2007 NZ radio survey results!

After waiting a year the latest New Zealand radio survey ratings are out. Of course radio stations have their big promotions during this period trying to attract listeners by giving away lots of money. There are four markets that I’m mainly interested in and I’ll make comments on these:

Waikato
This is where I live and listen to the radio so that’s why I’m particularly interested in this market. The Rock shoots to number one for the first time after The Edge and Classic Hits dominating Waikato radio for a few years. The Rock is at 15% (up a massive 4%), Classic Hits is now second at 12.6% (down 0.1%), and my favourite station, Radio Hauraki, is now in third place at 9.6% (up 0.7%). The Edge has dropped to fourth with 8.8% (down a whole 4.6%). The talk station I listen to, Newstalk ZB, is fifth with 8.5% (down a little by 1.1%). This is much better than the other talk station, Radio Live, which is only on 2.7%. Another music station I listen to is More FM and it’s good to see them up by 2.5% to 5.7%. More FM has been struggling for a while in the Waikato so it’s good to see them come back up a bit.

Manawatu
This is where I grew up and most of my family are still down there so this is why I’m interested in this market. The Rock hangs onto its number one spot on a big 17% (down just slightly by 0.4%). More FM (ex 2XS) had dominated Manawatu radio for many years but for the second survey in a row they are only in second place, on 13.7, although they are catching up slightly, rising by 1.9%. Oldies station Coast has been growing in listenership over the past couple of years. They are now at 6.9% (up 0.9%). No Radio Hauraki in the Manawatu (which is quite weird!)

Auckland
The largest radio market in the country so these survey results are always interesting. As usual Newstalk ZB is number one again – Paul Holmes still does it for Aucklanders. Newstalk ZB are at 13.3% (down slightly by 0.9%). Newstalk ZB’s main rival, Radio Live, is way down the list at only 3.1%. Coast, TRN’s oldies station, is doing extremely well in Auckland. They are now second at 8.6% (up by 1.1%). The Rock follows closely behind on 8.3% (up by 2.6%). Mai FM dominated Auckland radio for a few years but hasn’t been doing so well in recent times. They are now in sixth place on 5.6% (down by 0.6%). It’s good to see More FM and Radio Hauraki both up a little in the Auckland market – More FM up by 0.5% to 5.2%, and Hauraki up by 1% to 4.5%.

Wellington
Another interesting market being the capital of New Zealand. ZM, which used to dominate Wellington radio, is back in the number one spot on 15.7% (up 1.1%). (You may remember that ZM used to be ZMFM and before that 2ZM – if you can remember that far back!) The Breeze, which had been dominating Wellington radio for the past few years, has now dropped to third place on 13.7% (down 2.4%). (And you may remember that The Breeze used to be Radio Windy way back). Newstalk ZB is now second on 14.2% (up 0.6%). By the way, The Rock is fourth on 8% (up 0.5%).

Nationwide
Now let’s have a look at the country as a whole. For the first time the number one station in the country is, you guessed it, The Rock. It’s not a station I listen to (I prefer Radio Hauraki) but it appears a lot of people around the country do listen to it. The Rock are at 11.7% nationwide (up by 1.6%). The previous number one station in the country, Newstalk ZB, has slipped to second place on 11.3% (down by 1.4%). At least they are still the number one talk station in the country which I’m very happy about, as their rival Radio Live is in 11th place on only 3.1%. I wonder if MediaWorks regrets splitting Radio Pacific in half a couple of years back? Speaking of Radio Pacific (which also carries Trackside) they are at a lowly 1.1%. Next week Radio Pacific are changing to a sports station called BSport. I guess they are hoping to improve their ratings, and image, rather than just being a racing station. Their rivals, Radio Sport, are higher in the ratings on 3.1%, so BSport will have quite a bit of work to do. The number one music station a couple of years back, Classic Hits, are now in third place on 8.9% (down by 0.9%). Perhaps MediaWork’s rebranding of all their local stations to More FM (a couple of years ago) has paid off a little for them. More FM is now fourth nationwide on 7.7% (up by 0.4%). TRN recently renamed its easy listening station Viva to Easy Mix. This has paid off slightly as they are up by 0.3% to 1.6%. Although they are a long way from their rivals, The Breeze, who are on 5.1%. And lastly let’s talk about the wonderful Kiwi FM. This was a rebranding by MediaWorks a couple of years or so back of Channel Z (which did a bit better in the ratings) to an all NZ music station called Kiwi FM. They are on a whopping 0.1%! MediaWorks wanted a frequency in Auckland for The Edge so they got rid of Kiwi FM. So the government stepped in and gave them three frequencies around 102FM to carry Kiwi FM (which TRN were not too happy about). I guess this means it’s a station MediaWorks don’t have to worry about too much because they would have canned it by now. I’ve tuned into Kiwi FM a couple of times and even though I like NZ music I haven’t heard a song on this station that I like, or recognise!

For more information on the survey results see: http://www.radios.co.nz/radio_research/radio_research.htm
http://www.radioscope.net.nz/index.php?option=com_content&task=section&id=5&Itemid=39

Sad, sad day for New Zealand

We all thought it would be a straightforward win to the All Blacks in the World Cup quarter final this morning, and I was thinking wouldn’t it be funny if NZ lost the match against France. When I was watching the match this morning and the All Blacks were in the lead at half-time I thought they would win no problem. But as is the case all too often with NZ sport, when it comes to the crunch, they fail. Hence, France won the match 20-18. The worst result ever in a World Cup for NZ – bailing out in the quarter final!

