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Speaker 1: It's a heavy old day at this company. Almost forty

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Speaker 1: rolls are set to be cut at The Herald's business

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Speaker 1: desk and news TALKZBB. Now all these three brands are

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Speaker 1: owned by New Zealand Media and Entertainment, commonly known as

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Speaker 1: ennzed ME. We are restructuring our newsroom operation. The editor

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Speaker 1: of The Herald has said in the press that the

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Speaker 1: annual print advertising has fallen by ten million dollars between

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty two and twenty twenty four. Digital advertising was

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Speaker 1: also down the same period, but not to the same extent.

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Speaker 1: But when you don't have ten million dollars worth of income,

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Speaker 1: you can't employ all the people you used to be

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Speaker 1: able to employ. We asked Murray if you'd talk with us.

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Speaker 1: He would not. We also ask anybody from nz ME

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Speaker 1: to talk with us. They would not. So today we're

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Speaker 1: going to talk to Duncan Grieve, who has been with

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Speaker 1: the spinoff and I at the spinoff. He hosts the

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Speaker 1: Fold Media Bud Gass.

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Speaker 2: Hello Duncan Today, Andrew.

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Speaker 1: So it finally hit nzb ME because it's already hit

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Speaker 1: TV and z news Hub and basically the rest of

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Speaker 1: the industry including you.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's correct. I mean, it's not like this is

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Speaker 2: the first time means me has been hit, but it's

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Speaker 2: probably the hardest that's been hit.

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Speaker 1: So some people say it's because of politics, but of

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Speaker 1: course we kind of know if you're in the industry,

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Speaker 1: that's just bolded at. I actually had a cup of

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Speaker 1: coffee with Murray kirkness over in a cafe and he see,

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Speaker 1: what people don't understand is that this is an industry

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Speaker 1: wide problem. It's an industry wide problem in New Zealand

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Speaker 1: and in fact it's an industry wide problem right around

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Speaker 1: the world. Is he right, Yeah, he's absolutely right.

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Speaker 2: Like if you if you paid too much attention to

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Speaker 2: the media, as I have the misfortune of doing this.

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Speaker 2: This is a weekly you know, all all over the

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Speaker 2: world you see like massive job cuts, but you also say,

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Speaker 2: you know, as we did last year with news, have

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Speaker 2: you see brands just disappearing completely? So you know in

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Speaker 2: New Zealand and unlike a lot of the other sort

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Speaker 2: of anglosphere countries, you know, it's it's economy is going

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Speaker 2: backwards there, you know, the media and other countries is

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Speaker 2: going backwards even though their economies are going forward. So

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Speaker 2: in some you know, bleak respects it's surprising to me

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Speaker 2: that there's not more, you know, more and deeper cuts.

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Speaker 2: And you know, it wouldn't shock me if this was

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Speaker 2: just setting off another year of that, and and it

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Speaker 2: might not be anything like the biggest we're going to see.

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Speaker 1: Is it because the public have lost trust in the media.

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Speaker 2: I don't. I wouldn't want to completely discount that, but

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Speaker 2: I think that it's the public has never completely trusted

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Speaker 2: the media. Let's be honest, And you know, some pains

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Speaker 2: to say that. What matters less is whether you trust

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Speaker 2: the media as a whole as an institution. It metters

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Speaker 2: whether you trust the media you consume just the same

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Speaker 2: as you know, you might not trust one lot of politicians,

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Speaker 2: but as long as you trust your local electorate MP,

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Speaker 2: you're okay. I think the much bigger problem is that

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Speaker 2: we've got it. We've just got a sort of a

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Speaker 2: structural issue with the sort of financial underpinnings of the media.

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Speaker 2: It was previously wholly and relatively well funded by advertising.

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Speaker 2: Now it's increasingly audiences which have to pay, and it's

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Speaker 2: just taking a while for people to realize that. And

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Speaker 2: the longer it takes, the smaller it gets.

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Speaker 1: And that means we don't have journalists, And the question

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Speaker 1: will be, because there has been just the most remarkable year,

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Speaker 1: do we have enough journalists left in the country to

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Speaker 1: properly report the news? Because you know, these social citizen

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Speaker 1: journalists who are on social media, they believe they can

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Speaker 1: report the news, but many of them are actually finding

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Speaker 1: the news from a real journalist who works in legacy

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Speaker 1: media and then forwarding their spin on it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think, I mean, that's a perfect encapsulation of it.

