2014 Annual: the year that was – September

It was another year of continual change in the media and marketing world. Over the next 12 days, Mumbrella’s Miranda Ward provides a month-by-month recap of the major stories and developments that affected the industry.

September started with a bang with Kiis 1065 pulling down four explicit photographs appearing to show a nude Jennifer Lawrence after a hacker claimed to have images of several celebrities.

In other celebrity-related news, women’s magazine New Idea issued a legal letter to rival publications and news outlets warning them not to use its Australian exclusive images of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.

Daily Telegraph columnist Annette Sharp claimed that she was “championing” women in her criticisms of Sunrise presenter Samantha Armytage.

One of the big media stories of the year was Foxtel CEO Richard Freudenstein announced the company was going to drop its entry prices for new subscribers and rework its offerings in an attempt to combat the entry of new cheap online streaming services to the market.

The ABC announced the retirement of At The Movies’ Margaret Pomeranz and David Stratton.

In creative agency news, Clemenger BBDO Melbourne CEO Peter Biggs retired from the role after 15 years with the group and Whybin\TBWA hired London-based BBH creatives Gary McCreadie and Wesley Hawes as its new ECDs following the loss of Dave Bowman and Matty Burton to Special Group.

AJF Partnership Sydney was appointed to handle the creative account for Nine’s streaming service StreamCo.

In other streaming news, Quickflix CEO Stephen Langsford wrote an open letter to his Netflix counterpart Reed Hastings challenging the company to “come through the front door” to the Australian market and cut off access for an estimated 200,000 local subscribers.

Qantas launched a data marketing business called Red Planet and later pitched its $20m media account, putting incumbent ZentihOptimedia on alert.

Australian entries into the Print category at Spikes Asia Festival of Creativity dropped by 75 per cent on last year.

A dispute between News Corp Australia and the Daily Mail Australia which saw the two publishers trade allegations they were each lifting each other’s stories and exclusives was settled out of court.

Miranda Ward

Miranda Ward worked for Mumbrella from 2013 to 2017, eventually becoming deputy editor. Miranda joined Mumbrella in September 2013 from Sky News.

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topics AJF Partnership annual At the Movies Brad Pitt Jennifer Lawrence Kiis media account Netflix New Idea News Corp Quickflix Red Planet Samantha Armytage september Spikes Asia StreamCo Sunrise The Daily Mail year in review

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