Latest / Best of Business / Duncan Grieve: Spinoff founder expects more industry cuts to come following NZME restructure

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Duncan Grieve: Spinoff founder expects more industry cuts to come following NZME restructure · Best of Business

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talk st B.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Follow this and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: It's a heavy old day at this company. Almost forty
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: rolls are set to be cut at The Herald's business
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  Speaker 2: desk and News Talk SETB.
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  Speaker 3: Now.
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  Speaker 2: All these three brands are owned by New Zealand Media
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  Speaker 2: and Entertainment, commonly known as nz ME. We are restructuring
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  Speaker 2: our newsroom operation. The editor of The Herald has said
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  Speaker 2: in the press that the annual print advertising has fallen
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  Speaker 2: by ten million dollars between twenty twenty two and twenty
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  Speaker 2: twenty four. Digital advertising was also down the same period,
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  Speaker 2: but not to the same extent. But when you don't
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  Speaker 2: have ten million dollars worth of income, you can't employ
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  Speaker 2: all the people you used to be able to employ.
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  Speaker 2: We asked Murray if you'd talk with us. He would not.
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  Speaker 2: We also ask anybody from NZB to talk with us.
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  Speaker 2: They would not. So today we're going to talk to
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  Speaker 2: Duncan Grieve, who has been with the spinoff, and at
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  Speaker 2: the spinoff he hosts the Fold Media Bugs. Hello Duncan.
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  Speaker 3: Andrew.
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  Speaker 2: So it finally hit in zen ME because it's already
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  Speaker 2: hit TV and Zaid news Hub and basically the rest
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  Speaker 2: of the industry including you.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's correct. I mean it's not like this is
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  Speaker 3: the first times been hit, but it's probably the hardest
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  Speaker 3: that's been hurt.
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  Speaker 2: So some people say it's because of politics, but of
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  Speaker 2: course we kind of know if you're in the industry,
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  Speaker 2: that's just bolded at. I actually had a cup of
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  Speaker 2: coffee with Murray Kirkness over in a cafe and he said,
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  Speaker 2: what people don't understand is that this is an industry
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  Speaker 2: wide problem. It's an industry wide problem in New Zealand,
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  Speaker 2: and in fact, it's an industry wide problem right around
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  Speaker 2: the world. Is he right, Yeah, he's absolutely right.
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  Speaker 3: Like if you if you paid too much attention to
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  Speaker 3: the media, as I have the misfortune of doing this.
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  Speaker 3: This is a weekly you know, all all over the
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  Speaker 3: world you see like massive job cuts, but you also
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  Speaker 3: see you know, as we did last year with news
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  Speaker 3: have you see brands just disappearing completely. So you know,
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  Speaker 3: in New Zealand, unlike a lot of the other sort
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  Speaker 3: of anglosphere countries, you know, it's its economy is going
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  Speaker 3: backwards there, you know, the media and other countries is
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  Speaker 3: going backwards, even though their economies are going forward, so
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  Speaker 3: in some you know, bleak respects, it's surprising to me
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  Speaker 3: that there's not more, you know, more and deeper cuts.
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  Speaker 3: And you know, it wouldn't shock me if this was
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  Speaker 3: just setting off another year of that, and and it
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  Speaker 3: might not be anything like the biggest we're going to see.
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  Speaker 2: Is it because the public have lost trust in the media.
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  Speaker 2: I don't.
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  Speaker 3: I wouldn't want to completely discount that, but I think
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  Speaker 3: that it's the public has never completely trusted the media.
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  Speaker 3: Let's be honest, And you know, pains to say that.
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  Speaker 3: What matters is whether you trust the media as a whole,
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  Speaker 3: as an institution. It matters whether you trust the media
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  Speaker 3: you consume just the same as you know, you might
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  Speaker 3: not trust one lot of politicians, but as long as
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  Speaker 3: you trust your local electorate MP, you're okay. I think
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  Speaker 3: the much bigger problem is that we've got it. We've
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  Speaker 3: just got a sort of a structural issue with the
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  Speaker 3: sort of financial underpinnings of the media. It was previously
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  Speaker 3: wholly and relatively well funded by advertising. Now it's increasingly
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  Speaker 3: audiences which have to pay, and it's just taking a
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  Speaker 3: while for people to realize that. And the longer it takes,
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  Speaker 3: the smaller it gets, and.
