Proposed Merger NZME and Fairfax

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#2480981 11-May-2020 10:34

MikeB4:

Let them have it and hopefully it will all collapse and we will be rid of two very poor media outlets in one hit.

Leaving the masses with what exactly as a source for "news"?

Linuxluver

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#2480984 11-May-2020 10:36

tripp:
freitasm:

And we're back: "NZME makes offer to buy rival Stuff for $1"

I just see this as NZME trying to get what they have wanted for years during a time when people are looking the other way. I still don't think this is a good idea.

No

The NZ Herald is horrendously biased in favour of National. They consistently ignore stories bad for National, like Simon Bridges meeting with the head of Chinese Security in Beijing. Not a peep from the Herald. They employ only Trumpy columnists like Hoskings.

We do not need one foreign billionaire political agenda through almost all radio and newspapers in an election year.

The only major media owned in NZ are TVNZ and RNZ. Everything else is American or Australian conservatives.

That's not NZ.

Beyond the fact the owners don't live in NZ, the level of media ownership concentration this would bring should be unacceptable no matter who owns it.

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MikeB4

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#2480987 11-May-2020 10:40

Fred99:

Leaving the masses with what exactly as a source for "news"?

My comment was tongue in cheek but really NZH and Stuff are horrible and offer little. I worked for the Dominion and I weep at what the Dom/Post morphed into and the Blundell's would be mortified.

dejadeadnz

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#2480990 11-May-2020 10:44

MikeB4:

Let them have it and hopefully it will all collapse and we will be rid of two very poor media outlets in one hit.

That's a ridiculously naive and uninformed viewpoint. Look and think for a moment, see past your own personal distaste for either outlet, and see how this kind of saturated ownership has turned out for Australia. NZME will have the most dominant radio network full of poison mouths and they will continue to use the Herald to saturate the print/web media with their sensationalist hard right viewpoints. They will either extend that to Stuff or, just for the sake of appearing to abide by any condition of merger that requires them to maintain competing newsrooms, absolutely gut Stuff in order to save on opex whilst inserting in the most low quality staff/writers representing "the other viewpoint". Stuff does have some excellent climate change coverage (including long form investigative pieces) and have taken an editorial policy that goes against any kind of CC denial, which is a staple of Newstalk ZB. Expect that to be gone/undermined, just like how the Herald has hugely undermined the long form investigative work that the likes of David Fisher used to routinely do.

Whether you like it or not, a significant portion of this country (like any country) isn't that intelligent and will be hugely guided by the views of dominant super outlets like the proposed-merged Stuff/NZME. History tells us such entities do not augur well for informed debate, democracy, and media diversification.

MikeB4

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#2480996 11-May-2020 10:51

dejadeadnz:

MikeB4:

Let them have it and hopefully it will all collapse and we will be rid of two very poor media outlets in one hit.

That's a ridiculously naive and uninformed viewpoint. Look and think for a moment, see past your own personal distaste for either outlet, and see how this kind of saturated ownership has turned out for Australia. NZME will have the most dominant radio network full of poison mouths and they will continue to use the Herald to saturate the print/web media with their sensationalist hard right viewpoints. They will either extend that to Stuff or, just for the sake of appearing to abide by any condition of merger that requires them to maintain competing newsrooms, absolutely gut Stuff in order to save on opex whilst inserting in the most low quality staff/writers representing "the other viewpoint". Stuff does have some excellent climate change coverage (including long form investigative pieces) and have taken an editorial policy that goes against any kind of CC denial, which is a staple of Newstalk ZB. Expect that to be gone/undermined, just like how the Herald has hugely undermined the long form investigative work that the likes of David Fisher used to routinely do.

Whether you like it or not, a significant portion of this country (like any country) isn't that intelligent and will be hugely guided by the views of dominant super outlets like the proposed-merged Stuff/NZME. History tells us such entities do not augur well for informed debate, democracy, and media diversification.

Before you go on one of your typically personally attacking and insulting posts you should read further. If you took just a moment to read you would have seen that I have said my comment was tongue in cheek. For clarity for you the tongue-in-cheek figure of speech is used to imply that a statement or other production is humorously or otherwise not seriously intended, and it should not be taken at face value.

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#2480998 11-May-2020 10:52

Something funny is going on ...

