Public Address - Hard News (Home)

Invisible Harblz | Sep 28, 2007 12:23

In 1974, when we lived in Greymouth, there arrived a special surprise in the living room of the family house. It was a colour television -- a 26" Thorn the size of a small chest of drawers -- and it had been purchased so as to capture the glory of the Commonwealth Games. TVNZ will be hoping it can pull a similar trick with the launch of HDTV broadcasts for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

They've got me already, actually. We've been wondering about when to upgrade our present set, and July next year looks like it. But this could have a perverse effect on the uptake of Freeview in the short term: how many people will be willing to buy a Freeview SD satellite decoder now, and a DTT HD box in six months' time? My guess is that it's going to be hard to buy an HDTV set next year and leave the store without a bundled Freeview decoder.

We have a satellite decoder anyway -- people send these things to a chap in my line of work -- which, with Sunday's launch of TVNZ6 and Wednesday debut of Stratos -- I will now have to figure out how to have co-exist with our MySky box.

I've got tech happiness on the way today as well: finally, my new 24" iMac arrives -- along, fortunately, with the loan machine I've been using, which has been back with Renaissance since Tuesday last week after it suffered a sudden and catastrophic technical failure. It's all been very trying.

And, of course, all this is a but a signal for me to get back to actually earning to money to pay for it. So I'll be off.

But first: having been delivered Citizens and Ratepayers' Western Bays campaign leaflet this week, I have confirmed to myself that I won't be voting for any C&R candidates. It reads like a wingnut blog and is, in large part, highly misleading. I'd like to feel I have a choice in the local body elections, but it's now clear to me that I don't.

Also, here's the notorious guerrilla video of John Key's stage-managed visit to Porirua Market. I'm sure there is some unfair editing at work here, but really -- what's with sniffing all the vegetables?

And, finally, another lolcat featuring Colin, our cat. It is not flattering, but it is rather amusing:

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A Highlight | Sep 27, 2007 11:16

Yesterday was a good day. I chaired the Media Women in Asia seminar staged by the Asia: New Zealand Foundation, and it's a while since I've found such a gig as enjoyable and flat-out interesting as that one.

It was a sort of Beauty and the Beast scenario, with me as Selwyn Toogood guiding three sessions: the first, with Trish Carter, who set up al Jazeera's Asia bureau, and al Jazeera news anchor and interviewer (and CNN and BBC alumnus) Veronica Pedrosa; the second, with Charlotte Glennie, who didn't come back when TVNZ dispensed with the post of Asia correspondent and now reports from China for the Australia Network, and Sagarika Ghose, who fronts India Broadcast Network's totally intense flagship show, Face the Nation; and finally a panel discussion with questions from the audience.

I came away with a newfound respect for what al Jazeera does, and in particular for the work of Carter, who arrived in Kuala Lumpur with a laptop that only wrote Arabic and in 15 months put together the Asia bureau, which employs 180 staff and operates in a news environment an order of magnitude more intense than anything we know here. Remind me why she was made redundant from TVNZ, will you?

The stakes are high. While James Bays compiled this extraordinary report for Jazeera on the Taliban's re-taking of Helmand -- running everything from schools to security under the noses of under-equipped British troops -- he was kidnapped. Trish said there were serious fears for his life by the time Bays finally called in and croaked down the line: "Got some great stuff …"

The risks come from both sides, of cpurse. Al Jazeera cameraman Sami Al-Haj has been held for six years without trial at Guantanamo and is now in a perilous condition after embarking on a hunger strike. The Americans have never produced any evidence to rebut his story: he was captured in Pakistan on his way to work on an assignment in Afghanistan. This is a bloody disgrace.

Charlotte Glennie's rundown on the realities of reporting China -- including the absolute need to protect local bureau staff -- was fascinating too. (One thing we didn't get to discussing was the Chinese government's new crackdown on "low taste" reality TV programmes, and in particular Idol-style talent shows. The impression persists that what alarmed the authorities was less any failure of taste than the prospect of people getting too used to the idea of voting and getting what they vote for.)

Both those networks have the considerable advantage of not having to worry too much about commercial pressure: The Australia Network broadcasts to 42 countries on the Australian taxpayer dollar; and Jazeera is required only to deliver quality journalism by its patron, the Emir of Qatar.

Ironically, there was no better demonstration of what makes Jazeera different to other global news networks than the clip with which Veronica wound up the first session: Samantha Bee's brilliant Daily Show segment on the launch of al Jazeera English. Fake news that brings the truth …

Sagarika Ghose works in a very different space: the English-language IBN is just one of hundreds of channels in a very free, unregulated commertcial media environment in a country of extremes and accelerating change. Its focus tends to be on the collision of old and new India. You can watch it here.

It was all a really useful grounding in the reality of just how much news there is in Asia, and how little of it we see. The only letdown? The no-shows from quite a few journalists and editors who had registered to attend (Mark Jennings, where were you?). So there were a handful of working mainstream journalists, the regular ethnic media identities and a bunch of keen AUT students who lapped it all up. The problem of how to get working journalists along to these things isn't new -- we struck the same thing a few years ago when I helped the British Council organise the Intermediate conference -- but it is frustrating.

Anyway, yesterday was one of the highlights of my professional year. If you weren't there, you missed something.

PS: Best reason yet to get a Freeview box: Triangle TV's new nationwide channel Stratos launches next week, and will deliver 32 hours a week of Jazeera programming, with an emphasis on the 6.30-8am breakfast slot, along with chunks of PBS and other serious programming.

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One Million Tunes | Sep 26, 2007 07:07

This CNet story is suggesting that Amazon's new digital download service is going to give the iTunes Store a hurry-up. Well, it's not as pretty as iTunes, but it's nearly as easy -- and it's plenty cheaper. I bought Arcade Fire's 'Keep the Car Running' for US89 cents. It's a 282k MP3 file with no DRM -- and Amazon supposedly has a million songs in the same format to sell you.

Amazon even offers you a handy little downloader that will add your new song to your iTunes library.

There's someone who will be more concerned about this than Apple -- and that's the local branches of the major record companies. Amazon doesn't appear to care who it sells to so long as you have a valid credit card.

Meanwhile, I've also downloaded and installed Glenn Anderson's New Zealand Daylight Saving Time patch, which will fixes the problem that Apple apparently can't be bothered with. The new, earlier Daylight Saving Time kicks off at 2am next Sunday morning. There's useful information here.

And, meanwhile, I thought I'd leave the story about Bill English's son's Bebo page, with its apparent homophobic and racist invective, to GayNZ, but it appears I was the only one. There are two ways of looking at this. One is obvious: this is a 14 year-old kid, FFS (although before it went private, his profile had him as 18 years old). The other is that if a politician's teenage son had been caught in various other forms of anti-social behaviour that might embarrass his father, it would be news. (Indeed, it seems lately, if it's on Bebo, it leads.)

Jay Bennie has an editorial and The Press reports that Bill English is consulting lawyers.

Having clicked around the Bebo page in question, and those adjacent, yesterday, I formed the view that it might all be a bit more complex than what's been reported. In the meantime, it would probably be a good idea for Tom English to set his profile to private too.

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Opening a canned worm factory | Sep 25, 2007 10:01

Never mind getting your message in three times in the interview -- Clayton Cosgrove seemed intent on getting his in three times in every sentence on Morning Report yesterday. How many times did he say "a slow-burning fire sale"?

And, it must be said, Bill English, the other party to the interview, did not sound entirely comfortable discussing National's plans for part-privatisation of state-owned enterprises. What kind of a rationale for National Party policy is "Labour was going to do it too"?

English had reason for discomfort: privatisations don't have a good rep in our recent history. Telecom. New Zealand Rail. Fay, Richwhite.

But I don't actually think that's the problem with this idea. The problem is that we already spend quite a lot of time bemoaning organisations with a similar cocktail of public ownership and private capital to that which English seems to be prescribing.

