I would only support it if local news content requirements are imposed across the board.
At least 30 minutes of local news per day (including weekends) per local area that a station broadcasts to
This would in turn provide a community service to local communities.
What would be great also is if each local area by each station was required to air At least 15 minutes of local news in the mornings between 6am and 9am (this would likely come In the form of 3 x 5 minute local news inserts into today, sunrise and studio 10 etc)
This would ensure newsrooms across a Australia are operating all day and providing local communities and cities with access to local tv news at the second most watched tv time of the day.
If something like this was imposed - I would support the dropping of license fees - as it would provide communities with a significant local service of great benefit
In my pipe dream fantasy land, broadcasters would required to keep open a studio or at least locally produce and air a certain amount of content per week in each region that they have a licence for.
So, even if a network wants to consolidate all its news functions in one city or a few cities, they would still need to produce and air a certain amount of content from licensed regions.
That’s probably just too expensive and complex to enforce in this day and age, though.
More observations of Prime7 News during my three week or so stay up North. Long post incoming!
*It seems that Kenny presents all the Updates leading up to the 6pm bulletin (Dan Gibson does the later evening updates, mainly “national” or a local/national mix from what I’ve seen so far), as well as the full Sport segment.
*Casual/occasional reporters Christine Tondorf (Lismore) and Claire Simmonds (Coffs Harbour) were seen on tonight’s local North Coast bulletin.
*I think it’s going to look rather obvious that the crosses on the local bulletins are pre-recorded in coming weeks as the sun sets earlier and the end of DST draws closer!
*While I suppose it’s good to see Prime7 cover state politics from a regional perspective, wouldn’t that be better left for the 6.30pm bulletin to make it look less like a condensed and Prime7-ised version of Seven News Sydney? Aside from the bits that Dan presents (Opener, Story Intros, Break Playouts, Finance, & Closer) and the statewide weather, basically all the content is from Seven News Sydney.
*While I’m sure that Daniel Gibson is a decent enough person and is fine on Weather/Sydney Weekender, is Dan really the right person to lead what is supposed to be some sort of “statewide” or “national” (even though Prime7 News at 6.30pm is nowhere near a statewide or national broadcast, of course) bulletin?
*Both on Tuesday and tonight, a split second of the Seven News Sydney closer was seen when switching back to the network feed. Probably something that happens quite regularly, but still sloppy timing nonetheless!
The more I watch Prime7’s two bulletins, the more that I feel that they probably should’ve relaunched their news service (in regions where they do full local news, of course) as a composite bulletin when Madelaine & Kenny became co-presenters of the local bulletin.
Also, I think Daniel Gibson might be absent from the 6.30pm bulletin for at least a couple of nights next week. Something was mentioned at the end of tonight’s bulletin about him participating in a Royal Far West bike riding charity event between Wagga & Orange from Sunday. If Dan is indeed absent from the news on Monday night, it’ll be interesting to see if a version of the 6.30pm Opener with whatever fill-in presenter is used for the first time since the relaunch.
The Prime7 Coastal Bulletin airs across the Taree/Port Macquarie, Coffs Harbour and Lismore sub-markets. This is why you’d see a story about a Taree crime, then followed by a Lismore bakery winning some award.
Kinda agree, perhaps Prime7 has research that shows people prefer a purely local news at 6 followed by national news at 630. Or perhaps they want a point of difference to Nine with it’s one hour composite bulletin at 6.
Also, surprising seeing how 7 News Sydney dominates 6-7 in Wollongong and Canberra, also interesting that Prime7 don’t run an edited down version of 7 News Sydney at 630 - instead of the cost of doing their own 630 news. This format also works well for 7 QLD.
Currently Prime7 produces 6 individual newscasts, 4 pre-recored local news’ at 6, one live at 6 and one live at 630. That’s 6 individual newscasts daily. And no local news at all in Victoria.
Would it be better / cheaper to do 2 live bulletins 6-7pm, one for VIC and one for NSW - and add local windows for their 5 NNSW areas, 4 SNSW areas and 5 VIC areas?
As far as current media laws are concerned, Prime cannot do that for now. Plus, budget is not that enough to provide local bulletins on ALL MARKETS that they served. Besides, GWN is also threatened to axe local content should media laws won’t be changed.
And we don’t know the annual budget for Prime7 News - so I’m not sure how you can state budgets are preventing making 2 composite bulletins instead of 6 local bulletins.
But we don’t know the cost of producing 2 composite bulletins V 6 individual local bulletins.
It may be a wash out.
As always al we can do is speculate.
But it would seem to me the 6 individual bulletins would requite the production of a lot more original content than 2 composite bulletins. And the bulk of the costs in running news come from producing the actual news content - obviously.
I was moreso referring to the introduction of more Victorian bulletins and the reinstatement of bulletins in Newcastle/Wollongong/Canberra (even if they are composite ones).
Disagree - you shouldn’t be able to trade the exclusive use of public resources for what is in effect a ‘warm-and-fuzzy’
The spectrum that is allocated to both TV and Radio is at a premium (we only have limited amounts of it and the potential uses exceed the amount usable) - it needs to be treated as such. Trading it for a 5 night a week news service devalues it.
If the networks are unprofitable then that’s something that they need to fix, we shouldn’t be propping up broadcasters because they can’t afford to broadcast.
At a time when commercial broadcasters left to their own devices will axe the one community service they provide (commercial realities of local news) I see it as an incentive to provide a significant local service and resource.
At a time when almost 10)% of TV and now radio and online news services are national and networked, not to mention streaming, foxtel, international players and the death of print (Even SMH is saying it will go to digital only in 5 years) local TV news is the only place left to get local news.
We have zero local news in the mornings in Australia (except Perth) and almost no way to get live local info news and weather before 4pm in most of Australia. Zero.
Compare that to the US, canada, uk, germany etc…
It’s less propping up and more facing tv stations to offer a significant local resource and benefit to the community.
The same way the Govt subsidies airlines to smaller cities etc. And a billion other things they subsidize.
Have you listened to a radio news bulletin in a regional area during the day? In a lot of cases its simply regurgitating the contents of the local paper - the reality is that in a lot of areas, very little news occurs overnight. You could repeat the previous night’s bulletin but thats simply a waste of good airtime.
I’ve stopped watching the local news - a lot of it is simply filler or out of region content - shockingly there are days where there simply isnt local things that are newsworthy…
Just because we do it in one industry doesnt mean we should do it in others - subsidising activities is a politically-easy way out
Yes, I agree that Seven probably would buy Prime7/GWN7 if the reach rules were changed. Broadcasting in all metro markets and Regional Queensland plus Regional NSW, Victoria & WA would give Seven a bigger reach than Nine + SCA affiliates has now.
