Posts Tagged ABC

Taking a risk… just like the people wanted

by Spock... on 2 August 2010
Categories: Federal election 2010, Politics | Tags: , , , , , , ,

I woke up to the news of a 50-50 Newspoll and a shit-scared Julia Gillard vowing to stop playing it safe; she will throw out the ‘Rule Book’ and get down with the people.

Julia Gillard. Advisers now just out of frame.

Julia Gillard. Advisers now just out of frame.

Gillard’s advisers, after much focus group testing, found that the electorate thought she was too “safe”. The electorate thought that Julia was too stage managed during the campaign and they felt they didn’t really know the “real Julia”.

Feeling the threat of a Newspoll that showed Australia dangerously close to “Prime Minister, Tony Abbott”, Julia Gillard’s minders aranged an appearance on the Nine Network’s Today Show. She performed well and stayed on message. Gillard delivered her message well, telling the voters that she would get dirty and engage with the issues on her terms. “You’re avoiding gaffes and all the rest of it….we’ve been running that traditional style of campaign. I’m going to throw that rule book out and really get out there”, Gillard said.

And the media gobbled it up.

“Let Gillard be Gillard”, said the political geeks on Twitter, with their allusions to fictional West Wing President Jed Bartlett and has Chief of Staff’s “Let Bartlett be Bartlett” note.

The media stayed perfectly on message. The Australian, The Age, The Herald Sun, The ABC all lead with similar stories. Gillard would be throwing out the script, running a real campaign the old fashioned way, taking risks, making mistakes.

But in this age of stage-managed campaigns, even taking a risk seems so… dull. Doesn’t it?

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Steve goes on the telly

by @FakeFielding on 12 March 2010
Categories: Media, Politics | Tags: , , , , ,

Last Monday morning I was sitting at home on the floor of my room, absolutely smashing the evil Decepticons with a double-pronged attack of Autobots and Voltron, when Susan came in to tell me that I had been invited to go on the television! Apparently, a guest due to appear on some show called Q&A had cancelled and the ABC wanted me to go on instead! Tears welled in my eyes because it was the happiest day of my life.

I immediately sent a text to Nick Xzennophone, asking him if he’d ever been on the telly before. He answered yes, so I asked if he’d ever been on the ABC before. He answered yes, so I asked him if he’d ever been on the Q&A before. He answered no, so I told him that I was going on Q&A and he wasn’t. I signed off, “Regards Steve”, even though I don’t really have any regards for him. Xzennophone can be such a media whore sometimes so it’s nice to get one up on him now and again.

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Your ABC and climate change balance – a tale of two pricks

by David Bonnici on 11 March 2010
Categories: Environment, Media | Tags: , , , ,

In 1998, while living in London, my 18-month-old daughter wasn’t feeling well and came out in a strange rash. The local GP had no idea what she had and referred her to the Great Ormond Street Hospital, one of the world’s leading children’s clinics.

The doctors were unfamiliar with Sarah’s condition, but further investigation showed she had measles. The delayed diagnosis wasn’t due to any shortcomings in the National Health Service, but because a vaccine had all but wiped out the disease and none of the doctors, including experienced pediatricians, had actually seen it before. Luckily Sarah had that vaccination, as part of the Measles, Mumps, Rubella (MMR) injection, and while she showed the symptoms she never suffered the full effects, which could be deadly.

So why did my daughter get measles in a first-world city, two decades after a vaccination had all but eradicated it? The BBC’s policy of giving all issues and views equal measure regardless of their credibility had something to with it.

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Stick To Your ABC

by Bob Dumpling on 1 December 2009
Categories: Media | Tags: , , , ,

Anyone who follows the media would know that it’s a great time to be working at the ABC. While the wolf is at the door for many commercial and community outfits, our government funded ABC can sleep relatively soundly at night. Nothing highlights this better than Managing Director Mark Scott, who proudly tells the rest of the media they need to focus on quality journalism, stay ahead of the pack and other heart warming motherhood statements.

