Mike's Minute: Good riddance to the BSA

I do worry about Paul Goldsmith's ability to make a decision.  The BSA and its abolition is a “done by morning tea, let's move onto the important stuff” sort of thing.  And yet he seems to have been waxing and waning and pontificating for the past two years of Government.  At last, he has got there. The Broadcasting Standards Authority is over and thank the good Lord for that.  It was from another time: pre-streaming, pre-international, no borders broadcasting. It caught the few originals left in a weird, old net that made no sense.  And that’s on top of the fact they had next to no complaints given no one can be bothered and most of the industry is professionally run anyway.  The NZ Media Council will apparently take over duties, which I'm sort of torn over.  I think we need someone who corrects mistakes.  A decision this week over a story on the Interislander found the numbers used in the story on costings was wrong.  Winston Peters complained, he was right, they needed to correct the record. The point in that example is he went to the company who published and they rejected his argument. You would like to think they were better than that, hence the need for the council.  But those sorts of examples aside, what these quasi-courts end up doing is adjudicating on nuance and argument based on the moaning of some bored loser in suburbia, who would probably be better off watching less TV or reading less news and writing fewer letters.  I do worry about the council. The current lot appear all lawyers and consultants, with not a single proper broadcaster. They do, they tell me, have some industry people who offer advice.  But let me tell you this; unless you have driven a three-hour live radio programme or a live TV show with its varying unpredictables, you have no idea of the pressure that unfolds literally instantly, therefore the potential for verbal carnage. And yet that’s the sort of thing they pass judgement on.  Anyway, the BSA – been there, done that. It made no difference. It was an idea past its time.  And it will not be missed. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.