Stuff owner says talks with NZME 'terminated last week'

"... Nine spokesman Victoria Buchanan said it terminated discussions with NZME last week, and would be releasing a statement to the ASX on Monday morning.
Buchanan said on a call also attended by Nine corporate affairs head Nic Christensen that no talks were currently taking place with NZME.
It would be 'a fair call' to say she was surprised by the statement NZME had released, she said."

https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/300009341/stuff-owner-says-talks-with-nzme-terminated-last-week

freitasm

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#2481001 11-May-2020 10:58

PolicyGuy:

Something funny is going on ...

Stuff owner says talks with NZME 'terminated last week'

"... Nine spokesman Victoria Buchanan said it terminated discussions with NZME last week, and would be releasing a statement to the ASX on Monday morning.
Buchanan said on a call also attended by Nine corporate affairs head Nic Christensen that no talks were currently taking place with NZME.
It would be 'a fair call' to say she was surprised by the statement NZME had released, she said."

https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/300009341/stuff-owner-says-talks-with-nzme-terminated-last-week

From the article: "NZME said it was not seeking financial assistance from the Government to support the purchase."

Good. If they had to ask the government for a dollar...

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#2481002 11-May-2020 11:00

I don't personally have an opinion on whether the death of NZME and/or Stuff would be a good or bad thing, but I'm struggling to see how either of them is going to survive regardless of whether the merger goes ahead.

In my view both entities made a strategic mistake by not introducing a paywall before they started gutting their newsrooms. NZME's introduction of a paywall a year ago came too late because by that stage they had already lost credibility among the intellectual types who would otherwise have been willing to open their wallets. In addition to that, NZME's radio audience is aging and simply can't compete against Mediaworks among other radio demographics, and then there is the whole Facebook/Google issue that is creating further commercial pressures on the advertising market.

On top of all that, let's not forget that Mediaworks still hasn't found a buyer for Three and shutting it down is still a possible outcome. Maybe Nine will do the same to Stuff if the merger doesn't proceed.

dejadeadnz

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#2481003 11-May-2020 11:02

MikeB4:

Before you go on one of your typically personally attacking and insulting posts you should read further. If you took just a moment to read you would have seen that I have said my comment was tongue in cheek. For clarity for you the tongue-in-cheek figure of speech is used to imply that a statement or other production is humorously or otherwise not seriously intended, and it should not be taken at face value.

What does some so called "tongue in cheek" post add in the context of a serious issue and people wanting to have an informed debate? Frankly, you added that it was a joke after another poster pulled you up on it, so whether it genuinely was or not is debatable.

MikeB4

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#2481007 11-May-2020 11:09

dejadeadnz:

What does some so called "tongue in cheek" post add in the context of a serious issue and people wanting to have an informed debate? Frankly, you added that it was a joke after another poster pulled you up on it, so whether it genuinely was or not is debatable.

Oh for goodness sake lighten up man. This is an internet Forum, it is not a Varsity debating chamber, nor is it a Courtroom or House of Commons. You are not the judge of content or the quality control officer. It was tongue in cheek and I don't seek or need your approval.

Varkk

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#2481012 11-May-2020 11:17

Maybe the government should pay the dollar and give RNZ a print media division.

dejadeadnz

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#2481014 11-May-2020 11:18

@MikeB4: No one says you need my approval. I am just pointing out the obvious issue of people treating discussions and forums as receptacles of (at best) random irrelevancies, which is rather ironic and concerning in view of the concerns around quality of news media and the like engendered by this proposed merger, along with your own proffered views on those media's lack of quality content.

Fred99

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#2481016 11-May-2020 11:25

MikeAqua

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#2481022 11-May-2020 11:30

The problem is not that these companies are too small. It's that their products are very poor. Place one turd on top of another turd, it still isn't an appealing product.

That said, I wouldn't like to see NZME disappear as they provide a useful counterpoint to Red Radio and TVNZ.

Mike

Fred99

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#2481025 11-May-2020 11:40

MikeAqua:

Red Radio.

Media is biased. The problem isn't inherently with that - it's with people so brainwashed to think that what they're reading (or seeing and hearing) is "centrist".

If Radio NZ should be called "Red Radio", then the person making it is far from centrist. What a joke - reminds me of Muldoon's "dancing Cossacks". (It's probably against FUG as well)

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