Random Play by Graham Reid

Who knew a country as small as New Zealand was simultaneously so crime-ridden and weather-afflicted?

A rather sad total of 22 min, 29 seconds of actual news items in a one-hour bulletin.

And that's assuming that everything in those times was actually 'news'.

Those live crosses to reporters standing outside a court building where something happened earlier in the day that has been timetabled for months. I need something to throw at the TV when they do that.

And weather appearing in the 'news' section. FFS.

Who would have thought that the death of a prominent New Zealander was as important as the elections in Zimbabwe (though not quite as important as a barbecue in Ururguay)?

Dame Augusta's family must feel humbled.

A good reminder of why our household gets all its news off the net.

I CAN spell Uruguay.

I would say that one could summarise the entire content in that bulletin in 1500 words or less, which would take me about ten minutes max to read.

One of the main reasons I don't have a telly.

Four and a half minutes of previews and reviews, not including promos during the ads out of about 34 minutes of news and sports. Soon we'll be interupting the previews with with news, then reviewing the preview, followed by a summation of the review. Thanks god we no longer pay a licence fee.

Are news bulletins the source of ADD?

Heh, love how you itemised everything bar the sports.

Are news bulletins the source of ADD?

Maybe they are in my case. Five years ago I got to fill out one of those viewing and listening diaries for a marketing company. The day was marked off in intervals of I think 15 minutes but it may have been five. It was pretty straightforward.

But not today. If I’m in front of the TV at news time now I’m usually grazing between One and TV3 and Prime, which is showing highlights of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, the British version. I start getting interested when the contestant is at about $4000 and usually stick with it to see how he/she does so miss that news segment. I never sit through ads, just flick off somewhere else and probably never sit there for a whole hour as it’s a busy time of the evening.

I’d have to fill the diary out in groups of seconds rather than minutes now. I don’t even know why I do watch when I do. I’m familiar with all the major news of the day through radio and the Internet by 6.00pm. If it’s something I’m really interested in I have probably read several international news outlets and commentary about the meaning of the event by experts (including the ones here) so the nightly bulletin is redundant in that respect.

On the other hand I often choose to watch the sport to actually see the winning strokes at the Masters or the way the tries happened even though I know the out come of the game. There is also something communal about watching events on the news, you feel you are experiencing the occasion with others. For example I’ll probably be in front of the box tonight for coverage of the Tongariro tragedy even though at 9.30am I’m already pretty well informed.

On the other hand I often choose to watch the sport to actually see the winning strokes at the Masters or the way the tries happened even though I know the out come of the game.

I normally try and catch the sports news as well, and cook dinner during the early part of the news. It's the only part that makes sense to be delivered in the above way - a nice round up of stuff that's not really that important, few highlights, good patriotic nationalism.

If I’m in front of the TV at news time now I’m usually grazing between One and TV3 and Prime, which is showing highlights of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, the British version. I start getting interested when the contestant is at about $4000 and usually stick with it to see how he/she does so miss that news segment.

That's uncanny, Bob. My TV news intake is entirely dictated by where Millionaire contestants are up to.

the TV news has got so bad, I have started watching repeats of The Nanny and Third Rock. Seriously.

It's like the character Luanne said on King Of The Hill a while back -shes siting watching tv with the rest of the Hill family, and Hank Hill says he wants to watch the news. Luanne pipes up (shes pretty by not very bright) and says "But we watched that yesterday!"
Exactly. The tv news is the same every night. Crime and the weather. Same ish, different day.

And when did bad weather become a weather bomb? Does that mean God is a weather terrorist?

Now somebody should tune into Parliament TV during question time and see how much time our politicians actually spend discussing policy versus arguing like little kids. Maybe I will do that when I get my freeview set up this weekend.

Haven't u folk heard of timeshifting? I can't bear to watch TV any other way now...it's really quite pleasant to watch only the 40 mins of TV every hour that is actually the show.

Tony Veitch with sport and magazine-style footage. 11.50

Classic! Although it’s probably more magazine style footage than actual sport.

“And this week’s punch-ups in the NRL / S14 etc” or “Lets look at the latest F1 car crash.”

It affects people's perceptions though.

For instance, try finding a car crash reported in the Guardian or New York Times. They don't cover them unless there victims are exceptionally numerous or notable. NZ media covers every fatality, giving one the impression that this is more of a land of carnage than it actually is.