Aren't we all agreed that Mercury Energy is caught between two stools? Haven't we heard a bit lately about political mouthing-off with regard to Air New Zealand (not an SOE, but Labour will want to save English's statement yesterday that "Air New Zealand is a good example of this mixed ownership")?

SOEs are in a strong position to raise debt if they need to. The only strong reason for selling off minority stakes in public enterprises is as part of a staged privatisation. You could also make an argument for public-private partnership in some major new infrastructure venture.

But that's not English's reasoning. In an interview with Jose Barbosa on bFM yesterday, he explained the plan as a means of providing investment opportunities for personal KiwiSaver accounts, which he said were presently limited to "really only a handful of large companies" on the local stock market, but New Zealanders needed "some good long-term investment opportunities in New Zealand."

If I were planning to float my private company I'm not sure I'd be thrilled to hear the deputy leader of the National Party outline a plan to suck up liquidity. (But the Greens would have been happy to hear English complain that 80% of the Government Superannuation Fund is being invested overseas.)

Such an investment would have the virtue of great security, but that's about it. English was at pains to emphasise that the government would always "stay in control" of the enterprises, and would always own at least 51%. So your capital is stuck in a company where you'll never have control, and where there is always the likelihood that perceptions of the public good will trump profit. And, English seemed to say, where you will only be able to sell your shares to the highest bidder if that bidder happens to be a in New Zealand. (There seems some doubt about this: English told Agenda and bFM that only New Zealanders would be able to own the shares, but granted to the Herald that they could go overseas.)

The Herald editorial takes the opposite angle, arguing that such sales would offer "gilt-edged" opportunities to buyers and little payoff either to the public or the economy in general:

No company that will not be allowed to fail should be privatised. The economy gains no benefit from an asset sale if the asset is protected from the consequences of its bad decisions. The only beneficiaries of a partial sale of such an asset are the private shareholders of the state-assured company.

If National wants to privatise some state enterprises -- rather than just raise some spending money -- it should say which ones are on the block, put the list in its manifesto and sell them if and when it makes the Treasury benches. Because what proposes at the moment isn't so much opening a can of worms as opening a whole new factory producing canned worms.

PS: On a completely different note, I'm chairing a seminar called Media Women in Asia at the Heritage Hotel in Auckland tomorrow. It features accomplished Indian journalist Sagarika Ghose, Al Jazeera's Asia-Pacific news anchor Veronica Pedrosa, former TVNZ current affairs head (now also with Al Jazeera in Asia) Trish Carter, and Asia correspondent for the Australia Network Charlotte Glennie, with me as the Selwyn Toogood figure. It's free, but you'll need to register via this page, which has more information about the event.

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A. B. B. | Sep 24, 2007 10:30

Well, the voting forms have arrived, so it must be time for a comment on the Auckland local body elections. As he has through the campaign, John Banks is holding a handy lead over Dick Hubbard, but is well short of a majority, with Hubbard having shed some support to Alex Swney, who I think is both the candidate with the most potential and the one most likely to get Banks over the line by splitting the Anyone But Banks vote.

Both the leading mayoral candidates have their achievements listed on their websites. Banks, as usual, is claiming credit for things he didn't do, or even opposed:

Grafton Gully Improvements - I helped play a role in the Grafton Gully improvements, and pushed for the initial investments in Spaghetti Junction's upgrades.

Which is a slight improvement on his claim to Simon Pound in 2004 that "we have completed the Grafton Gully motorway project". But, for the record, Transit New Zealand's Central Motorway Improvement strategy was launched in 2000, before Banks was even mayor.

Westhaven Marina - I saved Westhaven Marina from the possibility of becoming an overseas-owned theme park and apartment blocks. I'm proud to have saved this harbour jewel for future generations, and look forward to a role in creating magnificent open spaces at the adjacent Tank Farm.

