63: Let's be careful out there

The recent case of a Swedish journalist who disappeared while out covering a story really does sound like one of those Nordic noirs - there was a headless torso, a missing reporter, and a submarine.

But behind the weird and nasty novelty factor of the case lurks a terrible truth that a lot of the biggest media companies  are ignoring - they are often sending reporters into real danger, with inadequate preparation to deal with the situation if anything goes horribly wrong.

In the past, reporters have almost always had - at the very least - a photographer with them, to back them up, especially if things go south. But with staffing levels being cut back further and further, reporters are now expected to head off on their own to cover things, loaded down with all sorts of gear - camera, audio recorder, notepad and everything else a reporter needs, except for actual human back-up.

That's not a real problem - not when you're off to cover a ribbon-cutting ceremony, some political announcement, or anything else that features a large media contingent.

But reporters are also constantly being sent out into openly dangerous and hostile areas, at weird times of the night, and that can be a big worry. Caught up in the rush of breaking news, reporters are sent out without a second thought for their own personal safety.

There are chief reporters at some of NZ's biggest and best newsrooms that have actively refused to send young reporters out in the field on their own, deciding that they can't send the night-shift reporter to cover a gang-related homicide in Mangere late on a Saturday night, because it's just not safe for them to be out there, especially if there is a pissed-up crowd gathering. But other chiefs don't even give it a second thought, and send their reporters into situations that are, simply, dodgy as fuck.

The actual assault rate is mercifully low, but journalists can be chased away from properties, or even off the public street, by people who lash out in grief or anger. Reporters at the scene can be dealing with people who have recently dealt with great loss or trauma, and need to tread carefully.

It doesn't help when a lot of the reporters sent out on these jobs are young, and keen to get out there, and might not have the experience to know when to push an issue, and when to back the fuck off.

It's also not helped when fuck-headed politicians whip up frenzies against the media - it's genuinely astonishing that the poor souls who cover President Trump's nasty and narcissistic rallies haven't been seriously assaulted, and it's surely just a matter of time.

Any journo who has been in the business for a few years  has been threatened with violence, and while the vast majority of this is from fucking nerds too scared to get out from behind their keyboards, it only takes one crazy shithead to do something terrible.

It's not just the danger of a late-night call-out, it's the ongoing risk of going to stories that might be nothing more than puff pieces, before things go sinister and wrong. The biggest personal risk to the well-being of reporters might even be just outside the workday, with shiftwork requirements that see journos forced to get to and from work at extremely risky times of the day - late nights and early mornings, with most big newsrooms found in the central city. A Radio NZ journo in Wellington was tragically killed while walking home after an overnight shift, just a few short years ago, and it's sadly guaranteed to happen again.

And the case of the submarine death also shows that even covering something as innocuous like some bloke with his private sub can have a horrific ending. The true story of what happened on the sub is still unrevealed, but it still shows that the simple act of going out there and getting the story can have an incredibly tragic result. Everything possible should be done to avoid this.

-Katherine Grant

62: Are you old enough?

If you just judge the news media by the keen young things that front up for the latest live cross to the TV news studio, it would appear that reporters are getting younger and younger every year, and it's only a matter of time before a toddler is solemnly reporting from outside the High Court.

There is always a constant injection of youth into the profession, and it's desperately needed. That kind of enthusiasm and idealism is absolutely vital - a newsroom that is full of nothing but cynical old hacks is a newsroom that is dying on its arse.

Of course, the young ones are also the only ones willing to put up with some terrible working conditions, as they strive to make a name for themselves. They'll put up with the shitty hours, and usually don't have kids that prevent them from devoting themselves fully to the job, and - crucially - they don't mind getting paid absolute peanuts for the first few years of their career. (Then they graduate to almonds.)

The majority of young reporters don't stay in the trade long enough for the jadedness to seep in, and they're off to comms or PR or teaching or any other bloody thing, happy to be out of the grind. You're lucky if half a dozen graduates from any j-school class are still in the business after a decade.

The ones that stay, though, they are in it for life, and for the long haul, and they're ready to age disgracefully within their profession. They're in it for the news, or for the platform, or just because they're not much use at anything else.

Unfortunately, after a lifetime of tiny pay rises, they're also expensive, and can sometimes come with a worklife that is full of baggage, and there are plenty of journos that have a stellar career right up until their forties or fifties, and then find nobody is returning their calls anymore.

This is a definite problem in the digital age, where even the people running some of the biggest news companies in the country actively seek only young people for online roles, because they're convinced the younger generation is the only one which understand this new-fangled internet.

This isn't dumb just because it overlooks the fact the internet has actually been around for decades now, and multiple generations have grown up in a digital environment. It's dumb because the online department is the one most likely to fuck up in the most egregious ways, and it can take an experienced eye to point out that maybe you should be more careful what thumbnail pic you put on that story, because a bit of carelessness in that regard can swiftly lead to legal action.