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Speaker 2: I think that people when people say they get their

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Speaker 2: news from TikTok or Facebook or Instagram, most commonly what

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Speaker 2: they're talking about is someone who will recap particular elements

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Speaker 2: of the news, whether it's in a vertical video or

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Speaker 2: a two hundred and eighty character format. But those people

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Speaker 2: aren't almost never doing their doing original reporting. They're just

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Speaker 2: simply reading original reporting from somewhere else and broadcasting it

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Speaker 2: to their audience. So you know, your fundamental problem remains.

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Speaker 2: You know, the work of journalism is hard and expensive

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Speaker 2: and not always popular, but they're the mechanism to fund

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Speaker 2: its production just just isn't there anymore. And that's why

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Speaker 2: you know that the their Digital News Bargaining Bill has

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Speaker 2: been such a contentious issue lately. But the idea that

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Speaker 2: social media can replace what you know, journalism did as

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Speaker 2: does as a as a function for society and democracy

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Speaker 2: as article and doesn't stand up to even the most

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Speaker 2: basic scrutiny.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so what have we got for a business model?

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Speaker 1: Michael bogs Boggsy as we call them our cego says

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Speaker 1: video is a fast growing area where Z of me

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Speaker 1: could grow its audience. Now, to be fair, none of

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Speaker 1: us know what he's talking about, do you?

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Speaker 2: I mean I do to an extent that there's sort

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Speaker 2: of you know, there's there's two key revenue trends for journalism,

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Speaker 2: right like there's there's audiences and there's advertisers. Advertisers and

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Speaker 2: particularly the media agencies that represent them, really love video advertising.

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Speaker 2: It's a close cousin to TV advertising, which used to

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Speaker 2: be you know, the biggest noise in media is from

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Speaker 2: a funding perspective, So everyone people still want to buy that.

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Speaker 2: So if you can create inventory, then plausibly you know

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Speaker 2: that that's a that's a great business. The thing is,

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Speaker 2: I think when someone goes to the Herald site or

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Speaker 2: goes to the news b site, they want to consume

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Speaker 2: a particular form. Maybe it's audio, maybe it's text. The

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Speaker 2: video is, for the most part autoplays. It's a bit

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Speaker 2: of an annoyance where the Herald, I think, potentially have

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Speaker 2: a point and a play is on YouTube, which is

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Speaker 2: rapidly becoming the biggest thing in advertising anywhere, and the

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Speaker 2: Herald's actually had some real success with putting video, whether

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Speaker 2: it's short documentaries or just news breaking news packages on

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Speaker 2: there and that has a fifty five to forty five

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Speaker 2: revenue share. Yeah, okay, so there is a case there.

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Speaker 2: It's not proven, but it's plausible.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, it's plausible. But at the same time, I know,

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Speaker 1: being in the industry, we were told the podcasts with

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Speaker 1: the futures, but we still haven't quite figured out how

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Speaker 1: to monetize podcasts. And if we could, because we do

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Speaker 1: such great podcasts, we wouldn't have the problems that we've

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Speaker 1: got at the moment. Anyway, Can I just ask you, finally,

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Speaker 1: how are you going at the spin off? Because when

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Speaker 1: you hit these walls of advertising drying up, you went

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Speaker 1: to get more paying subscribers to that bear Fruit.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well we're sort of you know, as Shane reported

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Speaker 2: on last year, we hit a bit of a wall

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Speaker 2: in November of last year, and we wrote an open

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Speaker 2: letter which which kind of laid out to our audience

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Speaker 2: what was going on and what we needed them to do.

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Speaker 2: And we're by no means out of the woods, but

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Speaker 2: we've been really really heartened by their response. And I

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Speaker 2: do think there's something in saying to your audience, this

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Speaker 2: is how it has to be and letting them decide

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Speaker 2: ultimately the scale of your organization. So you know, if

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Speaker 2: you're listening to this and you enjoy the Herald but

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Speaker 2: you're not a subscriber, I would strongly suggest that if

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Speaker 2: you want it to be around, and you want it

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Speaker 2: to continue to provide the function that does for you

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Speaker 2: in your life, that you don't just look at the

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Speaker 2: free version that you that you pick up A paid's

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Speaker 2: up too, all right, and.

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Speaker 1: I thank you for your time. Dow can grieve for

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Speaker 1: more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive.

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Speaker 2: Listen live to news talks. It'd be from four pm weekdays,

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Speaker 2: or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio