Live blog: Wednesday, February 19
Welcome to Mumbrella’s live blog, where you’ll find all the best of the site, and the latest goings on in the land of marketing and media. Make sure you refresh the page for the latest updates.
Highlights: Mumbrella Hangout with The Checkout tomorrow afternoon | Paul Fishlock legal drama moves to fourth year as Y&R reject legal costings | AFR editor Stutchbury hits back at The Australian’s ‘incompetent’ claim | Opinion: Russel Howcroft on why beautiful athletes and lack of ad hoardings makes Olympics spectacular | Comedian Dan Ilic looks to crowd source a new digital comedy hub |Dr Mumbo: The greatest quotes of Bruce McWilliam and AFP’s late night pizza raid |APN to buy out ARN | SCA Profit to $45.9m| The Biggest Loser drops to smallest audience of season |
5:08pm – We spoil you people, we really do. Tomorrow afternoon we’re hosting a live hangout with two of the stars of ABC consumer show The Checkout, which returns tomorrow evening, Julian Morrow and Kate Browne.
As if that wasn’t enough, you can also put your questions to them. Simply use the hashtag #askcheckout on Twitter or use the comments on the story where the hangout will be hosted on this page tomorrow at 3.30pm AEST.
Here’s some highlights of season one to get you in the mood:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dc82wkAnmf8
4:12pm – Let’s go all arty for a moment with the new Bridgestone tyres ad. Did you know each of your tyres has only a handprint’s worth of tread touching the road at any one time? What do we bother with bigger tyres for? CHeck out more of the rationale behind it here.
3:45pm – What are the intricacies of the new privacy and data handling laws? Any legal questions you have will be answered by our friendly lawyer Stephen von Muenster during a session at CommsCon. See what he will be chatting about here, and what else you can look forward to on the program here.
2:17pm -Comment of the day goes to Macca on the Stutchbury v The Oz story when he says “It’s like two bald blokes fighting over a comb”.
1:59pm – Bored of the Seven raid story yet? Don’t worry, The Oz has posted a story this morning confirming police are not raiding Seven today. In other news, we can confirm the AFP is not raiding Mumbrella House.
1.30pm – News Corp aren’t letting ABC Media Watch host Paul Barry off (see 11.06am). News Corp Australia’s network editorial director Alan Oakley has just tweeted:
1.25pm – Did you think the Paul Fishlock vs Y&R case was over? Nope. The case is ongoing as the parties fight about legal fees. The latest update is here.
1.2opm – As we mentioned at 9.19am The Australian gave the AFR and its editor-in-chief a serve and half today describing him as “incompetent” and calling on Fairfax to sack him.
Michael Stutchbury tells us he is “disappointed” with the personal attack but won’t be pursuing legal action. You can read the story here.
1.01pm – A quick update on our 11.27am item on how the Daily Telegraph was quoting the SMH online on its weather story. Yeah the story has now been updated and inextricably all mentions of the SMH have vanished…
12:53pm – You may remember a quote we popped in here a little earlier from Miranda Ward about her interview with comedian Dan Ilic this morning. Well, here is what they were talking about, and its one of the more entertaining interviews you will read today.
12:37pm – Remember Transport NSW ‘Get Your Hands Off’ campaign from last year? Well they’ve created three more versions of it. Here’s one below, and the others can be seen here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frGWfL93o9A
12:09pm – The story about tall poppy syndrome stifling innovation in Australia has Michael Graham fired up: “This is a CEO problem. The CEO is responsible for, among other things – wait for it -Growth!” See the full yarn, and have your say, here.
Reynolds
12:06pm – Siimon Reynolds is back in the ad industry taking a director role with Melbourne independent agency Accelerator.
11:57am – In other news, what do the police eat when on a late-night raid of a large media corporation’s offices? Dr Mumbo has the inside track on the thrifty AFP.
11:48am – “The Vanilla Ice ad – I’m sure they started with wanting to use “word to your mother” and worked backwards” – a comment from ‘Thomas’ on The Morning Update, and the new ad featuring the rapper for, of all things, Kraft mac and cheese shaped like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It needs to be seen to be believed.
11:43am – We’ve got some new creative for you to feast on today as well. There’s this piece from Arnold Furnace for Rest Industry Super, ANZ turn to Cubed for their new snail mail campaign (it’s got a cute dog in it), and this hip hop video empowering kids in care.
