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Posted at 11:48AM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

But mostly, NZ On Air has posted We're All in This Together: Public Broadcasting in the Digital Age, a discussion paper I wrote with the assistance of Andrew Dubber. It's big -- 17,000 words in a 235KB PDF -- and it took a long time to finish, but I'm quite pleased with it.

It's forty pages people!
Run, run away now ... FORTY PAGES!!

Posted at 11:53AM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

Is it double spaced though?

Posted at 12:04PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

I know, I know. I am up to page 10 and printing in stealthy chunks.
"Stealthy Chuncks" could be the name of a band...

Posted at 12:28PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

But whoever encoded it neglected to fill in the ID tags that would have identified the track [...] and no pirate would be as sloppy with a file as that.

"Every Mistake Imaginable", as they used to say 20 years ago. (Truth be told, plenty of pirates *would* be that sloppy; perhaps a better analogy is "No unsigned little garage band posting their tune on myspace would be as sloppy"). Either way, it seems likely that no-one involved in that promotion even understands the (very simple) difference between "file name" and "id3 tag info". And zipped? Why?

I'd go with "clueless", rather than "sloppy".

Some of the vandals were easy enough to identify. One, [...] whose private school clearly taught him little about decent standards of behaviour.

I hope the implication is not that the privately schooled would normally be more likely than the state schooled to exhibit decent standards of behaviour. Having been through both systems, I can confirm that some of the most amoral bastards you're ever likely to meet were privately schooled.

Posted at 12:53PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

One, for example, is a 22-year-old commerce student with a history of vandalism and vanity editing on Wikipedia, whose private school clearly taught him little about decent standards of behaviour.

I wonder if he did any of this from his tertiary institute; and thus I wonder if he is breaking any of said institute's computer-use policies?

some of the most amoral bastards you're ever likely to meet were privately schooled

I cant think of anything more disgusting than David the Pimp.
Met him in a K Road Bar. He only sells Filipino and Negro Girls.
Joined up as a Mercenary it´s a way to see the World.
Went to Kings still wears the Old School Tie.

He can get you anything. Found some drugs in a Dead Mans underpants.
Joined up at the mortuary. It´s a way to see the World.
It´s a way to see the World. It´s a way to see the World.
Went to Kings. Still wears the Old School Tie.

The Cakekitchen, Dave the Pimp

Posted at 2:50PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

We're All in This Together: Public Broadcasting in the Digital Age

Hang on, is that a High School Musical reference?

Posted at 4:00PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

The Survey is very interesting. So I can get the timeline and context

How long was the survey running and what were the dates?

It is a fast moving area - Also Are there any plans to run the same or similar survey again for companrative purposes?

Posted at 4:09PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

May have answered my own question..

Had a look at the comments on the survey - which suggests it ran between 23 & 30th of July '07 - Is that right?

And BTW - comments are the best part of the survey - thanks

Posted at 5:54PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

I wrote a long post about how the role of NZ On Air in the digital age could be to help NZ compete internationally culturally (orthogonal to competing economically), in order to ensure the long term survival of kiwi culture in an environment where importation of overseas culture is increasingly easy and occurring outside of the traditionally controllable channels (YouTube does not have a Charter obligation), but some timeout ate it.

Bugger.

Posted at 6:13PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

Jarno,

I'd be interested, if you felt like trying again.

Posted at 7:12PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

Jarno

as far as music funding goes brendan smyth of nz on air has stated nz on air make no attempt to target and support culturally significance in what they fund.
we do not "make any value judgements about cultural content" (Direct quote from brendan smyth)

I think they got upset abot the lack of success they had in getting the difficult voice of Kiwi onto the extremely narrow visioned commercial circuit so they narrowed their objectives down to simply getting songs on commercial radio and tv. Whether it is 'new zealand' sounding or not is now irrelevant to them.
They are successful at what they do because what they do is of little relevance to their mission statement," our voice our culture"

from nz on air about us

"Television and radio play an important role in the lives of New Zealanders, and NZ On Air funding ensures that our unique culture, our stories, our music and our identity are enjoyed today and preserved for tomorrow."

To be fair they are more successful in the field of television as they have succeeded in funding the kiwi accent onto tv screens.

I agree that it would be great for them to put the govt money set aside for kiwi culture toward long term survival of kiwi culture, but for that to happen there would have to be a serious overhaul of management and a re calibration of objectives.

