Heads should roll at TVNZ over its Tivo investment. It was clear from the start it was going to be a disaster -and after TVNZ refused to divulge numbers, it has now been confirmed it has now affected TVNZ's income to the point where bad decisions like the TVNZ7 one will be easy to make.
This story today reports: Television New Zealand Ltd. posted a 45% slump in first-half profit after the State-owned broadcaster took a $14.8 million hit on its ill-fated TiVo investment. http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU1103/S00716/tvnz-profit-slumps-45-on-tivo-write-down.htm
I hope Russell you will tackle them on your show about it as yoou did give Tivo a nice plug at the start -or will this be too close to TVNZ to allow.

Askew's Morningside murals are amazing. I havent seen them in person but must check them out http://www.aucklandtrains.co.nz/2011/03/15/rail-murals-to-turn-grey/
Surely they are not next to go? Does anyone know where they exactly are? (I only know Monringside from Bro town!)

Just what we need from SKY -another tedious 80s music channel is coming.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/CU1103/S00161/music-channel-to-celebrate-80s-00s-artists-mtv-programming.htm
SKY usually adds some crap channel as part of the basic channel lineup then a month later announces a price increase to cover "increased programming costs."
About time someone had them up about that.
Why can't SKY give us instead 24hr Al Jazerra which Stratos has rights to but never seems to make up its mind it we can really see it (It was showing at 11pm weeknights, brilliant for Libya coverage then vanished. BTW Their website is dreadful and even requires Outlook to subscribe to the programming update info so who knows when its now on).
But of course the rightwing Americans running SKY who drive Fox News would see Al J as the devil.
But back to the discussion: To be honest, TV7 always feels like cheap and nasty because it is run on the smell of an oily rag. For example, the TVNZ news on it looks like a training ground for young up and coming employees and if it really had any public service news philosophy, it would have gone 6am to midnight on the quake coverage including covering live news briefings from ChCh.
The big picture is not the end of TV7 but the end of TVNZ and as I never find anything on it to watch or record and hate the celebrity BS, I'm now uncomfortable with my taxes involved in some way. I got SKY to see BBC and CNN news and the documentary channel etc.
I spent Christmas in Australia and now so miss SBS and ABC. A feed of SBS would have been a nice addition to the digital lineup on Freeview and a replacement for 7.

Russell.. I'm thrilled you have not just embraced cycling but now discovered the new renaissance of rail in Auckland. I'm an addict of the Auckland Trains site (http://www.aucklandtrains.co.nz/) but everyone used to laugh at me as I had become some tragic trainspotter. Now it's become very fashionable and I'm glad with your endorsement, I can now come out of the closet and say I'm a big user of trains!

NZ Council for Infrastructure Developments sound like ACT people. This is all starting to sound like the return of Rogernomics and a plan to sell Auckland's assets.

A thoughtful post here on the question I can't work out: Why is the poll-sensitive government ignoring the noise from Auckland?
http://www.aucklandtrains.co.nz/2010/03/15/why-is-the-govt-riding-out-the-super-city-uproar/

Can't understand why the Herald continues to run John Roughan's laughable pieces when there are some good new voices out there.

My partner and I bought bikes at Christmas as we couldn't stand the idea of going to the gym.
Good to hear you are riding too Russell - and nice to start the year with a post about cycling rather than some political issue!
I have been rather scared by some of the traffic around the city and think I am still thinking of a car instead of a cyclist and am also surprised at the power of today's bike (I haven't ridden since a crappy school bike!).
I love seeing a different side of Auckland and familiar streets where I discover new things.
We have also decided to take our car off the road as much as possible this year and use public transport and support it.
Over Christmas we discovered the blog http://www.aucklandtrains.co.nz/ which has some great stuff about cycling developments and public transport issues. The writer seemed to have no holiday over Christmas and blogged extensively on the rail development taking place, which has really inspired us to try the trains.