current ridiculousness of having Nine News Canberra presented from Sydney and Prime7 Local News for the NSW North Coast presented from Canberra, etc.
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This should explain it
Most importantly, it proposes some local content being generated in areas where it is currently not a requirement to do so, like regional WA and SA
The key being âregional broadcasters that are party to a trigger eventâ - so nothing would change or be required under current ownership.
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Does Nine still have news bureaux/studios and reporters in Los Angeles and London?
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LA reporters- Robert Penfold, Lizzie Pearl
Europe reporters, Amelia Ballinger, Michael Best, Seb Costello.
Though I believe the London/Europe bureaux were ceased in 2009 for budget cuts, however were reopened within months.
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I agree that seems the most logical outcome, but I donât think it will be that soon. I think there are a few more variables at play as to when and if it happens.
- Nothing will move to Tasmania until SCA have moved to their new Launceston premesis, which currently has no set date.
- Nothing needs to move until SCA move out of their current Canberra premesis which also has no set date.
- It depends what SCA do with their playout centre. If they chose to build a new one in Canberra, then thereâs less reason to move those news bulletins.
- It depends what SCAâs plans are for Darwin/Central/SA/Tasmania. Although if they were to be sold, theyâd presumably be sold as a block given they are all 7 affiliates (or the main channel is at least in SA) - so that would support the case to centralize the news for those channels.
All that said, I think it would be the best move when the time comes to move them all to Tasmania - means they aside from field reporters, they only need to maintain studios, cameras, reporters, operators etc in one location, which can only be a good thing for the noodle updates and SA given how few staff are involved in them and how often they need to pull in relief staff to cover leave etc.
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I donât know about that - in Canberra at least there is a large appetite for international news, which is why ABC is blowing Nine out of the water.
The main reference I have is for very, very local Sydney stories appearing in the first half of the Canberra news. Not even NSW State politics, but things like a local bus service issue or house burning down in the Western Suburbs. Surely SOMETHING more interesting happened in Australia that day.
Nine should experiment with the story mix and see how it goes (the producers should be considering this regularly as itâs a zero cost way of better appealing to the audience).
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