Media Week: Summer moves, conflicts and wins
Today, the summer shuffle begins in Adelaide media, internal strategic conflicts laid bare, 7.30’s final local show and much more.
Media Mike
No, not that one – Mike Smithson, the evergreen Channel 7 political reporter.
Smitho has started his usual summer gig reading the weekend news bulletins – as well as reporting this week in usual robust fashion on the Fisher byelection.
Starting on Monday week (15 December), he’ll also be taking over FIVEaa breakfasts while the regular team of David Penberthy, Jane Reilly and Mark Aiston take a break.
Smithson will be joined by Tom Rehn, the Channel 9 sports reporter who already moonlights as the FIVEaa breakfast sports presenter.
Over at 891, Spence Denny will be taking over summer breakfast duties on Monday from Matthew Abraham and David Bevan.
Both talk stations will head into the ratings break feeling comfortable. 891 has had another good year, particularly in the breakfast shift, but FIVEaa has made some gains.
After a shock loss to Triple M in the sports drive shift early in the year, FIVEaa has settled in a new announcer, Mark Bickley, alongside Stephen Rowe. He replaced another former Crows captain, Chris McDermott.
Bickley has already shown himself to be a radio natural, quick on his feet and easy to listen to.
Doing his own stunts
The affable Labor state secretary, Reggie Martin, was responsible for a possible media first this week.
Martin, I believe, became the first Labor state secretary to voice a complete political ad (not just the authorisation statement), adding his dulcet tones to a radio attack piece ahead of Saturday’s by-election in Fisher.
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Labor had a last-minute opportunity to fill some ad space and didn’t have the time to track down a professional voice-over artist.
He’s not giving up his day job, I am assured.
Emmerson’s master move
Russell Emmerson, one of the gentlemen of Adelaide media and public relations, has begun a new gig as head of strategic communications for the Master Builders’ Association.
The former Advertiser journalist proved to be dab hand at the PR game during his time as a senior account manager at McClusky & Co.
Digital conflict
The media industry is riven with conflicts at the moment, none more aggressive than News Corp’s stoush with the ABC.
One of the more bizarre bugbears of the Murdoch crew is the ABC’s alleged “incursion” into the digital realm.
Just what could this criticism possibly mean? Are they suggesting the ABC shouldn’t be making its products available online or in forms which are mobile device-friendly? Should the ABC regress to gramophones and newsreels?
Interestingly, the debate is widening existing rifts within the ranks of News Corp itself, which has long been divided between print nostalgists and those who realise that digital is the present and future of news.
A debate on Twitter this week – a medium regularly pilloried by the “print-first” crew at The Australian – laid bare News Corp’s internal debate.
On the digital side was Neal Mann, the Wall Street Journal digital guru brought in to help out News Corp Australia with digital strategy. His antagonists were The Australian’s media editor Sharri Markson and former Adelaide journo, now Sky News and Australian commentator, Chris Kenny.
Markson was particularly concerned that the ABC was “redirecting resources from TV and radio journalism to digital”.
Mann’s response was pithy: “As it rightly should. The important point is the audience is shifting its consumption to digital.”
Isn’t that obvious?
And the ABC isn’t happy either
The above conflict began as an internal ABC fight, when several senior journalists took umbrage at a suggestion by an ABC manager that he admired digital-only websites like BuzzFeed because, “unlike us”, they don’t have a “legacy to deal with”.
We know what he was getting at – in the digital age, newsrooms need to be structured in a different way and journalists need to adjust some, but not all, of their practices.
But the suggestion that the ABC’s fine tradition of radio and TV broadcasting was some sort of barrier in the brave new world wasn’t appreciated by many senior ABC journalists.
Goodbye 7.30 SA
Stay informed, daily
The curtain goes down on 7.30 SA tonight – one of the first victims of ABC budget cuts.
It’s yet to be seen how the local currents affairs hole will be filled, although ABC management insists the content will still be there. Somewhere.
ABC news director Kate Torney told a Senate Committee this week that other programs and platforms would take up the slack.
“There’s no reason to reduce the local content because the majority of the resources will still be there,” she said.
There’s understandable skepticism within the ABC about whether this will happen, given the head office’s laughable understanding of South Australian stories and priorities.
So for your last chance to see the local 7.30 team in action, tune in tonight.
The story list is a strong one.
Leah MacLennan reports from inside the world of Adelaide’s controversial street preachers, talking to those within the movement and those who have fallen out with them.
Mike Sexton examines why health outcomes vary within our hospital system depending on the day and time of admittance. He has an interview with Health Minister Jack Snelling.
The final piece will be 7.30’s annual year-in-review report.
Top of the class
It’s impossible to go past former Adelaide journalist Adele Ferguson, who took out Australian journalism’s highest honour, the Gold Walkley, last night.
Ferguson, who works for Fairfax Media, shared the award with the ABC’s Deb Masters and Mario Christodoulou for their stunning expose of dodgy banking practices – particularly at the Commonwealth Bank.
Watch her report, Banking Bad, here.
For all the Walkley winners, go here.
Naughty corner
I’m tempted to nominate myself for my opening statement on ABC 891’s ‘Spin Cycle’ this morning: “Woody is coming.”
It was meant to be a reference to Fisher independent Dan Woodyatt and his chances in tomorrow’s by-election.
Ahem.
But no, this week’s winner is The Australian for continuing to show a lack of grace towards its fellows in journalism. In a triumphant report on the Walkley Awards headed “Oz journalists dominant at prestigious Walkley Awards”, the Murdoch mouthpiece couldn’t bring itself to mention that Gold Award winner Adele Ferguson works for their rivals at Fairfax.
Having said that, it wasn’t quite as bad as The Advertiser’s print coverage of the SA Press Club Awards last month, in which only winners from the local Murdoch stable were mentioned.
Media Week is published on Fridays.
