Hard News by Russell Brown

It’s healthy for someone to be keeping the pressure on, but I’m not sure Willie actually serves Te Whakaruruhau by focusing almost exclusively on it.

Well, you missed your calling in the diplomatic service there Russell. :) Honestly, Willie is entitled to his opinion but I really wish media would stop presenting him as some kind of disinterested observer because he just isn't. Perhaps inevitably, given New Zealand's media scene is a village and its not as if mainstream/Pakeha media outlets don't sledge the competition with unedifying glee. But watching him sledging public radio, and prosecuting some kind of bizarro vendetta against Mihi Forbes in particular, isn't adding anything worth having to the korero.

more than iwi stations operate as a national network

Number missing here; still to be inserted from another browser tab?

Yes, Jackson has a highly vested interest. It would be nice if the next media outlet giving Willie Jackson airtime to vent against RNZ just came out and asked him if it is because they dropped Waatea News.

Hi Russell,
Off topic somewhat. There exists in your suburb a chap whom even a baby boomer like myself would call _elderly_. Eric runs Reef Radio (106.7) a low power FM station, dedicated to those musical genres likely to appeal to his generation (now, sadly, almost invisible): jazz (up till bebop), 50s comedy tracks, musicals, the bland, the beautiful, the rare, the forgotten. Since becoming acquainted I have learnt that he has mates all over the country sending each other mp3s for broadcast to their few but loyal listeners.

My point, if there is one, is that so much of our musical (and hence radio) heritage gets so quickly forgotten. Gordon Campbell reaches into the vaults occasionally, and Chris Bourke's _Blue Smoke_ series was a delight. But it's Eric and his ilk who play old Goon Shows every week. Hence this shout out.
Bob.

Reef Radio sounds awesome (goons fan here), I really appreciate how the regulators allowed the LPFM stations to flourish in their very limited by constraints manner

air ear…

Reef Radio

Sounds like a good listen.
No web presence I suppose – can’t find any playable streams…

I’ve been occasionally listening to Blue Mountains Radio 89.1 from Katoomba on line, Paul’s Boutique/Party at 6pm (oz time) on a Tuesday is pretty darn funky!
Hosted by ex-pat Paul Gifford.

http://www.rbm.org.au/#

do they host the Reef Lectures?

Sure, Willie over does it But it always seems odd to me that there's no Maori host on any of the main RNZ shows. I love Wal, Suzie, Bryan, John, Jim, Kim and all the rest of them. Just that all the brown voices tend to be specialists covering brown stories. Why no Maori anchor? The more I think about it, the weirder it feels.

Willie Jackson does have a point - and CEO Thompson agrees. However, with a constrained budget and a deeply pale organisational culture, change will take many years. Thompson outlines their strategy.

Willie recently berated RNZ for investing in Te Reo lessons for Pakeha staff, but it seems smart to me to make sure new Maori staff do not face a hostile clueless environment.