Media Watch to Ten: ‘You’re prostitutes’; Ten to Holmes: ‘You’re naive’
The Ten Network has returned fire at the ABC over criticism by Media Watch host Jonathan Holmes that a paid news-style segment featuring the Ten News logo was “prostitution”.
Last night Media Watch revealed that Ten carried a sponsored commentary around the bank rate cut hosted by Matt Doran and featuring Mortgage Choice spokesman Ben Herden.
And despite the fact that key lenders had already passed on the cut, which Ten had reported hours before, the Mortgage Choice “news” segment featured Harden calling for the rate card to be passed along and urging viewers to call a mortgage broker if not.
During the program Holmes described the segment as “fake news”. He told viewers: “It’s not advertising, it’s prostitution.”
However, Ten derided the comments, saying: “To describe them as ‘prostitution’ is ludicrous, extreme and naïve. Sponsored segments are commonplace in News bulletins across all commercial networks.”
According to the station, the segment was originally intended for broadcast only before the RBA decision and was accidentally put to air afterwards. The station said it has now changed its internal processes to ensure this does not occur again.
“The Mortgage Choice sponsorship is clearly identifiable with their logo and the analyst is clearly announced as a representative of Mortgage Choice,” Ten said. “The newsreader asks the commentator for his views on the RBA announcement and implications for mortgagees.”
Holmes, this afternoon told Mumbrella that he rejected the station’s criticisms. “I’d be interested for other examples of fake news updates that are entirely paid for and that are basically ads,” said Holmes.
“I’m not aware of any parallels. That’s why I said it was prostitution, it was a deliberate attempt to pretend that this was a genuine news update – it had the same set, it had the News at Five, it had more news later in the evening — all of that stuff plus the genuine newsreader doing it, so in all of those ways it is an attempt to make it look like a genuine news update.”
“That is what I would regard as deceit or close to it,” he said.
Ten also criticised Media Watch for failing to seek comment about the segment before it was broadcast. “It should also be pointed out that Media Watch failed the most rudimentary test of fair reporting: at no stage did it contact Network Ten before its ‘story’ went to air,” said the Ten spokesman.
Last year Media Watch apologised to The Daily Telegraph’s Andrew Clennell for failing to seek comment over a story it ran on gaming reform in 2011. It apologised again a fortnight ago for not contacting News Limited’s Tim Blair for what turned out to be an incorrect item about his blog.
Holmes said the situations were different. “I don’t know what was going to be added for our viewers by seeking their view on it,” said Holmes.”We were focusing on any particular individuals, in the case of Andrew Clennell – in the ACMA’s view anyway – he was entitled to a right of reply because he was personally criticised. We didn’t criticise any particular newsreader, I mean clearly they were just doing their jobs or what they were told to do.”
Nic Christensen
I have to agree with Media Watch here – this stuff is pretty crook and erodes the network’s credibility as a news source. It’s naive to think this stuff will just fly with the public.
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Holmes is right and TEN’s attempts to defend itself are fatuous. It’s clearly a commercial masquerading as a news update. It says TEN News on the graphic, it has news-style straps across the bottom of the screen and it has a TEN newsreader doing the interviewing.
I’ve got nothing against a sponsor paying for a stand-alone segment, but this is clearly being passed off as news when it’s not.
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In my days of writing/producing radio, we weren’t allowed to imitate “news” so there were no newsy stings or intro’s purporting to be news or news-like… because radio didn’t want to hoodwink the listener – and fair enough too
so why not tv?
And, may I say, what a load of crap the station’s response was – poor dears
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desperate for cash
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Does CommSec pay for the privallidge of having their so called ‘talent’ deliver the finance update too? It’s like Tom Waterhouse giving the odds on NRL, no difference really it’s all gambling.
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The Mortgage Choice piece is no different to most of the sponsored content running online and on TV. It was stupid that it aired after the RBA decision, but I believe Ten when they say that the timeslot was a mistake.
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Lets face it. Anyone who watches 7, 9 or 10 news and takes these broadcasts seriously is either naive / stupid or damn right mental. This scam from 10 is yet another example of why these tabloid news broadcasts have zero credibility.
Why on earth 10 are questioning this, is beyond me? The majority of media in this country is truly catered to the pitch fork wavers. It is very sad.
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I used to believe the old “This News Update…” Because I remember when there were genuine News Updates. Some Networks are honest enough to Brand them as News Headlines. Since having worked in Commercial Radio, I see them for what they are.
