Author: Gavin Ellis
Gavin Ellis is a media consultant, commentator and researcher. He holds a doctorate in political studies. A former editor-in-chief of the New Zealand Herald, he is the author of Trust Ownership and the Future of News: Media Moguls and White Knights (London, Palgrave) and Complacent Nation (Wellington, BWB Texts). His consultancy clients include media organisations and government ministries. His Tuesday Commentary on media matters appears weekly on his site www.whiteknightnews.com
NZ journalists as ‘useful idiots’?
A significant fact about the 2.4 million names on the Zhenhua database of foreign individuals is that few of them are people with deep links to China or interest in the Communist state.
The men behind the revelation about the database, Professor Christopher Balding and Robert Potter (co-founder of Canberra security firm Internet 2.0), say this points to the likelihood that the Overseas Key Information Data Base (OKIDB) is only one of a number of linked databases.
If there is a separate set of records for China’s close associates, is there another for journalists?
Continue reading “NZ journalists as ‘useful idiots’?”We could all do with a laugh
Last week I suffered a rare bout of depression. I was pursued by the Black Dog due to a situation over which I had no control. It wasn’t the Coronavirus pandemic but that didn’t help. Nor did the news media.
I negotiated my way out of the darkness with the help of my wife, my brother and a good friend. I realised most of the stresses in my life – like editing a newspaper – had been matters over which I could exercise a measure of control and my black mood was caused not by the current situation but the fact that I couldn’t fix it.
The depression lifted with the realisation that I had to rely on others to resolve the issue.
Continue reading “We could all do with a laugh”A better foreign owner for TV3 in an uncertain future
It was an open secret that MediaWorks was negotiating to sell its television arm to Discovery. Now that sale has been confirmed. Yes, it’s substituting one foreign owner for another but TV3 will be better off as a result of the sale.
The US-based Discovery group has an established record not only in subscription TV but also in linear broadcast. It is the owner of free-to-air channels across Europe including Norway, Sweden, Italy, Poland, Germany and the UK. Its digital portfolio includes Discovery Channel, HGTV, Food Network, TLC, Investigation Discovery, Travel Channel, Turbo/Velocity, Animal Planet, Science Channel, Oprah Winfrey Network in the United States, Discovery Kids in Latin America, and Eurosport, which carries the Olympic Games across Europe. Last year it signed a partnership deal with the BBC.
Continue reading “A better foreign owner for TV3 in an uncertain future”