You just have to browse the Facebook comments sections to get a sense of what many Kiwis think of the crisis engulfing Three and TVNZ, where hundreds of journalists are set to lose their jobs. The reactions fall into a few categories: “I don’t watch TV news anyway”, “go woke, go broke”, “the media lied to us during the pandemic”, “I get my news online anyway” and “Don’t axe Fair Go!”
I’m a news junkie so I still sit down to watch the 6pm bulletin, flicking between 1News and Newshub. Those flagship news shows still attract audiences of hundreds of thousands of people.
But there’s clearly a growing cohort who may only ever see a 1News report as a clip on YouTube or X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. That sees them straddle the “I get my news online anyway” category too. There are, and will continue to be, numerous local and international news outlets serving current affairs coverage online, freely available and behind paywalls.
But there’s limited appetite for paying for a news subscription and Google and Meta control about 90% of the digital advertising market. So there will probably be more media-industry casualties. Long-form video news journalism may largely disappear; fewer experienced journalists will be around to break stories.
People may be consuming digital content in shorter formats on social media. But a news story still requires the same amount of leg work to get right. With so many streaming options, games platforms and social media networks vying for our attention, the reality is news media will increasingly be at the periphery of many people’s lives.
But the public will still benefit from the news media’s efforts to shine light on the postcode-lottery in the health sector, or to expose the ties between politicians and big business. Most people will grudgingly admit that the news media is worth saving even if they’re disengaged from most of it. The question is how to save the media without putting a large burden on the taxpayer.
I believe the days of TVNZ as a public broadcaster are numbered. It should be sold off and the proceeds used to turn RNZ into a true multimedia platform, a stripped-back version of Australia’s ABC. The sun is also setting on digital terrestrial transmission. Within a decade, those radio and TV towers will be switched off as we move completely to internet-based streaming. That will save the industry money on transmission fees.
But it won’t be enough, which is why tapping tech giants that pay little tax here and invest next to nothing in local content is the obvious solution, and the one most countries are pursuing. Australia’s media bargaining code has been a successful effort, yielding hundreds of millions of dollars for publishers. But Meta has opted to pull news from its Facebook platform in Australia to try to avoid paying.
A cleaner approach is the “Netflix levy” that most European countries are considering as negotiations over a fairer international tax regime for multinationals drag on.
A small levy (2-3%) on the New Zealand revenues of streaming providers and the digital advertising giants would yield a decent pool of funding that a body like NZ on Air could dish out to content producers, including news outlets, on a contestable basis.
We give the likes of Netflix, Apple, Google, Amazon and Microsoft our attention and subscription dollars. But it’s time for a more meaningful relationship, one that sees them support the industry they’ve helped hollow out. It’s likely the difference between sinking and swimming for the news media.
