Seven may be considering it but do they have the staying power to make a Newcastle news work? NBN is heavily rusted on so it’ll take probably a generation to change viewing habits. They’d need to present it locally to have any chance with someone like Paul Harragon on Sports or anyone with a Knights connection.
I’d say they’d have a better chance in Wollongong where WIN News is a poor imitation of its glory days.
Local News won’t work in Canberra due to 7News rating well enough on its own, unless they possibly shoved it in at 5.30 to go up against another poor imitation of WIN News.
As someone who lives in Canberra I absolutely disagree.
ABC News Canberra is very popular because it is the only good local option.
7 News is popular because Canberrans want a metro standard news and there isn’t a local metro standard news bulletin available. When Canberra used to have one, Capital News was very popular.
Combine both of these things together into a local Canberra 7 News bulletin of near metro-standard quality and that would absolutely be popular here.
Last time Prime Canberra had a 1 hour local 6pm composite local, national, and international bulletin it did not rate at all. The previous straight relay of ATN’s 6pm and Real Life combo hour rated higher, as did when Prime axed the local bulletin and re-commenced it’s relay of the ATN bulletin.
The SCA 9 produced 6pm composite hour on 9 Canberra was so shoddy, no wonder it failed.
In contrast, the NBN bulletin works being there is a true mix of content with local news contained to within one segment where all NBN markets breakaway for a segment of local only news.
I would argue, for local news to come back in Canberra, Wollongong and Newcastle, the approach should be similar to the NBN model, and not the 7QLD model. That is, within the existing Sydney metro bulletin, say the segment around 6.30 to 6.40, these markets breakaway from the metro bulletin for a 8 to 10 minute local news segment. And then return to the metro bulletin at 6.45 for Sport, and then breakaway at the end for a local market weather segment. This would be a less resource hungry way of returning local news into these markets, plus keeps the higher production quality of the existing metro bulletin mostly intact. To insert a 30 minute local bulletin at 5.30 would be madness and force viewers to sit through 90 mins of news instead of 60 minutes if they want some local news in their mix.
And yes, how bad in WIN News now, a former shadow of itself, sad.
No doubt Capital News was popular but that was a long time ago.
I’ve seen the ratings for Prime7 Canberra and they’d be stupid to tinker with their schedule in this particular sub-market but if Seven can make something work then good luck to them.
the biggest problem with the first hour long NNL Canberra (and i assume the other markets since it was the same bulletin) was the consistency of the local news breakaway window, sometimes it would appear earlish in the hour and then a little later the next night, and then come back for a sport window segment, i think you are right, if they have the local window at the same time every night or at least announce that “after the break, all your local news” then it think it would work right across the network. Only time will tell on what 7 have planned for staffing and schedule.
Whatever happens, production will no doubt move to either Redfern or Docklands.
Just because 7QLD is still based at Maroochydore, does not mean that model will apply to what Seven does for regional NSW, VIC and WA.
GWN News production may well end up going to Osbourne Park?
I wonder if Seven will produce multi-region local news for regional QLD, regional Victoria, Canberra, Wollongong and Newcastle eg Wollongong/Canberra 1 bulletin, Wagga/Orange 1 bulletin, Newcastle/Taree 1 bulletin, Tamworth/Coffs 1 bulletin, Lismore/Gold Coast 1 bulletin.
Infomercials will probably be reduced and replaced with NBC Today but I expect we may see extra infomercials on 7TWO and 7Mate eg 8:30am til 9:30am weekdays on 7TWO to offset any losses from reduced infomercial air time in regionals. In the next few years I think networks as a whole will give more airtime to infomercials to at least maintain their revenue base and the services provided. In time I think we may lose one or two secondary channels eg 7TWO could be merged with 7Flix and 7Mate could be merged with the racing channel. Like other propositions, this is just a suggestion, nothing has yet been indicated either way
One possible factor here is that Seven already has/requires an established presence in Canberra for federal coverage. Prime7’s current setup is also currently in Canberra. Would it be any more beneficial to move regional news to Sydney or Melbourne versus keeping it in Canberra and co-locating both operations?
Of course, control and other corporate matters would be moved anyway, but studio production of the news isn’t required to move or stay.
yeh they could use the studio facility in Canberra to be a main hub for all regional news studio production… its all guess work for now. something may or may not happen. who knows
I wonder if Seven and possibly Nine and Ten will try and petition to to try and have Canberra area changed from a regional station to metropolitan station for commercial television purposes
Seven already do a Gold Coast News so Lismore ain’t joining it.
Prime7 already do a very successful individual Wagga Wagga and Orange/Dubbo bulletins.
They also do a Coastal bulletin with Lismore/Coffs Harbour/Port Macquarie and Taree.
I’d say if this local news eventuates there’ll be separate Newcastle, Wollongong/Far South Coast and Canberra bulletins.
As for where they’re Presented from is anyone’s guess but I’d say if Seven was smart they’d have local presenters in each of Newcastle, Wollongong and Canberra to provide some real competition.
Anything is possible but whether it’s worth it is another story.
It does seem odd that the national capital is considered regional though. Same with Darwin and Hobart. But their populations aren’t large as the other state capitals.
Will Seven drop the local news and move it to the regional network?
My thoughts on multi-region bulletins come from 2 places. Nine regional (under the SCA agreement with Nine) initially had around 12 minutes of local news before they went to a half hour edition for local news combined with the suggestion of statewide editions.
Its hard to say whether Seven would commit to a full half hour in regions not currently receiving a news bulletin but I think they would consider doing a bit more than noodle updates.
If they arent too worried about rating but more presence, they could do what 7Central did in Broken Hill and put local news on 7Two at 7pm weeknights
The main impact of changing any regional area to metro is to remove the legislative requirement for local content from the area. Hard to see how that would likely get support from Parliament. It would need a change to the Broadcasting Act.
Why would Seven move their Gold Coast News to a much lower watched Prime7? That doesn’t make any commercial sense. It wouldn’t justify the cost of the bulletin and it also would make sure any audience gains go back to Nine. I do see the bulletin duplicated on Prime7 though at a later timeslot.
I would say Seven would be the most likely to reintroduce half hour local bulletins into areas not receiving them because it worked in regional Queensland (they did the same in Toowoomba, Rockhampton, Cairns and Townsville in different points).
It didn’t work with Prime in Newcastle, Wollongong and Canberra all those years ago due to a better product as their competition but now WIN News is a poor shadow of itself and Seven has made huge gains against it in regional Queensland plus they can pounce at the changes at NBN, also they’ll be buying the number 1 regional television network so the timing is good.