NOW however I see the recent practices as disgusting, dishonest, and reprehensible. Advertising Break Times were deregulated some time ago, and Networks discovered pretty quickly that viewers had their limit. So Station/Network Management got creative, leading to the dishonest activities we see today.
If typical viewers could see the whiteboard in any Media Outlet’s sales office that lists all the segments and spots available for “Sale” they would view TV and Listen to Radio in a very different light.
Community Radio and TV have to clearly ID “Station Sponsors,” why shouldn’t Commercial organisations?
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Shame this writer couldn’t get the spelling of the names right. It was reported correctly on media watch. Who’s sloppy? And as this was originally broadcast within minutes of the RBA decision why isn’t it news? It was co-branded, so what’s the big deal?
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OMG pls – ppl who do you think pays for 60 sec money report just on 8.00am on the today show. Westpac. Branded content, better get used to it.
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OK trendoids… look in the crystal ball and you’ll see the same principle at work (that of monetising “news”) or at least around the digital corner, viz:
“Observing those trends, Yahoo has already been experimenting with new types of ads, including much larger “billboards” on its popular homepage and “stream ads” that look like news updates but are written and paid for by a sponsor.”
source: QUARTZ
author: Zac Seward
http://qz.com/86437
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It’s a bit rich of Media Watch to run a story without contacting both sides, regardless of whether it is technically “necessary” – they stand on ethics and fairness and to not at least give one side of the story a chance of reply is poor form. I have noticed they have done this, or only given one side a day or less to respond to questions on regular occasion recently.
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Do 7,9, 10 Actually Broadcast News …well I never …here’s me thinking it was just advertorial and Muppets quoting from Tony Abbott’s PR machine…
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I was surprised that the ABC denigrated sex workers. Seriously the women and men involved in sex work do not need the putdown.
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I think Ten make it pretty clear it’s a sponsored piece. Are we as Australian viewers that dumb that we need it literally spelled out across our screens?
The printed word I think is different but there’s nothing wrong with what Ten and Mortgage Choice have done here.
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@Beau Ushay
“there’s nothing wrong with what Ten and Mortgage Choice have done here.”
You would say that Beau (who works at News Ltd). If you guys could have your way there wouldn’t be any fair, balanced reporting at all! Give me strength?!
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The sooner the Coalition privatise the ABC the sooner we can hire Jonathan Holmes to create Media Watch interstitials that endorse TEN management.
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I do not see why Ten are being singled out. This happens across all media. We all want to shand on the milk crate and bang on how rubbish this is. Remember guys we are in media/advertising, our jobs are to get products/services infront of a target audience. Job done!
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Brought to you by the network that has turned its call-sign into its prime-time share.
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SBS World News, why waste time on anything else. The content, the news angles even the dress sense of the news readers, it leaves all the rest for dust and I don’t even work there!
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Bob, you’re thinking of the ABC. SBS World news has no real point of differentiation to the ABC Bulletin.
And you can bet that a highly successful Drum & Bass band from Perth will never remix their opening theme either.
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check out their traffic report, its even worse, a 2 sec shot of a conjested street somewhere followed by a 30 sec spruike and banner behind head shot of whatever sponsor is featured that week, completely pointless and stupid. They should just call it the sponsored helicopter shot segment.
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i agree with nick bartlett #14- leave sex workers alone Media Watch and don’t denigrate them.
The difference between sex work and what Channel 10 did is that sex workers transactions are obvious and honest to all parties involved whereas Channel 10’s dirty little secret would not be clear to many of their viewers – not everyone works in the industry and understands how these things work.
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The Ten News graphic is bigger than the MC logo and it is obviously trying to appear as ‘news’ – how can this not be be construed as misleading and deceptive?
Media Watch has no obligation to call Ten first – they are reporting what we viewers see, and Ten’s opinion can’t change the fact of what we were presented with.
It also wouldn’t have gone to air ‘accidentally’ – time and money have been spent by a client and Ten can’t afford to say no to cash these days… unless of course, they had integrity, which they obviously do not.
Why does Ten think that just speeding up the rate of shit-shovelling will make it stink less?
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@Beau Ushay – you can personally answer ‘yes’ to your own question if you can’t see what’s wrong with it. News Ltd is a hardly a good foundation to have beneath you when commenting on shonky media practices.
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