MEDIAWATCH- NZME job cuts just latest wave of media job losses

Look.

I predicted the collapse of Today Fm.

I predicted the collapse of Newshub.

And I host the Gold Award Winning Political Podcast ‘The Working Group‘, so what the fuck would I know about the new media industry, but the NZME cuts are but the beginning of the next wave of cuts that will gut the media industry again this year…

High-profile journalists to go as NZME announces 30 job cuts

A number of high profile senior reporters will leave the New Zealand Herald under its restructure to cut about 30 roles from the newspaper’s editorial team.

According to the Herald’s Media Insider, staff that have taken voluntary redundancy include political editor Claire Trevett, deputy business editor Grant Bradley, senior sports reporter Chris Rattue, specialist science reporter Jamie Morton, investigative journalist Nicholas Jones, long-time reporter Kirsty Wynn and social media head Mitch Powell.

RNZ understands other senior journalists also applied for voluntary redundancy under the proposal by the Herald’s owner NZME, which was announced in January and originally aimed to axe 38 jobs.

A source said some of those who had applied for voluntary redundancy had been denied.

…before I start I just want to acknowledge losing Claire Trevett, she is a political journalist who always deserved more coverage, I didn’t agree with a lot of what she wrote, but I respected her opinion.

The 30 job losses at NZME are just the beginning.

What we are seeing now is full fledged panic amongst the legacy media. They are still paying for capital like satellite dishes, printers and transmission towers while new media are all online paying none of that capital cost.

Look at how bad the economy truly is right now…

Spark’s profits tumble as the company blames the recession

Spark’s half-year profit has fallen by more than three-quarters, with the company blaming the country’s deep recession for its tough result.

Key numbers for the six months ended December compared with a year ago:

• • Net profit after tax $35m vs $157m
  • Revenue $1.94b vs $1.98b
  • Underlying profit excluding one-offs $448m vs $530m
  • Interim dividend 12.5 cents per share v 13.5 cps

Spark chair Justine Smyth referred to its October market update, saying the company was experiencing “one of the longest and deepest recessionary periods in recent history”.

“Since that time, we have seen no improvement in these conditions, and while there has been movement on monetary policy, this is yet to flow through to any meaningful change in consumer or business spending,” Smyth said.

…legacy media are in danger.

The strategy inside legacy media now as they slowly die is to move everything online while gutting talent, content AND tech staff because they have been sold AI programs that can automate much of the editing and content creation as a solution to costs.

AI programs can streamline content creation editing through to social media networks where the only focus now is on video because that can still be monetised using existing legacy media advertising contacts.

That means we can expect at least another 30% of staff to go in the media market before the end of the year.

These ‘solutions’ are kept under wraps until the tech has been bought, put in place and then tested.

Once they have these new content creation to social media streaming work streams in place, huge redundancies will follow mid year.

This is a desperate legacy media now on its last legs and the actual news content created will become meaningless bullshit.

As the Chinese Navy do live fire tests in the Tasman Sea, this is what Stuff thought mattered…

…Paddy Gower jumping into the water and not trying to drown really does sum up the legacy industry right now.

 

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