Business of Media
Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp go down in major outage
Facebook Inc’s platforms and apps, including WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook, have abruptly gone offline, disrupting user access and communication in many countries for an extended period, reports News Corp’s Talal Ansari and Robert McMillan.
“We’re aware that some people are having trouble accessing our apps and products,” Facebook wrote in a message posted on Twitter. “We’re working to get things back to normal as quickly as possible, and we apologize for any inconvenience.”
Facebook wasn’t immediately available to comment on the reason for the outage. The problems appeared to be linked to a change the company made to networking instructions for how the world accesses its systems, according to outside experts.
Former boss of NSW Jewish Board of Deputies named to SBS board
Vic Alhadeff, a former NSW Jewish Board of Deputies chief executive, has been handpicked by Communications Minister Paul Fletcher to join the SBS board as a non-executive director, reports AFR‘s Miranda Ward.
Alhadeff said he was “deeply honoured to have been appointed to the SBS board”.
“SBS plays a vital role in fostering understanding and appreciation of diversity in Australia,” Mr Alhadeff said. “Its ethos accords precisely with my own, as I have dedicated my career to building a more resilient, respectful and inclusive society.
“I am delighted to have the opportunity to work alongside the SBS board and executive to advance the organisation’s mission.”
Kayo, Binge kick goals as Foxtel cash streams
Foxtel boss Patrick Delany says the company’s successful streaming services — namely Kayo Sports and entertainment platform Binge — are more than offsetting any losses incurred by other parts of the business, reports News Corp’s James Madden.
“Any revenue we are losing on the traditional pay TV side is being more than backfilled from the streaming side,” Delany told Sky News Australia on Sunday.
“We’ve done a pretty good job at creating new value.”
On Sunday, Delany said Foxtel’s growth had led to a culture of fearlessness, as the harnessing of the latest technologies — its recently released iQ5 set-top box does not require any cabling or satellites — had made its product available to a wider cross-section of the Australian community than was previously possible.
Carlos Watson says Ozy Media won’t shut down after all: “We are open for business”
Ozy Media isn’t shutting down after all, reports The Hollywood Reporter‘s Alex Weprin.
Just a few days after saying that Ozy would wind down its operations, CEO Carlos Watson went on NBC’s Today show Monday morning and said that he and the company’s board had a change of heart.
“We are going to open for business, so we are making news today,” Watson told NBC’s Craig Melvin. “This is our Lazarus moment, if you will [a reference to the biblical figure who Jesus brought back to life a few days after his death].”
Watson said that they made the decision after speaking with Ozy advertisers and the company’s investors.
Is Google Showcase paying Australian publishers more than global counterparts?
UK media industry publication Press Gazette has been examining Google Showcase and the size of the contracts it has signed with Australian publishers.
Over the past 12 months, Google has offered three-year Google Showcase contracts to hundreds of publishers across 16 countries. Most have accepted their payments, while a minority are holding out for more, reports William Turvill.
When asking why there is little detail about the contracts available, Turvill writes that in part because of strict confidentiality clauses that come attached with Google’s offers, little is known about News Showcase.
He continues:
How much are publishers being paid? Why is Google paying for content that it previously indexed for free? Does anybody actually use Showcase to read the news?
[There is] evidence that publishers in Australia, where political pressure is highest, are receiving more favourable offers than news companies in larger countries.
In April 2020, Australia’s treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, announced to the world that his government would be introducing legislation to force Google and Facebook to pay for news content.
The announcement came two-and-a-half years after the Australian government had first ordered the nation’s competition watchdog to launch an investigation into the effect digital platforms were having on journalism.
in February this year, as legislation became an inevitability, Google announced the imminent launch of News Showcase in Australia.
In short order, the tech giant agreed a series of eight-figure Showcase deals with the nation’s largest and most influential publishers – News Corp, Seven West, Nine and ABC.
These agreements meant that Google could avoid being forced into an arbitration process with the publishers once the law was passed.
According to Australian news reports, and industry sources spoken to by Press Gazette, Seven West and Nine are both thought to have signed annual deals with Google worth AU$30m. ABC, Australia’s publicly-owned broadcaster, is reported to have agreed a deal worth AU$25m per year.
The size of News Corp’s deal – incorporating its titles across the US, UK and Australia – has not been reported. But the market rumour, and the working assumption of two rival international publishers spoken to by Press Gazette, is that News Corp’s Google deal is worth around $50m annually.
According to market sources, Guardian Australia signed up to News Showcase after being offered around AU$5m a year by Google. According to one well-informed source, the Daily Mail Australia is understood to have rejected an offer worth about a third of this amount.
Press Gazette’s investigation suggests publishers in Australia are being offered better deals than their peers elsewhere.