A focus on cheap youth can leave those with a bit of history out in the cold, and you can find some staggeringly experienced journos doing any job they can, and that can involve frankly demeaning work with terrible hours, and they're just happy to be working.

But the important thing to remember is that the older journos are just as vital as all that youthful enthusiasm in a well-rounded newsroom, because they have the kind of institutional knowledge that is absolutely necessary in this fast-paced age.

They're not necessarily any smarter than the young pups, but they have made all those fuck ups in the past, and have learned from them, and can spot something that will quickly get everybody into trouble, before it hits the printer or studio.

They can also have astonishingly great contacts lists, and any of them that have done regular news gathering for years will always know exactly who to call to get the right scoop.

Most importantly, they can teach the younger generation a whole slew of journo tricks and methods, built up from decades of experience, and passed down from previous generations. It's knowledge that is eternal, even as the technology behind the news continues to evolve.

Still, while it might seem like there are younger and younger faces in front of the camera, there is still centuries of experience in all the best newsrooms, and editors that still go after experience, rather than a flashy smile. There are reporters who have been doing this for years and still produce fucking amazing stuff, and subs and news editors and other people behind the scenes who have the kind of knowledge that would fill a hundred textbooks. They might seem like a dying breed, but the elder ones still in the mire every day are tough as fucking nails.

After all, none of us are getting any bloody younger.

- Steve Lombard

61: Be calm

It's been a frantic few weeks for breaking news, and with international tensions continuing to go crazy, and the local general election rushing up fast, it's unlikely to die down soon.

As always, there are legitimate questions about media coverage of some of the big events, with some genuine concerns raised about the way Metiria Turei's political career was targeted and destroyed, and these are issues that deserve to be considered and discussed.

But all of that stuff - all of the problematic issues - don't matter in the moment when it comes to breaking news, because it's such a fucking rush getting it out there into the world. From the first burst of info coming through, to the moment all the news has been shared on air, or on the website, it is a heady rush of activity that can leave you shaking.

Some journos are in the game almost purely for this rush, getting the cheapest of thrills through the simple sharing of information. For these poor souls, a sudden, huge breaking story - especially when it doesn't actually involve anything horrifically tragic - beats any drug in the world.

It can also be hugely stressful, trying to get something out when all your competitors are also trying to beat your arse to informing the public, and when your boss is leaning over your shoulder, wondering what's taking so bloody long. This stress is unavoidable under such huge time pressures, but reporters, editors and producers need to keep their shit together, and above all, keep calm.

After all, the best bit in the original Matrix film isn't the crazy kung fu, or Agent Smith's contemptible sneer, or the bit where Keanu Reeves falls down the rabbit hole. It the part where everything is turning to shit and Morpheus' crew starts to freak out, and the big man simply, bluntly, tells them to 'be calm'. And then, without missing a beat, he works the fucking problem.

Morpheus may have a stick up his butt the size of the Sky Tower, but it's a good, simple mantra to follow when the shit hits the fan. It's no use freaking out when a big news story suddenly drops into your lap, it doesn't help anybody.You've just got to work fast and smart, and get it out there as soon as you can. Freaking out over it will just make it harder, and slower.

The human voice is still the best communications technology we have, and will still be used to instantly share information across a newsroom. You'll hear a bit of that when it's all going down, but most journos involved will just have no time for chat - when they're getting the story out there, the volume around a newsroom should be more of a sustained hum than an elongated shriek.

This does, unsurprisingly, freak out some older journos who still miss the incessant clatter of typewriters, and loud shouting from old-school chief reporters, but when it comes to big breaking news, seconds really do matter. Nobody has got no time for anything too noisy, and the journos involved are too busy getting the job done for anything else. Calmness reigns, because it has to.

Mind you, for all Morpheus' calmness, he still gets the living snot beaten out of him by Agent Smith in their bathroom fight, so maybe we shouldn't be putting too much faith in baldy.

- Katherine Grant

60. A question nobody needs to ask

No, it's none of your fucking business what anybody's plans are for parenthood. It doesn't matter if they're someone on the dole, someone running for Prime Minister, or anybody in-between, it's a question you don't get to demand.

But if there was ever a classic example of a small number of media muntheads ruining it for everybody else, it was the story that grew around new Labour leader Jacinda Ardern's baby plans. Even though almost everybody knew it wasn't right, proper, or even fucking legal to ask the question, she got asked twice.

So even though it was just two people - and one of them was the goddamn sports presenter on a breakfast TV show - the entire local news media scene gets blasted, especially when it was picked up by overseas media, who were basically laughing at their idiotic antipodean cousins, still struggling with the most basic issues of decency and gender equality.

As noted last week, it only takes a couple of people to make some stupid-arse decisions to taint everybody in the entire media industry, and that's certainly how it was seen, both locally and overseas.

There were more than a few reaction pieces in New Zealand too, although the best of them showed the sheer tiredness at having to deal with this shit yet again.

