Yesterday's Midweek MediaWatch covered the decision by police not to prosecute Stuff for publishing anonymised audio of the cops during the final minutes of Tom Phillips' life;

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=22b39814-2065-4113-a6bd-587235737567

I guess the cops haven't heard of the Streisand Effect. Because the first thing I did upon learning that they didn't want it published, was to go listen to it;

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360819884/police-audio-end-tom-phillips-chase

I doubt I'm the only one who did.

#podcasts #RNZ #MediaWatch #Stuff #StreisandEffect #DeathByCop #TomPhillips

A fascinating discussion on Midweek MediaWatch about whether or not Sean Plunket's digital soapbox The Platform is under the jurisdiction of the Broadcasting Standards Authority;
https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=7308019f-a654-4741-b3db-b6f3edb1fce2

Plunket is a contemptible human being who platforms hateful concern trolling, in the style of Cameron Slater. So on one level I'd love to see the BSA throw the book at him. But as with the case against Slater, there are deeper principles at stake here.

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#podcasts #RNZ #MediaWatch #BSA

This week's MediaWatch dived into the online safety debate. Starting about 23 minutes in, after a story about news coverage of Silver Ferns coaching drama, and a roundup of the midweek edition;

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=33fb446b-4f18-4f7d-8327-ddd5cf4bf4ab

It's a mixed bag. As with so much commentary on this, our genuine concerns about civil liberties and human rights kind of get lumped in with the self-serving opinions of reputation launderers for DataFarms (including ACT MPs).

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#podcasts #RNZ #MediaWatch #OnlineSafety

The enshittification of commercial news media continues apace ...

"So you need human journalists. AI will not replace them. It might make one journalist do the work of 10, but you still need that journalist.

We're ... moving into a full newsroom based on AI."

#PeterFowler, 2025

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=4df8ef6b-aef5-4a92-9f6a-44a3d314ae09

*shudder* Oh the hubris. This is exactly the wrong way to use any kind of AI. But especially the current crop of Trained MOLEs.

#podcasts #RNZ #MediaWatch #MOLE #AI

MediaWatch did a good segment on the datacentre-related reputation laundering by scAmazon and NatACT First, and its Useful Idiots in news media (notably Mike Hoskins);

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=18fdbc07-39b4-4deb-96ba-1d9809b54c6f

#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch

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@leighelse
> Moving Radio New Zealand's "centre of gravity" to Auckland is an ill-considered strategy.

I had the same concerns based on my first impressions. But after listening to the interview with Paul Thompson on yesterday's edition of MediaWatch;

https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/mediawatch/audio/2019002028/rnz-s-push-to-stop-the-slide-on-air-rude-words-ok

... it doesn't sound like the plan is for RNZ to become "Auckland-centric". Just to focus for a while on making sure it's serving the needs of (50+) radio listeners in Tamaki Makaurau.

#podcasts #RNZ #mediawatch

Complaining about of "maorification" of media, because they're starting to reflect the unique cultural mix of Aotearoa, is like complaining about "pacification" when institutions start taking meaningful action to prevent domestic abuse.

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=e6bc82e6-bcc8-42bf-915c-f27d859a21df

#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch

"[IDF] have admitted it was deliberate attack, but it claimed that [Anas] al-Sharif was Hamas operative. They called him a 'mouthpiece of intellectual terrorism'..."

#HaydenDonnell, 2025

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=36b8bb92-d72c-404b-8948-5850ce600cf6

#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch#Gaza #journalism

"We can't have this namby-pamby stand in education where we don't like winners and losers, we just like winners."

#BarrySoper, 2025

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=199b86ae-c200-4075-ab0c-f5dec7f2b80f

Why not? Why would we choose to structurally frame people struggling at school as "losers"? Why choose to make education a zero-sum game, when there's no evidence that moving away from that toxic framing does any harm?

https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/schooling2/learners/student-engagement-and-behaviour/29252

#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch #education#NCEA

"... politicians [are] going to put more pressure on supermarkets, we've heard that for years. Fundamentally the problem is that we've only got two big players in the country."