They would also have to face the difficult task (which they presently avoid) of identifying what is relevant as kiwi culture (hopefully seeing a wider vision than gumboots and DB ).
The problem is the people making the decisions and acting as advisors don't appear to have a grasp of what our culture is or the wider significance of preserving it and or creating an environment in which it can thrive.

Shall I set up the guillotine?

Posted at 7:52PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

Screw the RWC, bugger The Booker here's something to have a patriotic geek-gasm over:

Karl Urban is strapping on a stethoscope to play Leonard "Bones" McCoy, the Starship's Enterprise's medical officer, in J.J. Abrams' "Star Trek" feature for Paramount.

[...]

Abrams has been furiously casting "Trek," with John Cho, Simon Pegg and Eric Bana joining the film last week.

Also on board are Zoe Saldana as the young Uhura, Anton Yelchin as the young Chekov and Zachary Quinto as the young Spock. Leonard Nimoy, who originated the role of Spock, also will be part of the film.

The movie is expected to shoot from November-March.

Plot details are begin kept under wraps, but it is understood that the movie chronicles the early days of the Enterprise crew.

The character of McCoy, originated by DeForest Kelley, didn't trust advanced technology and frequently sparred with Spock in debates of logic vs. emotion. Bones also was responsible for several of "Trek's" catchphases, including "He's dead, Jim" and "Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor, not a ...," ending in a profession in which he had no training.

Posted at 10:37PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

Only read the Executive Summary so far so could be prematurely expostulating here, but I didn't see any discussion of a significant problem with the "internetification (c)" of television - namely that a lot of the user-generated material online is incorrect, either because of benign ignorance of malicious disinformation.

People have learned to automatically associate a certain believability to their media. I'd suggest that in NZ it goes, from most beliveable to least, print, radio, TV, internet - though of course the internet sites of official news outlets such as Radio NZ, Stuff, The Herald etc are imbued with much greater believability due to their association with the respective media.

So if more and more low quality, user-produced material makes it to our TV screens (and don't get me wrong, I think this is potentially a good thing) or whatever form of interactive moving picture device TV evolves into, how will viewers decide upon the credibility of what they're reading?

It's what I call the "Wikipedia effect" - the "broadcaster" of the information imbues that information with a level of credibility it sometimes doesn't deserve, as evidenced by the number of people in blog comments referencing Wikipedia articles as fact when they're probably, on average, about as accurate as the average Fox News broadcast.

Posted at 10:48PM on 18 Oct 07. Permalink.

Bad call. Wikipedia is about as accurate as Encyclopedia Britannica.

Posted at 12:06AM on 19 Oct 07. Permalink.

Rex,
Interesting perspective. Any chance you'd be interested in joining the fight to ban the dangerous chemical Dihydride Monoxide?

Posted at 3:47AM on 19 Oct 07. Permalink.

I don't think I would even want NZoA to make judgements on what is culturally significant or not. That's up to the viewers and listeners, and is something that only becomes clear over time. They are however in the business of promoting New Zealand cultural products.

The discussion paper seems to concentrate on what the role of NZoA is in bringing NZ content to NZers in a digital age. The strategy employed at the moment to increase New Zealand stuff on air in NZ is to inject it into broadcast media through charters, quota, and salesmanship. As the paper points out, we are getting more and more content through channels which originate overseas, and over which NZoA or the government has no hope of getting any direct influence over.

More overseas culture being pulled in, less NZ culture being mixed in locally. I think the better approach to at least maintain the balance is to shout back at the world.

And the export of culture should probably stand above direct financial success. The country certainly gets a prouder "hey World look at us" feeling out of hearing of an NZ song being used in an overseas film, than hearing of an NZ company getting an export order.

Posted at 7:30AM on 19 Oct 07. Permalink.

Screw the RWC, bugger The Booker here's something to have a patriotic geek-gasm over:

Karl Urban is strapping on a stethoscope to play Leonard "Bones" McCoy, the Starship's Enterprise's medical officer, in J.J. Abrams' "Star Trek" feature for Paramount.

This is almost as exciting as when Martin Henderson played Britney's boyfriend in the "Toxic" video.

Posted at 9:22AM on 19 Oct 07. Permalink.

I don't think I would even want NZoA to make judgements on what is culturally significant or not.