Actually, it was the government that purchased the land from Ports of Auckland, then onsold it to Auckland City at a $10 million loss. But Banks did play a critical role in the purchase, by obtaining confidential knowledge on the bidding process, which he provided to Cabinet, putting the government at an advantage. He was in his element there.

But then there's this:

Parnell Baths - My council found $4.2 million for the makeover of the historic Parnell Baths.

This is ludicrous. The renovation of the baths was budgeted by the previous council, under Christine Fletcher. Banks actually tried to halt the project, because it would interfere with his eastern motorway plan.

Sylvia Park - I helped kick off the redevelopment of Sylvia Park – a destination shopping centre that is the envy of other Southern Hemisphere nations.

Oh, shut up …

CBD Auckland - The central city was a safer and cleaner place to work, visit and recreate under my watch. We brought in liquor bans and toughened up on boyracers. Sadly, this has been neglected under my opponent's term.

The CitRat council during Banks' term did apply a 10-year targeted rate for CBD renewal in June 2004. The current council extended the period for the targeted rate by a further two years. But it's hard to survey this list and demonstrate "neglect" of the CBD. I see Banks is no longer promising to close Queen Street to traffic at night.

Finance - City debt was eliminated and a strategic asset fund was created to help fund infrastructure. Sadly, the current council mismanagement means this fund has been spent and debt is projected to blow out.

Banks and the CitRats cleared the debts not through some special genius, but by selling half the city's shares in Auckland International Airport, an action which will deprive the city of $115 million in dividend revenue after tax over the next decade. (That's still less than it costs the council to borrow money, but the capital appreciation since the sale has been significant.)

And so it goes. In truth, major initiatives tend to span council regimes, so perhaps we should average it out and give Banks his list. Even so, Hubbard's listed achievements seem more copious.

I am, as you may have noticed, a signed-up member of the Anyone But Banks tendency, but it's not just because of the above. Brian Rudman covered the GABA candidates meeting and noted the following:

It was something of a two horse race, with former mayor John Banks under the distinct handicap of his homophobic utterances of earlier days. We all know he claims to have undergone a transmogrification, and is now a gentler, kinder, touchy-feely sort of bloke these days, but at least one questioner angrily accused him of references to gay activities on talkback which I won't spoil your breakfast by repeating.

Well, I'll tell you. Banks was being questioned by Jay Bennie, the publisher of gaynz.com about the time he took a call on Radio Pacific from a man who declared that "sodomites" should have "six inches of barbed wire" shoved up their rectums. Bank responded by telling the caller "that would be a waste of good barbed wire."

Banks is claiming to be a reformed man. Which is what he said when he was grasping for votes in 2004 too. GayNZ totted up his utterances since 2004. I don't believe at all that he has changed his beliefs. He's still a nasty little bully and a bigot.

Hubbard's problem is the rates and Metrowater. People might have forgotten that the last time they got a majority the CitRats campaigned on a zero rate rise then presented a budget containing a nine per cent overall rate rise that fell most heavily on the least wealthy -- but they're all too aware of the bills landing in their letterboxes this year.

And, worse, in an effort to keep down rate rises, the council has used Metrowater as a cash cow in a very dubious way. Raiding water rates to keep down property rates is precisely what got Auckland's water into the mess it's in today. It appears that it's Auckland City CEO David Rankin who is most squarely in the gun over this (Green councillor Neil Abel has campaigned against the policy all along and City Vision and the CitRats have run screaming from it now), but it's still not a good look for Hubbard.

In my local manor, Western Bays, the incumbents are not standing this time, meaning two new City Vision candidates. I'll happily vote for Lindsay Rea, who is hard-working and diligent, but I'm not a big fan of Graeme Easte, who comes from the Alliance side (on the other hand, anyone who has these people for enemies has my sympathy). And I have a lot of respect for Sally Wenley, who, unfortunately, is standing as a CitRat candidate. I'm going to have to think about that one …

PS: The winner of the Halo 3 game and sweatshirt from Friday (a very popular draw, that one) was Sam Tobin.

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