This is all very well coming from the public broadcaster with $800 mil coming in from Treasury. I have no problem with the ABC fulfilling its charter. What bugs me is the ABC running around doing things (with public money) where there is no imperative to do it.

I hate to say it but as Kim Williams repeated in Crikey;  “… in the digital age we need to be careful to ensure that public broadcasters like the ABC don’t merely replicate what the private sector is now doing or inadvertently crowd out market-driven creativity and innovation.”

And what is this replication that shits me? The inane, pop-culture of the malnourished, sub-70 IQ celebrity kind. Essentially why is the ABC wasting time and resources on infantile dross like this: http://blogs.abc.net.au/articulate/.

Or (and this is far worse) this: http://blogs.abc.net.au/theshallowend/.

I read the ABC Charter all the time and still can’t locate the section where it says it is required to fill the gap not taken up by commercial interests to inform and report every hot celebs current crisis or full colour documentation of the current fashion disaster unfolding at some drug-infested awards night or event opening.

Surely the funds being sent in the direction of the Vacuous Celebrities Awareness Department of the ABC would be far better administered by employing a few more journalists or funding some of the core services that are the reason for the ABCs existence?

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Damn it, I want Janet

by Bob Dumpling on 13 November 2009
Categories: Media | Tags: , , , , ,

There seems to be a misconception that the ABC’s Q&A program is engaging and rewarding television. It’s not. In actual fact, it is vaudeville bullshit.

In more recent times and with the advent of the twitter machine, this misconception has only grown. Many observing the twitter hashtag on a Thursday evening (AEST) see #qanda become a “trending topic” and start to get giddy, thinking “Our ABC has really made it on the world stage now”. Unfortunately this popularity spike occurs all too frequently and I hate to spoil things but it’s actually our communist Asian neighbours mistyping their lovable bamboo eating mascot.

As you may not know, ABC star employee contracts frequently stipulate that as soon as the first Christmas decorations appear in shops, programs must begin to wind up or cease to broadcast for the year. Not much happens in November and almost nothing in December, so the view is that little should keep the ABC luminaries away from Paris in winter or the sanctity of Pearl Beach. In keeping with this, Q&A has already packed up for the year and it is a good time to reflect on what could have been.

The worst part of Q&A is how unbearably predictable it all is. Watching the self-righteousness of David Marr with that smug grin and all knowing whine or Sophie Mirabella. Well, two words are enough to describe her.

In fact the only participant that I honestly enjoyed watching was Janet Albrechtsen. Seriously. She knows what she thinks and she just says it. No façade, no sensitivity or groupthink (if you can excuse the irony there). Sure, the underlying sado-masochistic, power suit/corporate lawyer look is pretty stale but as a form of political entertainment, I think she is a star.

I rarely read her column in the Oz because it is predictable and equivalent to unpacking seventeen gaffa taped boxes to find little inside, but on TV she is great. She is so great that I think she should have her own ABC program. Before the wowsers start wailing about ABC Board members being ‘impartial’ – what about Quentin Dempster, he somehow manages to walk the impartial tight rope? I’m sure Janet can too.  Instead of the conservatives constantly complaining about Left wing bias or the lack of conservatives on the ABC, why shouldn’t Janet have the chance to have a chat with those forgotten people ignored by our Leftist media!

The other thing that has become apparent is the complete lack of engaging female conservatives. Besides Ms Mirabella, Helen Coonan, Julie Bishop or Bettina ‘Blackshirt’ Arndt, there isn’t a lot of media talent. Poor old Miranda Devine belts out columns but she hasn’t got it for TV. Mind you, she’d be great to play Scrabble with, “Hey MD, can I borrow an UM?”

As an interim measure, I suggest Mark Scott punts Tony Jones into a new show where he can truly blossom, reading his own poetry. I think Q&A in 2010, hosted by Janet Albrechtsen would be compulsory television.

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