Comment
Change is constant for the news industry and 2022 will be no different. Stephen Parker examines the questions facing our media players and how they might respond.
Will RNZ/TVNZ merge?
The idea of merging RNZ and TVNZ into a single public media entity has been around for several years. Millions have been spent developing a business case, but last November the government delayed the decision, citing the Covid workload. The Cabinet must now decide in February.
Will the Stronger Public Media project get the green light? Probably because of all the prep work that has been undertaken.
But not definitely.
Counter-arguments exist. A practical argument is that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Ultimately, both TVNZ and RNZ performed strongly last year. And so far the government has not fully defined the benefits of a merger.
Even if the business case proves compelling, the political calculations will plague senior ministers.
The Public Interest Journalism Fund is a good example. This path of good intentions has produced a bumpy ride. There have been accusations that the government has received media coverage due to its direct funding of the media with the $55 million program. Media bosses rightly deny these claims, but the perception has taken hold in anti-Labour circles.
The second political consideration is where the merger plan fits into the government’s overloaded work schedule.
Maybe not so high. Labor has been heavily engaged in costly structural reform work. He might just start the new year by figuring out what he can lose.
Even if the Cabinet agrees to approve a new public media entity by merging TVNZ and RNZ, nothing obvious will happen quickly. A establishment committee will be formed and a new broadcasting law will be prepared for submission to Parliament, which will take the next 18 months. The new public service broadcaster would not become operational until mid-2023.
A sign that the government will take on Google and Facebook?
2022 begins with questions about government policy around Google and Facebook.
So far, the government has been staunchly reluctant to regulate digital giants. It is difficult to see how this hands-off approach has benefited the local news industry and the national interest.
And the government’s regulatory approach is a big problem for the national media. They want to be paid for the content that Google and Facebook aggregate.
Australia took on the big offshore digital players by writing a news media trading code that ensured sound payouts. Many European governments have established similar regulations. Canada is also moving in this direction.
Broadcasting and Media Minister Kris Faafoi advocated a soft-soft approach. He verbally encouraged social media giants to make voluntary deals with national media saying he didn’t want the abrasive regulatory approach seen across Tasman.
Eventually, late last year, our media joined forces through the Newspapers Publishers Association to bargain collectively with Google (in hopes of gaining greater leverage since it there was no news media trading code to fall on).
He got bogged down. To collectively bargain effectively as a trading cartel requires a license from the Commerce Commission. The papers were filed towards the end of the year. A few days before Christmas, the Commerce Commission indicated that it would issue a decision by the middle of the year at the earliest.
If the government had followed the same path as Australia, or many other like-minded countries that have developed a code of negotiation, it is likely that the national media industry would be much better off now.
Why this did not happen is unclear. Perhaps a mixture of weak policy advice from officials or an unwillingness to antagonize Google and Facebook (which are also platforms for ministers).
Either way, the influence of Google and Facebook is on the rise, and local news outlets (with the exception of the smaller, subscriber-based ones) business office) did not secure content payments. The pot continues to boil. News industry bosses are quietly becoming deeply frustrated with government inertia.
Can TVNZ rely on Power to make an impact?
TVNZ’s board moved quickly to replace its outgoing chief executive, announcing late last year that former Westpac Bank executive and national minister Simon Power had been appointed to the top job.
It ticked some boxes. A quick date at a critical time, a New Zealander who gets the job, and he’s known in numbers.
The unchecked box indicates experience in the media industry or a demonstrated passion for media.
Perhaps the TVNZ board has decided that the job description of the managing director has changed with stronger skills in the Wellington ring road, particularly if the public media project goes ahead.
Although a former national minister, Simon Power is not Steven Joyce. He served under a John Key government as Minister of Justice, where he was considered to be on the liberal end of the spectrum. His office described him as the left hemisphere of the national government.
It’s not an easy mission for Power to navigate TVNZ’s interests under a public media model. And one of the key people he has to negotiate with is RNZ’s Paul Thompson, who is now a public media veteran.
Will the government continue to fund commercial media?
The $55 million Public Interest Journalism Fund (PIJF) was paved with good intentions. He was formed to create journalism jobs when the industry seemed on the verge of failure, particularly in the face of the economic shocks of Covid.
Is it a success? If this were a movie, you’d have to say a year on the PIJF lacks critical acclaim or overt popularity.
The unease exists because the PIJF includes direct funding for journalism in commercial newsrooms allocated according to criteria set by NZ On Air. Fair or not, critics say it leads to soft influence of the news by the government.
Many industry bosses also have reservations about the program’s design, but have been shielded by public criticism.
Belatedly, NZ On Air decided to form an industry advisory board (although it is halfway through funding rollout). The influence he will have on the regime remains uncertain.
The government has indicated that it will abandon the PIJF when the $55 million is spent. But Pandora’s box has been opened. Ending the diet will create problems in itself. How many people hired under the program will lose their jobs when the well runs out?
This year, the government and its decision makers will grapple with the next stage of funding the news industry. This is outside of his own public media project.
Can Tova make inroads into Hosking’s breakfast odds?
There was a splash of publicity when it was announced that Tova O’Brien was quitting her role as political editor at Discovery/Newshub to be the morning host on a reformatted Magic talkback station now called Today.
Widely described as the start of a war between Tova and Mike Hosking, it will be an intriguing competition.
Today hasn’t set a date for the launch – other than that it will be in the first quarter. It’s a slow, well-heralded launch that gives Newstalk ZB and the NZME stable plenty of time to deploy its own preventative marketing.
No doubt this radio war will be a compelling listen for media junkies, but it will be until the end of the year before any judgments can be made on the new audience models. And it won’t be easy to reward the deep-seated audience of Newstalk ZB. MediaWorks has already reported Today is a long term project.
“The Platform” is coming but what are the chances of it inflaming “the resistance”?
This year will see the birth of a brand new point of sale, The platform, set up by elders magic radio/RNZ/and TV3 broadcaster Sean Plunket. If you run out of platforms, the only option is to create your own. The radio station and website will offer an anti-cancellation culture format.
You can buy a t-shirt that leaves no doubt about political positioning. Its logo is “Join the Resistance”. Plunket says the mission of The platform is to “overcome the hatred fueled by taxpayer-funded media and culture commissioners who use your tax dollars to stifle public debate”.
Studios are being built (including one in Queenstown) and staff hired for the new platform, funded by an unnamed private funder. 2022 will judge whether The platform is about to ride a political zeitgeist.
Will Sky’s resurgent new strategy succeed?
While TVNZ and RNZ may spend much of the year watching each other, Sky has laid out its strategy to revitalize its fortunes. 2022 will judge whether the plan bears fruit.
In the second half of the year, it will launch the new internet-enabled Sky Box which will combine satellite and broadband streaming content. As a product, it will offer third-party apps, free content and Sky programming.
Sky hopes to retain customers who previously accessed its product through Vodafone TV, which is being wound up this year. Sky will continue its policy of making deals with free-to-air networks and may reorganize First – its own FTA channel.
The pay-TV company will also be watching Spark closely to see if the telecommunications company questions its role in delivering sports content or doubles down on its expensive strategy. For example, have the rights to Rugby World Cup and Cricket NZ paid off for Spark in attracting or retaining subscribers?
And so, a lot of rewriting of the media landscape to sweep through to 2022. This may well turn out to be a year where public media entities transform profoundly into public interest values. The commercial media are getting more fiery in their political coverage. And Labor’s media policy faces greater tests.