No, me either but I don't want to see 'cultural' dollars being channeled to wipe out our point of difference via the next next piece of commercial radio friendly pap.

it's a difficult thing to put your mind to, deciding what is and isn't us being ourselves, but the way things have gone lately NZoA's actions in the music field have actually helped to erase a little (or a lot) of our perceived individuality, and that isn't what we want our tax dollars being channeled to is it?

I think it all comes down to who you have making decisions and advising. I'd much rather have Chris Knox or some other reasonably literate music genius steering the ship than a bunch of wannabe "music fans" and suits.

Art galleries do their best work when they've had artists at the helm, (see CHCH gallery under Coley, etc), perhaps the same respect could be extended to the field of modern music which is an artform after all, however mass marketed and diluted some of it is, the rest is culture, shouldn't we be focusing our efforts on the rest?

Posted at 10:31AM on 19 Oct 07. Permalink.

Karl Urban is strapping on a stethoscope to play Leonard "Bones" McCoy, the Starship's Enterprise's medical officer, in J.J. Abrams' "Star Trek" feature for Paramount.

Okay, that I _can get excited over (although I'm still disappointed the very brief James Kyson Lee-as-Sulu rumours didn't pan out.)

Posted at 12:40PM on 19 Oct 07. Permalink.

Karl Urban is strapping on a stethoscope to play Leonard "Bones" McCoy...

Spock = Zachary Quinto! Squee!

Posted at 12:48PM on 19 Oct 07. Permalink.

Screw the RWC, bugger The Booker here's something to have a patriotic geek-gasm over:

OMG! I was already solidly on board from the Simon Pegg thing, but that's just... genius.

Bones also was responsible for several of "Trek's" catchphases, including "He's dead, Jim" and "Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor, not a ...," ending in a profession in which he had no training.

Except my very, very favourite "Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor not an escalator".

Posted at 12:37AM on 20 Oct 07. Permalink.

Karl Urban is strapping on a stethoscope to play Leonard "Bones" McCoy, the Starship's Enterprise's medical officer, in J.J. Abrams' "Star Trek" feature for Paramount.

This is almost as exciting as when Martin Henderson played Britney's boyfriend in the "Toxic" video.

I hope ur not being sarcastic Robyn! :-)

This could be a big break for Karl, if the part is reasonable. And if not, well there's the international GeekCon circuit to pay his rent/Herne Bay mortgage for the next 15 years.

And let's not forget that Martin almost played Spiderman (allegedly) and almost played the Brad Pitt character in the TV version of Mr & Mrs Smith (but the pilot wasn't picked up).

It can take years of hard work to get that 'lucky break' ...

BTW - how do you strap on a stethoscope? I've seen them hanging round necks, and plugged into the ears, but never strapped. Maybe the straps are for zero gravity conditions?

Posted at 2:15PM on 20 Oct 07. Permalink.

Just pausing to remember Alan Coren, passed away from cancer at 69.

Brilliant editior of Punch amongst many other things. Still remember him dressing up in Arab costume and standing in the visitor's gallery at the London stock exchange and accepting the insults from the traders on the floor during the first oil shock of 1973.

Posted at 2:36PM on 20 Oct 07. Permalink.

Just pausing to remember Alan Coren, passed away from cancer at 69.

I was checking his Wikipedia entry to see if he was Giles and Victoria's dad (he is), when I saw this:

__On The News Quiz, Coren said that he edited his own entry on Wikipedia every morning just so he could change his date of birth to make himself appear younger__

That's how you do it.

Posted at 2:49PM on 20 Oct 07. Permalink.

Coren? There goes one of the greats.

Was just laughing this morning. He entitled a book "Golfing for Cats" and put a swastika on the cover after reading that sport, pets and books about the Nazis sold best.

Posted at 5:25PM on 22 Oct 07. Permalink.

But mostly, NZ On Air has posted We're All in This Together: Public Broadcasting in the Digital Age, a discussion paper I wrote with the assistance of Andrew Dubber.

I finally got around to reading this (in bed this morning, yay).

I found myself most interested in the part about NZ on Air's relationship with music. The fact that NZOA funds music videos and music production is all based around television and radio - bands have to be able to get videos of good enough quality to get played on TV and music of good enough quality to make it to radio playlists.