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  Speaker 2: That means we don't have journalists. And the question will be,
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  Speaker 2: because there has been just the most remarkable year, do
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  Speaker 2: we have enough journalists left in the country to properly
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  Speaker 2: report the news? Because you know, these social citizen journalists
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  Speaker 2: who are on social media, they believe they can report
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  Speaker 2: the news, but many of them are actually finding the
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  Speaker 2: news from a real journalist who works in legacy media
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  Speaker 2: and then forwarding their spin on it.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, I mean, that's that's a perfect encapsulation
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  Speaker 3: of it. I think that people when people say they
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  Speaker 3: get their news from TikTok or Facebook or Instagram, most
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  Speaker 3: commonly what they're talking about is someone who will recap
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  Speaker 3: particular elements of the news, whether it's in a vertical
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  Speaker 3: video or a two hundred and eighty character format. But
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  Speaker 3: those people aren't almost never doing their doing original reporting.
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  Speaker 3: They're just simply reading original reporting from somewhere else and
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  Speaker 3: broadcasting it to their audience. So, you know, your fundamental
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  Speaker 3: problem remains. You know, the work of journalism is hard
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  Speaker 3: and expensive and not always popular, but they're the mechanism
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  Speaker 3: to fund its production just just isn't there anymore? And
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  Speaker 3: that's why you know that the feed digital news Bargaining
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  Speaker 3: Bill has been such a contentious issue lately. But the
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  Speaker 3: idea that social media can replace what you know, journalists
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  Speaker 3: and as a does as a as a function for
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  Speaker 3: society and democracy, as fastical and doesn't stand up to
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  Speaker 3: even the most basic scrudinary.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, so what have we got for a business model?
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  Speaker 2: Michael bogs Boggsy as we call them, our CEO, says
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  Speaker 2: video is the fast growing area where zi me could
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  Speaker 2: grow its audience.
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  Speaker 3: Now, to be.
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  Speaker 2: Fair, none of us know what he's talking about, do you.
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  Speaker 3: I mean I do to an extent, there's sort of
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  Speaker 3: you know, there's there's two key revenue trends for journalism,
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  Speaker 3: right like there's there's audiences, and there's advertisers. Advertisers and
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  Speaker 3: particularly the media agencies that represent them, really love video advertising.
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  Speaker 3: It's a close cousin to TV advertising, which used to
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  Speaker 3: be you know, the biggest noise in media is from
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  Speaker 3: a funding perspective, So everyone people still want to buy that.
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  Speaker 3: So if you can create inventory, then plausibly you know
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  Speaker 3: that that's a that's a great business. The thing is,
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  Speaker 3: I think when someone goes to the Herald site or
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  Speaker 3: goes to the news b site. They want to consume
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  Speaker 3: a particular form. Maybe it's audio, maybe it's text. The
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  Speaker 3: video is for the most part autoplays. It's a bit
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  Speaker 3: of an annoyance where the Herald, I think, potentially have
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  Speaker 3: a point and a play is on YouTube, which is
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  Speaker 3: rapidly becoming the biggest thing in advertising anywhere, and the
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  Speaker 3: Herald's actually had some real success with putting video, whether
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  Speaker 3: it's short documentaries or just news breaking news packages on
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  Speaker 3: there and that has a fifty five to forty five
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  Speaker 3: revenue share. Yeah, okay, so there is a case there.
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  Speaker 3: It's not proven, but it's plausible.
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely, it's plausible. But at the same time, I know,
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  Speaker 2: being in the industry, we were told the podcasts with
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  Speaker 2: the futures, but we still haven't quite figured out how
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  Speaker 2: to monetize podcasts. But if we could, because we do
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  Speaker 2: such great podcasts, we wouldn't have the problems that we've
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  Speaker 2: got at the moment. Anyway, Can I just ask you, finally,
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  Speaker 2: how are you going at the spin off? Because when
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  Speaker 2: you hit these walls of adveratis as in drying up,
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  Speaker 2: you went to get more paying subscribers. Do that bear fruit.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, well we're sort of you know, as Shane reported
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  Speaker 3: on last year, we hit a bit of a wall
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  Speaker 3: in November of last year and we wrote an open
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: letter which which kind of laid out to our audience
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  Speaker 3: what was going on and what we needed them to do.
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  Speaker 3: And we're by no means out of the woods, but
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  Speaker 3: we've been really really heartened by their response. And I
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  Speaker 3: do think there's something in saying to your audience, this
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  Speaker 3: is how it has to be and letting them decide
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  Speaker 3: ultimately the scale of your organization. So you know, if
• 7:51
  Speaker 3: you're listening to this and you enjoy the Herald but
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: you're not a subscriber, I would strongly suggest that if
• 7:56
  Speaker 3: you want it to be around and you want it
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  Speaker 3: to continue to provide the function that does for you
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  Speaker 3: in your life, that you don't just look at the
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: free version that you that you pick up A paid's
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  Speaker 3: up to.
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  Speaker 2: All right, And I think you for your time down
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: can grieve
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: Or from news talk set b listen live on air
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: or online, and keep our shows with you wherever you
• 8:13
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