Written By:
Anthony R0bins - Date published:
3:06 pm, May 22nd, 2015 - 27 comments
Categories: Media, tv -
Tags: campbell live, kill your tv, vanity posts
I was 4 when my family got its first TV – a kitset black & white, one of the earliest available in Christchurch at the time (mid 60s). It was like Magic. After a while it was 2 channels of magic. TV unified the country, we were watching and talking about the same things. Then it was in colour! Then three count them three channels! After that I sort of lost track (never had Sky, don’t do sports). With proliferation TV began to divide us instead of unite.
I haven’t owned a working TV for 20 years or so. The advertisements drive me nuts. For the last 5 or so I’ve been able to watch TV if I wanted to, via a Freeview USB dongle plugged in to my computer. With the passing of Campbell Live I’m not even going to need that any more.
Why would I? The amount of media available on the net is mind boggling. The quality of reporting and analysis I can find on the web is orders of magnitude better than NZ TV news. If I want live reporting I listen to RNZ, which is again much better than what is left on TV (with some honourable exceptions and a salute to Maori TV).
My kids are in their 20s. Their peer groups don’t watch TV, they think it’s crazy to be dictated to by someone else’s schedules, they laugh at the idea. I suspect that we’ve seen the last of the TV generations.
Anyway, so long TV. It was fun while it lasted.
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I suspect you’re right about the “TV Generations”. Who can imagine sitting around, now, with their closest friends, waiting in excited anticipation for the opening moments of Channel 3 – a two hour special of… wait for it… TV programs and news presented by Genevieve Westcott!
and when and in what generation did that ever happen Charles?
Top rating shows get something in the order of 12%, news is a bit lower and really falls off cliff towards end of week.
Even the hey days were only around 18-22% in the peak hour.
The little secret is most people havent been watching for a long time. Hosking and Campbell have been fighting over around 15% of the possible viewers.
“The little secret is most people havent been watching for a long time. Hosking and Campbell have been fighting over around 15% of the possible viewers.”
Perhaps Campbell will start a blog where he can reach a much wider audience.
Funny you should say that ” I’ve done with TV” this morning I put on the radio after years of getting my morning news fix from the tv3 then tv1 due to f%&$#+*g henry turning up .
My question is, is there somewhere a average Joe like me can go to get good balanced reporting in a visual format with out having to search all sorts off places.?
“If I want live reporting I listen to RNZ, which is again much better than what is left on TV.”
They got rid of Campbell Live and we could not stop them.
Then they will go for RNZ because it does cover the issues too. They will start with installing advertising, then reduce the funding after a decade of static funding. The likes of Katherine and Guyon and Kim will resign of their own “free will.”
Leaving the World to darkness and to thee, and the lone voice of The Standard..
Let’s stop funding TVNZ.
Or fund it much more – especially for public service content.
If, as Anthony suggests, multiple channels on TV divide us then I imagine the “mind boggling” amount of media on the internet utterly shatters us as a society.
It is not choice in media that we lack. What we lack is a ‘town square’. That is one thing neoliberalism will never – can never – provide. It is, by definition, something that cannot be privately provided.
Thatcher’s much-abhorred comment about society may well come to be seen as prescient (rather than definitional – which is how she meant it, of course).
I thought we all real, ready had The Gormless Fool formerly known as Oleolebiscuitbarrell. I mean it’s no longer a public broadcaster – just a wee cash cow for the government.
Well, not to much of one, or else National would just sell it – it can’t though – so back to the original point of this post – me thinks.
Lets start taxing the broadcast spectrum at something closer to its real value, and stop Joyce from giving sweetheart payment deals to his old company.
I’m not interested to subsidising TV3 or the rest of mediaworks.
Let’s break the back of the SKY monopoly shall we? I mean any ‘free marketeer’ couldn’t possibly object could they – given they claim to love competition in the spirit of true capitalism?.
Let’s also get them to refund what’s effectively been corporate welfare (TV 3 as well for that matter) – ‘loans’; cheap access to intellectual property paid for by Tex Paya (now that’s it’s been thrashed it’s time to ditch Heartland).
Let’s also ‘unbundle’ SKY shall we (especially since its operating as a monopoly) and allow ‘consumers’/customers/clients to subscribe to only those services they intend watching/consuming? Huh?
How about we also give everyone FTA access to sporting events that have in anyway received public funding (in any form).
Let’s stop funding Parliament.
I have said the following else where:
If John Campbell goes…
I will not only NOT watch ANYTHING again on TV3, I will also stop using any of the media works’ other outlets such as Radio Live too to show Media Works a lesson. Yes, I can live with that. Sure, my solitary action will not affect them much, but just imagine if 50% of their regular clients take the same action! Then it will be the crap biased useless management that will get the sack. That would be well deserved just desserts and sweet revenge. We are not beholden to those idiot managers there. They are to us!
The Media Works management seem like a crooked bunch of despicable RW arseholes.
Thank you John for the great meaningful worthwhile show you have produced for over ten years.
I hope John Campbell will soon get some other avenue to host a show. Fingers crossed.
r0b – I’m also one who remembers the advent of TV and the day one arrived in our house.
