Just Left

Parliament Live

Now you can watch Parliament live on the net:

http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/Visiting/LiveBroadcast/

Excellent stuff for democratic transparency.

Parliament on the Net

We'll be able to see Parliament live online from July, according to this news release from the Office of the Clerk today.

Good stuff! Another step on the way to a more transparent democracy. The next thing we need is broadcasting of select committee hearings...

TVNZ On Demand

It's nice to see a useful public service being rolled out to the Internet.

This is what's happening with TVNZ's new On Demand service, http://tvnzondemand.co.nz/. The quality is pretty good and it's great that stuff is downloadable. Much less great that it is behind digital rights management protection, but you can't win em all I suppose.

RIP Steve Irwin

... that bloody Crocodile Hunter.  I was watching tv by accident on Sunday with the flatties and some show about him and crocs was on.  Little did I know he was about to be killed, and not even by a croc, but a stingray.

What did people think of him? To me he was quite iconically (perhaps, rather, stereotypically) Australian in his approach, and way way way too over the top.

Like him? Not? Either way, why?

More on public broadcasting

I've often wondered why we don't bother with a proper TV public broadcaster. We do pretty well with Radio New Zealand (which now has, at last, a decent website).

There's no particular reason why we shouldn't. There are two major things which one would change, in my view, about TVNZ to make it a "proper" public broadcaster:

• Remove all advertising from One, and limit the way advertising is treated on Two. Don't let it drive the ratings race. Yes, the stuff needs to be popular and quality TV on both channels, but there'd be no need to bid to the lowest common denominator by chasing ratings endlessly.
• Fund TVNZ through taxes. You do not spread money around if you want a decent public broadcasting service; you keep it in the public broadcaster. So NZ on Air would not hand out TV funds any more - TVNZ would get that money. NZ on Air would do radio etc. There'd need to be more tax payer funds as advertising revenue would decline - it would not vanish but it would decline.

More money worth spending. Telling our news and stories and life in our own way, in our own voices, unmediated by commercial values, is an integral part of every sustainable national culture in the world. Some countries have this with commercial systems: US stories and values dominate their media thoroughly. That isn't the case in a small country on the edge of the world. It's not even true of a big country like the UK which spends billions on the BBC.

I'm not proposing a new BBC. Any public service network would still play overseas TV; still use other networks for news etc. The difference would be in what was driving it: values, not dollars, to pervert an ACT slogan from 1996. We are not going to create a worldwide broadcasting and publishing empire like the BBC, we don't need it and we cannot afford it.

We can afford to invest in our national future. A public service TV broadcaster is a key part of that. If New Zealand wants to accelerate the amazing cultural progress of the past thirty years, then we need to build on those foundations and expand the space where our stories, in our voices, are heard.

 

Homer beats Holmes :)

Whoever thought of that headline in the Herald this morning had it exactly right. I am delighted to see the return of the gnome, if only to laugh at the long slow descent to the end of his career. Paul Holmes is an entertainer, not a journalist, and the best thing TVNZ did last year was get rid of him.

The fact that a Simpsons repeat had more people watching than his debut, simply makes it all the more delicious.

HOLMES GONE AT LAST!

I got an email and I thought it was too good to be true -- but it's not!

Both Stuff and the Herald are reporting that Holmes has left TVNZ to go to Prime TV.

It appears that this is because he was only offered a one year contract renewal.

Who cares what the reason is? The Gnome has gone!!!!! Praise the Lord!!!! Maybe TVNZ will be able to get someone to front the 7pm slot who can actually interview people competently, and provide news/current affairs instead of infotainment drivel?!

Someone who wouldn't call Kofi Annan a "Cheeky Darkie!"

This has to be the best day in New Zealand news broadcasting for a generation!

Teachers

I watched the last episode of "Teachers" on TV1 tonight.

I don't usually watch TV but it's rather a good show. It did remind me quite a lot of my own visit to the UK earlier this year...

It must have been the pub scenes :)

They do seem to have the knack of being able to make TV shows without the cringe factor. I still cringe at Shortland Street. I wonder if that makes me a bad kiwi??

Wish we had decent local pubs in which one could sit for hours with just one pint. They all somehow seem rushed here in Wellington.

JC