Some, including the irredeemably fucked Mike Hosking, tried to claim that it was a legitimate question to ask, as if the deepest and most personal decision a person can make is ripe for public consumption, and there were plenty of dickheads in Facebook comments who were absolutely gagging to share bullshit anecdotal evidence about poor beleaguered employers suffering as young women they hired threw in jobs to raise a family, as if the employer still had a right to know.

"They're just asking the question."

Once again for the cheap seats - it's none of your fucking business, even if it might affect your company or country. You don't get to pressure potential workers about it. Just fucking deal with it.

In a way, it was a shame that anybody bothered to follow up on the numbskull questioning, and didn't let it flicker and die like the nothingness it was. After all, there weren't two sides of the argument - it was just a question that was not worth asking, because, again, none of your business.

The other argument for ignoring it was that it didn't need to be defended. It would be like writing a thinkpiece saying 'is racism really that bad'? - nobody needs that because it is so goddamn self-evident that yes, it really is that fucking bad. Similarly, nobody needed to write anything that raised the possibility that the country needed to know about a potential leader's potential plans, because nobody needed to know.

After all, we're 17 years into the 21st century - businesses and employers, including at the highest level of government, can deal with this type of thing now. It's not like the entire government would collapse if a political party's leader had to take some maternity leave. Life would literally go on.

The election is just a few short weeks away, and the political news cycle quickly moved on, to focus on the fact that somebody wasn't living in the place they were enrolled at (and if we're going down that road, nobody is safe, because real life is invariably more complicated than 'you must live at this address, because that's what the official records say').

Unfortunately, there will still be people talking about baby plans if Ardern and her crew do get into power. All the news media can do is wait for them to grow the fuck up, and get the fuck over it, and stop hassling people about their baby plans, whoever the hell they are.

- Ron Troupe

59. Ripping off Facebook pics for fun and profit

The legality of taking pictures and video from social media is one of the great grey areas of modern media. There are many who maintain that permission must be sought before any images, of any kind, are used. But there are also others who argue that anybody who wanted to keep things to themselves could just adjust your privacy settings, so anything still showing is totally public, and up for grabs.

As always, it's a fuck-sight more complicated than that, and the actual truth of the matter is somewhere in between, and heavily dependent on the circumstances in a case by case basis. Not all pillaging is equal.

Most people can agree that profile pics of people who have suddenly become news are okay, provided the people using it is 110% sure it's actually the right person, (everybody remembers the unfortunate Jackass cover of the NZ Herald). If you want so have some kind of presence on social media - and let's face it, no matter how much we pretend, it's not actually essential to have a Twitter or Facebook accounts - there is always going to be some kind of profile picture. Just remember to put your best face on, because that's probably how you're going to be remembered for the rest of time, (and if even that terrifies you, you can always put up an anime avatar or a pithy saying or a Shortland Street character, or anything else in that space).

But when there is a tragic event, even people who complain the hardest about privacy want to see the faces behind the stories, because those images - which are a necessity in online templates - give it an emotional heft. They're not just names, they're people, and if we can all help avoid future tragedies by putting a human face on them, then it's all worthwhile.

Make no mistake - all non-sociopathic reporters hate doing death knocks, because they're awkward and intrusive, and nobody wants 30 different organisations looking for a picture. If everyone has the same photo at the same time, more people can leave the grieving parties alone.

But there are limits on this, and they're fairly fucking obvious, and it only takes one media outlet to dance over the line, and everyone gets tarred with the same shit-brush.

One of the big arguments for a crackdown on use of social media pics recently has involved a terrible bus crash near Gisborne, and pictures of the injured victims that were taken and used on a leading news site.

Several people died, and dozens were injured, in the crash near Gisborne, and the victims were part of a Tongan church group. The Pacific Island communities have embraced the whole social media thing in a way tech-nerds never envisioned, using it to keep strong family bonds even tighter, and they share everything, including friends and family lying on gurneys in a hospital.

It wasn't hard to find these photos on Facebook, they were all public and heavily shared. There is no doubt almost every newsroom in the country saw them, and almost every newsroom in the country made the right and proper decision not to use them.

It was a question of dignity, and good taste, and plain good manners. Profile pics of a victim in happier days is one thing, people suffering and bleeding in plain sight was just unnecessary. It was no use arguing that it was all in a public forum, it was just gross and deeply invasive to use them.

Unfortunately, at least one of New Zealand's major news media outlets thought 'fuck it', slapped them up all over their website. They took a lot of immediate flak for doing so, and got heavily, and rightfully, slapped down by the BSA.

It was a fucking dumb decision, and the unfortunate side effect is that it created an example of media callousness that is going to be lobbed at every fucking journo for years to come. It's already been used as such in several chin-stroking think-pieces, and has also been put forward in parliamentary committee's looking at the issue.

Thanks a fucking lot, TVNZ.

There is nothing that can be done about it, because it was absolutely the wrong call to run those photos, and everybody fucking knows it. All the editors who saw those pics and decided not to use them just have to suck it up, and wait it out. Until the next time some other newsroom fucks up and makes us all look bad.

- Steve Lombard