But now that so many of us are happy to watch low-res music videos on YouTube (and apparently US record companies are no longer happy to spend millions funding music video extravaganzas when videos like those made by OK Go are more popular), and that bands don't need commercial radio play in New Zealand to enjoy overseas success, is there still a role for NZOA to play in funding these types of artists?

If bands like the Checks and Shapeshifter and Fat Freddys Drop can find degrees of success overseas without having NZOA propping them up all the way along, why should other bands need it? Does it create a Feelersization; a welfare state for bands who wouldn't normally work hard enough or be good enough to survive without NZOA?

While radio and television still plays a huge part in music promotion in New Zealand, I like the levelling of the playing field that the internet is starting to create.

The music I've bought in the last couple of years or so is rarely a result of radio or television. It's more likely to be some web-based, whether a band's MySpace, a video on YouTube, an mp3 blog, a regular blog, or something unexpected (like the Klaxons song I heard played in one episode of the last series of UK Big Brother, that I was watching on YouTube).

I reckon there is still room for NZOA (or the government) to support music in varying ways, but the old system of music video and recording grants seems to be heading into obsolescence.

Merci beaucoup.

Posted at 5:57PM on 22 Oct 07. Permalink.

Does it create a Feelersization; a welfare state for bands who wouldn't normally work hard enough or be good enough to survive without NZOA?

That's quite a nice way of putting it. And thanks for reading the whole thing.

I can't say what will happen to the ideas in the paper, but I think NZOA deserves credit for commissioning a discussion document it knew would be critical. My impression is that there will be some change on the music front.

But now that so many of us are happy to watch low-res music videos on YouTube ...

And it's worth reiterating that it was a major label boss who told me that he'd rather use his NZOA funding grant to make a bunch of low-res clips for every track on an album, rather than one clip for TV.

Posted at 10:10AM on 23 Oct 07. Permalink.

And it's worth reiterating that it was a major label boss who told me that he'd rather use his NZOA funding grant to make a bunch of low-res clips for every track on an album, rather than one clip for TV.

That's assuming incorrectly that the 'quality' of a video comes from the expense of the camera only, which it doesn't.

Broadcast quality is easily attainable from domestic 3ccd cameras, or even a 1ccd camera with good lighting. Image quality really isn't the difficult or expensive part anymore. its the idea, staging and editing that are the deciding factors in a good video, and that isn't any cheaper whether the finished product is rendered to full broadcast quality or you tube video.

You can easily make a cheap video if you have a good idea, and a crew of skilled and hungry video tech people willing to give their time for free, but getting those people to work for free for the second video, is a little harder, and by the 4th, 5th, 6th video they'll be asking themselves what's in it for them.

You tube does nothing for the industry in terms of costs of producing a video, they remain the same, it does however free up the delivery medium, and means you're no longer relying on a few broadcast hours to squeeze your master piece into.

Posted at 11:04AM on 23 Oct 07. Permalink.

Does it create a Feelersization; a welfare state for bands who wouldn't normally work hard enough or be good enough to survive without NZOA?

Is it wrong of me to pine for a system that provides grants to non-commercially viable acts -- but who are somehow seen to be worth something artistically (?) -- to help them do things that are only normally available to commercially successful acts -- tour, record, release.

Especially now we have technology which can allow bands from NZ to much more easily gain huge acclaim globally while being virtually unknown at home. And recognising that "huge acclaim" doesn't usually translate into anything like money to pay for recording, releasing, touring.

i.e. wasn't it like this in the good old days?

(Disclaimer: I'm thinking of my own band(s) and those of my friends, a lot, here.)

Posted at 11:34AM on 23 Oct 07. Permalink.

Is it wrong of me to pine for a system that provides grants to non-commercially viable acts -- but who are somehow seen to be worth something artistically (?) -- to help them do things that are only normally available to commercially successful acts -- tour, record, release.

apparently it is wrong of you, but technically that is what the system is set up to fund, only it has been hijacked and misdirected.
if you read the various NZ on Air Mission statements it says its objectives are

to fund things of cultural value (read artistic with that),

"NZ On Air's job is to promote and foster the development of New Zealand's culture on the airwaves"

to fund that which would not get funded,
"We aim to fund programmes and broadcasts, not otherwise provided in a commercial market"

Those 2 objectives alone seem to bare no resemblance to the activities of the current system.