One well-informed source estimated that Google’s budget for Australian deals is three times greater than its equivalent budget for the UK news industry. This is despite the fact that the UK economy is twice the size of the Australian economy. The source suggested Google may be willing to pay more money to Australian publishers because of pressure from Canberra.
News Brands
ABC jobs to go amid fallout from false claims aired in the Juanita Nielsen series
The serious editorial failings of the ABC’s recent TV crime and podcast series about the 1975 disappearance of journalist Juanita Nielsen are likely to result in job losses at the national broadcaster, reports News Corp’s Sophie Elsworth.
Sources have told The Australian there have been discussions at management and board level as to who is ultimately responsible for allowing questionable material in the two-part miniseries, Juanita: A Family Mystery, to go to air.
Both TV episodes, which aired in September, were subsequently removed from the ABC’s online streaming platform iview after new information emerged that discredited some of the bombshell claims made in the series.
The Australian understands senior figures within the ABC are aghast at the latest failure of the organisation’s editorial checks and balances – especially as the errors have been exposed so soon after the taxpayer-funded broadcaster was embarrassed by the critical assessment of another of its true-crime investigations, into a fire that killed seven people at Sydney’s Luna Park in 1979.
Publishing
Independent regional group expands with ag monthly and new editions
Australian independent publisher the Today News Group has announced a new agricultural publication and a second weekly edition for its CQ Today, based in Rockhampton, reports GXpress.
Monthly free newspaper Queensland Farmer Today will have two editions, with the first – for southern Queensland – launching on October 28. A Central Queensland and Wide Bay edition is planned for next year.
The group is also planning to expand its CQ Today masthead – launched as a weekly following News Corp Australia’s closure of the Rockhampton Morning Bulletin’s print edition – with a second edition.
Today News Group claims to have grown to be the largest independent newspaper publisher in Queensland, following the successful restart of local independent newspapers in markets, in many of which News Corp stopped printing in 2020. They include Rockhampton, Gladstone, Bundaberg, Gympie, Burnett, Noosa, Ipswich, Warwick and Stanthorpe, all in Queensland.
Radio
James Valentine set to cash in on ABC overhaul
The shock departures of Wendy Harmer and Robbie Buck from the plum ABC Radio Sydney breakfast came just weeks after they finished second only to Ben Fordham in the Sydney ratings, after recording their highest-ever share of 14 per cent, writes News Corp’s Nick Tabakofff.
Diary’s first juicy piece of intel is quirky ABC afternoons host James Valentine is a warm favourite to take over the plum gig.
Our mail is even before last week, Valentine had already held talks with senior ABC radio executives, and is willing to brave 3.30am wake-up calls to make the switch if the job is offered. Diary is told the ABC’s thinking is Valentine would bring a “Clive Robertson-like” vibe back to Sydney breakfast radio.
Others in the mix include respected ABC radio fill-in host Josh Szeps and weekend breakfast host Simon Marnie. Meanwhile, ex-Q+A host Hamish Macdonald would have been in the mix but for his much-trumpeted defection to 10’s The Project.
Another big revelation is the departure of Harmer and Buck will be the trigger for a major overhaul of how ABC Radio in Sydney will sound in 2022.
Previously, Harmer and Buck stewarded ABC Radio Sydney through most of the morning, from 6am to 10am. But Diary has learnt the station is planning to split the slot into dedicated breakfast and morning programming.
Podcasts
Spotify’s fresh host signings are all about the ‘X-factor’
Spotify, having proved a master in the music recommendation game, is giving it everything to try to win the next generation of podcast hosts and listeners as it looks set to surpass Apple in the podcast battle for the first time, reports AFR‘s Natasha Gillezeau.
The streaming giant is doubling down on the under-30 market, trying to lure new listeners in but also move their music listeners around the Spotify ecosystem and make podcasts feel more accessible and less elitist to this age group.
Locally, the company poached its new ANZ head of studios Ben Watts from Apple in February, handing him, and the rest of the Australian management team, a high degree of trust to make decisions that will land with Australian listeners without every step needing a rubber stamp.
As part of the focus on the under 30s, Spotify has signed the likes of NSW south coast-based social media entertainers The Inspired Unemployed (Jack Steele and Matt Ford), Sydney-based entrepreneur and content creator Flex Mami (Lillian Ahenkan), South Australia-based social media stars the Fairbairn brothers (Lachlan and Jaxon Fairbairn), and Melbourne-based comedian Em Rusciano to make podcasts with a local flavour for the Stockholm-headquartered app.
Television
“See it First on Paramount+”
10 ViacomCBS is adopting a ‘See it First” strategy for its suite of CBS procedurals for Paramount+.
All Shows (except CSI: Vegas) will premiere and roll out day / date with the USA. Paramount+ will be the only place to see them same day as the USA, reports TV Tonight.