#LiamDann, Business Editor-at-large, #NZHerald, 2025

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=29744fe6-be1b-4bde-94ce-89aee9f80581

Wrong. The fundamental problem is lack of pro-competition regulation and enforcement.

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#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch

Who watches the MediaWatch? I do!

"Bitter butter battle, Saudi cash chaging the picture for sport on screen"

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch/2025/bitter-butter-battle-saudi-cash-chaging-the-picture-for-sport-on-screen

"Chaging"?

#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch

This is the talking point #CLuxon pulls out when asked about health system failures;

"Basically I think that's the hangover of a Labour government that didn't care about Auckland, focused on Wellington, shut the joint down for 2 years."

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=7c69e0c3-ba0e-47f7-a4fd-7b37a9e604d1

I'm just imagining the next tory PM blaming the previous government for health failures in Otago. Blatantly ignoring consecutive tory governments delaying and defunding the Dunedin Hospital rebuild.

#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch #health

Journalists seem to finally be realising that #MOLE Trainers selling "AI" are selling us a bill of goods;

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=d6af8e05-b61a-4f80-ace5-e9b00a408999

But they're still buying into the "hallucination" line. The MOLE is not "hallucinating", it's just generating plausible sentences. Just like when it outputs a sentence that happens to be accurate.

Either way, it's not "answering" your questions, it spitting out plausible sentences. Because this is all it can do.

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#podcasts #RNZ #MediaWatch #AI #journalism

"Sports influencers and celebrity influencers or whatever it is that's driving this craze, they should be thinking and reflecting very strongly about [Run it Straight] now. But it's not something you can practically ban at a government level. But it's just calling for people to exercise individual responsibility."

#ChristopherLuxon, 2025

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=13bfab36-a20f-4a61-8f3f-575d334abce0

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#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch

Anyone need more bad news? MediaWatch this week is full of it.

For a start, there's the govt cancelling a focused tax on international online services making money from Aotearoa. A sensible policy I hadn't even heard was on the cards. While continuing with a link tax on currently dominant platforms - an unprincipled, short-term policy that has mostly failed in Oz, Canada and elsewhere - and the online age verification farce;

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=3b55abf5-5b70-408a-8d70-c7d1514d875d

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#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch#MOLE#AI

Colin Peacock did a good segment on the bill proposed by National MP Catherine Wedd, aping the Australian government's attempt to ban under-16s from social media (with the head-scratching exemption for YouTub);

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=3ad7cf4e-6f76-4fcc-8d74-de5fc080f878

Like all such laws, it would require anyone using social media to identify themselves to service hosts, so they can verify age. Corporate DataFarmers would love to have this information.

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#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch #TechRegulation#AgeVerification

"[Pattrick Smellie says of future news outlets] they'll be smaller, driven by editorial concerns rather than advertising imperatives. Today's ... news publishers he said, both in Australia and NZ, have in practice now become real estate advertising platforms, with newsrooms attached."

#ColinPeacock, 2025

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=a2db3e6a-d412-44ff-880b-c9c90f7a449f

Burn!

For those who can afford to vault the paywall, Smellie's full piece can be read here;

https://businessdesk.co.nz/article/opinion/the-future-of-news-yet-another-reckon

#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch#NewsMedia

"Having dedicated health reporters in key newsrooms makes a huge difference, and giving those reporters the time to cultivate their contacts, to dig through documents, to make OIA requests."

#RachelThomas, 2025

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=61d7c2a9-7bca-435a-b796-b5d87c90ca92

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#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch #healthcare#NewsMedia#HealthReporting

"NZ has had a housing shortage for so long, it has fostered a cohort of entitled property owners and landlords whose businesses can't survive normal market conditions, in which occupants and tenants have a modicum of choice. We need to weed these businesses out."

Stu Donovan, quoted by Hayden Donnell, 2025

https://www.rnz.co.nz/podcast/mediawatch?share=cf3970fc-9508-4412-a6da-c98a0a64a102

#podcasts#RNZ#MediaWatch #housing