11:27am – An interesting attribution from The Daily Telegraph this morning – they’ve run a story about the fact there will be thunder storms in Sydney this afternoon, then cited their source as rivals the Sydney Morning Herald, despite flagging their own weather service in the paragraph above. Bizarre scenes.
The Daily Tele’s weather story today, replete with satellite image from their own weather service.
11:25am – “They don’t really interview properly, they just keep making up jokes,” reports creative reporter Miranda Ward after a phone interview with comedian Dan Ilic. You can find out about his latest project a little later this morning here on Mumbrella.
11:06am – However, Barry isn’t taking it sitting down, and has gone to war on Twitter over the piece, calling out News Corp’s ‘Public Defender’ in a string of tweets:
11:03am – News Corp has hit back at the ABC (surprise, surprise) after host Paul Barry claimed on Media Watch the company’s newspapers are losing money, but not giving the company a chance to respond.
10:53am – Much has been said about the raids at Seven yesterday. But no-one has said it better than Seven’s own Bruce McWilliams. Dr Mumbo has pulled together a selection of his very best quotes from the day that was.
10:43am – This news will come as a relief to the car drivers at News Corp. Despite rumours apparently the ‘executive car park’ opposite the Holt Street HQ in Sydney is not up for sale, reports the Australian Financial Review’s Rear Window.
10:38am – This is Ana Sidorova, Russia women’s curling captain. See why Russel Howcroft thinks she and the other athletes make the Sochi Olympics more visually appealing here.
Anna Sidorova
10:34am – The Biggest Loser has lost more ground in the 7.30pm ratings battle posting its lowest numbers for the season last night, although the Snowboard Cross did pull in respectable numbers for Ten’s Winter Olympics coverage. Full TV ratings are here.
9.59am – There appears to be some confusion in today’s newspapers about whether Malcolm Turnbull called Seven over the AFP police raids or whether it was the other way around. The AFR says the Communications Minister rang Bruce McWilliam while the Daily Telegraph says it was the other way around, with Turnbull then ringing fellow ministers Attorney General George Brandis and Justice Minister Michael Keenan.
The Tele’s version also squares with what Turnbull told Radio 2GB host Ben Fordham on Twitter:
9.36am – Meanwhile in news just in from the Ten Network, controversial columnist, radio and TV host Andrew Bolt has had his Sunday morning program extended from half an hour to a full one hour program. There will also be a “special encore presentation” at 4pm.
The announcement:
Network Ten today announced The Bolt Report will return from its summer break on Sunday, March 2, in a new, expanded one-hour format.
The new-look The Bolt Report will be seen on TEN at 10am every Sunday, with a special encore presentation at 4pm on the same day.
Hosted by Australia’s most-read newspaper columnist, Andrew Bolt, The Bolt Report will continue to bring viewers the latest political and social commentary, panel discussions and interviews with leading Australians.
The expanded show will include a new News Watch segment to put the media under genuine scrutiny.
9.33am – Southern Cross Austereo has reported it increased its revenues by 1.3 per cent and had an after tax profit of $45.9m. Full story here.
9.28am – APN has this morning announced it is going to buy out its US partner Clear Channel from the Australian Radio Network for $246.5m, giving it full ownership of the network. You can read the full story here.
9:19am – As Stephen Mayne notes on Twitter this morning News Corp has again lashed out at rival the Australian Financial Review. The company’s national broadsheet, The Australian is reporting that Monday’s story by Neil Chenoweth, which reported that News had received $882m tax windfall from the ATO, had been “undermined by the company, the tax office and Joe Hockey”.
True to form The Oz doesn’t leave it at a single news report, there is also a sternly worded editorial which concludes with a slight for Michael Stutchbury editor-in-chief of the AFR and a former editor of The Oz.
8:25am – Conspiracy theorists might argue it was a good day for Seven’s rivals yesterday, with the raids overshadowing some decent first-half results from the company, which posted a $150m profit. Despite that the share price closed down 1.83 per cent last night.
8:21am – Last night Seven West Media CEO Tim Worner broke his silence to criticise the police raids as “overkill” and insist the network had been co-operating with them for the past week over the Schapelle Corby interview. See the full story, as well as the AFP statement, here.
8:13am – It’s fair to say the Channel Seven raids by the police yesterday are causing a kerfuffle in the media, who love nothing better than writing about other media.
8:05am – It was a hugely disappointing night for Ten with Australia’s last real gold medal prospect Alex ‘Chumpy’ Pullin crashing out early of the Men’s Snowboard Cross in Sochi. It will be interesting to see how it rated when the results are in at just after 9am.