This includes the NCIS franchise, the FBI franchise, Bull, Evil, Seal Team, Nancy Drew, The Neighbourhood, Blue Bloods, A Million Little Things (and more to come).
But Network 10 will still fast track CBS favourites into the schedule as quickly as possible.
Australian Survivor will head to Charters Towers, North Queensland, in a $29m filming coup
Juggernaut reality series Australian Survivor will film in Charters Towers in a $29 million return to Queensland, reports News Corp’s Amy Price.
After filming in Cloncurry earlier this year, Endemol Shine Australia has shifted production on season seven to the North Queensland town, inland from Townsville, following a $3.9 million cash injection from the Federal Government’s Location Incentive.
Production on the series moved to Australia this year from its usual locations in Fiji or Samoa due to the global pandemic as well as government funding incentives.
Arts Minister Paul Fletcher said filming on season seven would inject more than $29 million into regional Australia and employ 250 crew members.
“Australia’s amazing landscapes are once again being showcased to the world on Australian Survivor, stimulating tourism in Charters Towers and creating work for around 250 local businesses,” he said.
Sport Media
NRL seals $100m broadcast deal with Foxtel for expansion in Brisbane
The NRL has agreed to terms with Foxtel on a new broadcast deal for a 17-team competition in a move poised to deliver an NRL expansion windfall of up to $100 million, reports News Corp’s Peter Badel and Brent Read.
In a landmark development for the code, the NRL’s Pay-TV partner has thrown its support behind a second Brisbane team with a mega deal that will bankroll rugby league’s most significant expansionary move in 14 years.
As revealed by News Corp last week, the NRL is inching towards expansion with the ARL Commission tipped to announce Queensland’s fourth club by the end of October.
Now ARL Commission boss Peter V’landys will attend a meeting with the 16 NRL clubs on Thursday armed with a beefed-up broadcasting deal from Foxtel worth between $17-20 million annually.
Applying the figure across the sport’s traditional five-year broadcast cycle, a new 17th franchise will be worth between $85-100 million to the NRL in a deal that will guarantee the existing 16 clubs are financial winners from expansion.
News Corp strikes $75m deal with NRL to prop up 2023 Redcliffe expansion
The NRL is expected to propose the Redcliffe Dolphins as the expansion team for 2023 after striking a deal with News Corp to inject an extra $75m into the sport over five years, reports SMH’s Michael Chammas.
Sources with knowledge of discussions told the Herald that as part of the deal, the NRL has pledged to reduce the number of free-to-air games involving the News Corp-owned Brisbane Broncos by up to 25 per cent.
The deal with News Corp, which is worth $13m-$15m a season, came as a shock to Nine Entertainment Co, publisher of this masthead, when it was recently told of the arrangement.
The deal has caused some angst among Nine powerbrokers as they head to the negotiation table in the coming weeks to resume what are already proving to be delicate discussions for the free-to-air rights beyond 2022.
‘Don’t ask me if I’ll retire’ Ray Warren to The Daily Telegraph
Hall-of-fame commentator Ray Warren [has called] his 45th grand final but he has no idea if it’ll be his last, reports News Corp’s Phil Rothfield.
The 78-year-old legend is happy to chat about his six-decade career, as long as we don’t ask the obvious question: “Is this your last GF?”
“Don’t ask me if I’ll retire,” Warren said. “I don’t want to talk about it.
“Put it this way, I’m not going into the game as though it’s my last.”
These days he’s calling off TV screens inside Channel 9 studios because of Covid, a far cry from his old fold-up seat at a sideline card table, the umbrella and binoculars when it all started more than 50 years ago on radio.
Sterlo reflects before calling his final game of rugby league for Nine
Peter Sterling still can’t quite believe that, after 30 years, he will call time on his media career on his own terms, reports The Sydney Morning Herald’s Adrian Proszenko.
Sunday’s grand final marks Sterling’s last game as a commentator, with the former Parramatta halfback poised to call time on an illustrious career that has spanned 45 years as a top-flight player and analyst. He will farewell not only the game but a career working alongside close friends including Paul Vautin and Ray Warren.
Many expected Sterling to turn his hand to coaching and he admits there are times when he wonders how he would have fared with the clipboard. He says he “came very close” to taking up a head-coaching role, on two separate occasions.
Retirement doesn’t sit well with everybody, but Sterling has no concerns.
“It’s clichéd, but it’s to spend more time with my family,” he said. “It’s to travel as much as possible, I’ll play as much golf as I can. People ask if I’m concerned about retirement and boredom; I don’t get bored, I like my own company. I’m an avid reader, there’s a whole lot of things I’m looking forward to doing that are difficult in the job.”