I can’t remember when I last sat down to watch tv in NZ.
Overseas – Australia for instance – it’s a far different story. Let’s actually fund TVNZ properly (as per ABC) and forbid the need to grovel for money from advertisers. Then we could have some decent programming such as is seen on ABC. Abbot in his ‘wisdom’, and with the vested interests of shutting down investigative news gathering at heart, is reducing funding of course -so how long the ABC can retain its standard who knows.
I have spent the beginning months of this year grandparenting full time in Perth. Let me say that ABC Kids is a life saver! The indigenous channel also has some powerful documentaries, as do the main news channels. Of course, you can get the nonsense of Murdoch if you so wish – but who in their right mind would chose to.
I wonder how much longer the Advertisers will stick with the TV channels ?
One would think that many would be asking where is the value for them ?
TV does seem to be a sunset industry .
I said to then Broadcasting Minister, Marrianne Hobbies, decades back that broadcasting was a mess, and she replied that she had just appointed Ian Fraser to sort it out. He lasted months and jumped ship. IMO Radio NZ is under pressure to ‘conform’ and it’s board is stacked with business types. Perhaps John Campbell, and team, should consider RNZ, MTV or move to his rightful position and take out Seven Sharp. Seriously this is no laughing matter. Thanks John and team, pity NZ couldn’t find a place for you.
Other than CL, I rarely watch TV. I download whatever I want to watch in my time when convenient to me. Much better 🙂
I used to watch a lot of TV, but with all the reality shows and teen or dark vigilante style so called superheros that have taken over I have grown tired of it. These days I watch only a few hours of TV a month. I have a cheap Android TV box I got off TradeMe that has allowed me to convert it to a smart TV so that I can play YouTube or other videos on it while I am busy doing something else on my computer.
Waiting on new TV show episodes to air here and avoiding spoilers about them online is also a big problem. A lot of the time I have to set my DVR to record them due to other commitments like work and other things conflicting with the time they chose to show them making TV watching a hassle as well.
Please tell me how to get good news/good journalism via the internet rather than supporting the current TV1, TV3, Prime and Sky! What url? What equipment if needed?
Campbell going is the final straw!
No equipment, no secrets. My best source internationally is of course The Guardian:
http://www.theguardian.com/international
For a real leftie take on the news I like:
http://www.truth-out.org/
I should check out this one more often than I do:
http://www.aljazeera.com/
But for both international and NZ news good stuff pops up here and there all the time. Follow lots of interesting people on Twitter and you’ll never be short of great reading, links and ideas flying round all the time.
http://www.democracynow.org
http://www.wearecitizenradio.com
Welcome to the club. I gave up the TV about 5 years ago and don’t know how we ever had time to watch it. I find I think for myself a lot more and am much more critical in my thinking when I read the news as opposed to simply watching like a mindless zombie.
To keep up with whats going on and get multiple view points I tend to read stuff, the herald, the standard and I generally have look at whaleoil (it does help to know what the punters over there think in my view and I do feel compelled to give them a different point of view to help broaden their horizons). With those four I feel I keep fairly well up to date on whats happening here in NZ.
What gives with Hilary cry baby tears, read the auto cue girl impartially, I don’t think a journalist giving up one 6 figure job albeit a new role in an organisation to move to a new employer no doubt in the future for a salary many times the average wage warrants a flood of tears, possibly Syria, boat people, JC leaving, I don’t think so, left hysteria in overdrive again
[deleted], it’s time for your meds! You said exactly the same thing yesterday on that old private forum, Facebook.
[lprent: If you want to out someone, then this is a VERY BAD PLACE to do it. I ban people for it, often permanently.
If they have outed themselves, then you have to point out something to the moderators where they outed themselves first. Not some fool speculating about them.
This is your warning – read the about and the policy. ]
your right there just no need for TV any more in fact i cant see why we should pay for likes of hoskins
media is just so easy access and get case in point media works .tvnz going to court to try and stop global mode.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/68120449/global-mode-case-will-be-complex
these dinosaurs never learned anything from napster you cant fight technology.
media at its fundamental level is distribution business and the dinosaurs were the gate keepers that is no longer the case and hasn’t been for a long time .https://popcorntime.io/ is good example of disruptive technology open source community run.
An excellent short article. I’m very much of the same mind Anthony. We have a 40 inch LCD and the only one who watches it is our daughter with her Mickey mouse DVD’s. Its not connected to any television service. The only time I do see TV is at our holiday getaway which we rent out when we are not using it to holiday goers. Hence we feel obliged to offer Freeview.
That said I still rarely turn it on. Its such utter excrement. I usually sit in winter by the log fire and read a good book or go for a walk on the beach in summer. As to news, there are far superior choices to the right leaning garbage dished up on so called public service and commercial news services in this country. With the departure of John Campbell I suspect there is little, if anything left, for those who hope for honest, impartial journalism.
I spend my time on my laptop on this site, No Right Turn, Daily Koz and RT News. I see no point in reading or listening to lies and half truths so the garbage peddlers get ignored and always will. RIP TV indeed.
http://www.theonion.com/article/area-man-constantly-mentioning-he-doesnt-own-a-tel-429