Ralston leaves on Friday
January 30th, 2007 at 12:41 pm by David FarrarThe Herald reports Bill Ralston has quite his job with TVNZ and leaves on Friday. This was announced shortly before the new TVNZ staff structure announcement.
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January 30th, 2007 at 8:30 pm
Until TVNZ wakes up to the obvious facts that:
(a) viewers don’t want 50% of the news hour devoted to sport and
(b) we don’t “invite” Simon and Wendy into our living rooms, we don’t give a damn who they are provided they’re not ugly and
(c) their low ratings are due to the above + vapid content
then their ratings dive will continue.
It wasn’t all Ralston’s fault.
Vote:January 30th, 2007 at 8:31 pm
Good riddance. I’ve always been a fan of him as an entertaining TV personality ( anyone remember The Ralston Group ) but as a manager he was appalling and just dumbed everything down. His only real acheivement was getting rid of that arrogant midget who used to host the 7:00 pm trash journalism slot.
Vote:January 30th, 2007 at 9:30 pm
I lossed a few bets. I bet he would be gone within a year of being in the job (probably more to do with the terms of his contract), since his performance as a manager was abysmal. I really enjoyed the Ralston Group. Hope he gets back into fronting a political show or two.
Vote:January 30th, 2007 at 9:49 pm
I loved the voiceover on the end credits of The Ralston Group “Conviviality and reconciliation is assisted by Glengarry wines…”
Vote:January 30th, 2007 at 10:15 pm
…we don’t give a damn who they are provided they’re not ugly…
I don’t recall Dougal Stevenson or Philip Sherry being drop dead gorgeous (sorry, Dougal and Philip). Or any other newsreader till about 10 or 15 years ago.
Now it seems that’s all they need to be.
I’ll take my news from someone who looks like a bulldog licking a thistle covered in… well, they can basically look like me after a night on the turps provided they know what they’re talking about.
Lest anyone think Judy Bailey was actually worth $800,000 or that Simon and what’s-her-name are worth whatever they’re getting, ponder this. When it needed newreaders for it’s 3G mobile phone news service, a UK firm decided it could dispense with humans altogether and employed monkeys. Monkey avatars, in fact, which took text from Reuters, ran it through a text-to-speech converter, and read it out.
Vote:January 30th, 2007 at 10:34 pm
As a ‘brand’, Bailey may have been worth probably more.
Vote:January 30th, 2007 at 10:41 pm
I loved the voiceover on the end credits of The Ralston Group “Conviviality and reconciliation is assisted by Glengarry wines…”
Posted by Put it away | January 30, 2007 9:49
and… Choose to dine at Ramses. (Read free nosh and boose for Bill & Co. No wonder they went belly-up)
Vote:January 30th, 2007 at 11:52 pm
We really should start an internet campaign to bring back The Ralston Group.
It was good.
One of the most legendary moments in NZ modern television has to be the show when they looked like they had been drinking at Ramses all afternoon and Jenny McManus went fly at I think Derek Fox and then the show descended into an all in verbal brawl that looked like it was one away from punches.
There are some logistical issues however such as they would have to pay bail for Peter Verschaffelt first
Vote:January 31st, 2007 at 7:14 am
Cactus – hah, I didn’t know that about Peter before now. That’s just bizarre. I’m just picturing him with Anthony Dixon eyes…
Vote:January 31st, 2007 at 8:22 am
I may be wrong, but I think it’s Verschaffelt’s son that would need bail.
Vote:January 31st, 2007 at 9:59 am
Hah! I was wrong. Like father like son eh?
Vote:January 31st, 2007 at 3:42 pm
Re Judy’s 800k, TVNZ are their own worst enemies. They spent hundreds of ks telling us how wonderful she was and we couldn’t be without her in our homes. After doing that they could hardly quibble about paying her. Then after waxing lyrical about their Asian news coverage they sacked Charlotte Glennie who was a decent reporter.
Doesn’t this and Ralston’s sacking show that the product offered just does not live up to the marketing, (in which case why isn’t it the marketers being sacked? or more insidiously, does this mean marketers are driving news values?.
I also find some of the commentary on Ralston’s departure odd. Are they really serious when they say he reintroduced strong news values into the newsroom? Have these guys switched on to emotive, he said/she said, never let the facts get in the way rubbish put out.
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