S0 who do we blame for the match? The coach? The players? Or maybe the referee. The referee did make a couple of significant mistakes which could have cost NZ the match – the unnecessary sending off of one of the players, and the forward pass by the French before their winning try. Unfortunately referees are not perfect so I guess they do make mistakes, but he shouldn’t have made mistakes like that at this level of rugby. I’m sure there will be an inquest into the All Black’s lost and perhaps some heads will roll too.

NZ had three chances this year at being world champions and I thought at least we’d win a couple of them – the cricket world cup, the America’s Cup, and the rugby world cup – but, we won none! I think NZ sporting teams get too confident of themselves and completely lose it at the end.

Whether we like it or not it is a national disaster. Rugby is the number one sport in this country and it means a lot to a lot of people. It was even the main thing discussed at church today!

There are just two things I wish to say – roll on 2011, and Bloody French!!

Go to the toilet in Te Awamutu

If you want a nice place to go to the loo then come to my beautiful town, Te Awamutu! It has been named by the Keep New Zealand Beautiful Society as the winner in the Best Public Toilet category! The chief executive of the society said: "A lot can be told about a place from its loos, so Te Awamutu must be a great place to live." So when you think of nice toilets you think of Te Awamutu!!

See:
http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/newsdetail1.asp?storyID=124745

Free toll calls for the Waikato region!

At last, a phone company has done the sensible thing and got rid of all the toll boundaries for the Waikato:

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU0709/S00206.htm

TelstraClear have announced that we can now call anywhere in the Waikato for free! This is excellent! The toll boundaries around here imposed by Telcom were crazy! I live in Te Awamutu and I can call Kawhia for free, but not Hamilton or Otorohanga which are much closer. When I lived in Otorohanga last year I could only call Otorohanga for free (90% of my phone calls were outside Otorohanga). Calling Te Kuiti (a 15 minute drive away) was a toll call.

I am so happy now I left that hopeless Telecom and joined TelstraClear a couple of years ago.

See: www.bigbackyard.co.nz

An Inconvenient Truth?

Today I finally got to see the Al Gore documentary movie “An Inconvenient Truth”. And it is an “inconvenient truth” for a lot of people, especially our politicians. This movie has had an effect on me and I didn’t think that it would.

Global warming had been a topic that I have been quite sceptical of – especially living here in New Zealand. I feel that the older I get the colder the winters get, and I often say “I can’t wait for that global warming to kick in!” But now that I look back at this winter I must say that it has been milder than usual. I’m sure we haven’t had as many frosts as usual. Usually well into September (even further) we still have frosts, however this week we have had two days near the 20° mark. I’m not alone in thinking that we have had fewer frosts. This article from The Dominion Post last month says the same thing:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/4162466a11.html

I have always been a fan of Al Gore and I believe he should have become president of the United States in 2000 instead of that idiot George W Bush. After all, Al Gore got 48.4% of the vote and Bush got 47.9%. I’d go as far to say that 9/11 may not have happened the way it did if Al Gore was president. I’m not the only one who thinks this:
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070913043019AAHltQ3

Let’s have a look at some of the facts from the movie. Now I see no reason to dispute these facts, but then again statistics can be altered and presented in any way to suit your own purposes. So I have done a little research myself to see what I can come up with. The movie says that the ten hottest years ever measured have all occurred in the last fourteen years. Wikipedia has a page showing the warmest years on record since 1880. This table shows that the 17 warmest years on record occurred within the last 20 years!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature_record_since_1880

The movie says the number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes has almost doubled in the last 30 years. Apparently intensity in Hurricanes (and other tropical storms such as cyclones and typhoons) increases with rises in ocean temperature. This page on Wikipedia says a similar thing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricanes#Long_term_activity_trends

The movie says the flow of ice from glaciers in Greenland has more than doubled over the past decade. Glaciers around the world do appear to be shrinking, as this page on Wikipedia shows:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_global_warming#Glacier_retreat_and_disappearance

Those are just a few of the many things that Al Gore mentioned in the movie. Wikipedia has a page which says a lot of interesting things about this movie:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_inconvenient_truth

Here’s a few of the things that are mentioned:
The Associated Press contacted more than 100 climate researchers and questioned them about the film's veracity. All 19 climate scientists who had seen the movie said that Gore conveyed the science correctly.
In contrast, the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, at the time chaired by Republican Senator Jim Inhofe issued a press release criticizing this article. Inhofe's statement that "global warming is the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people" appears in the film. (Trust a Republican to say that!)
RealClimate, a group blog maintained by eleven climate scientists, lauded the film's science as "remarkably up to date, with reference to some of the very latest research."
Michael Shermer, scientific author and founder of The Skeptics Society, wrote in Scientific American that An Inconvenient Truth "shocked me out of my doubting stance". (Same with me)
President Bush, when asked whether he would watch the film, responded: "Doubt it."
In September 2006, Gore traveled to Sydney, Australia to promote the film. Australian Prime Minister, John Howard said he would not meet with Gore or agree to Kyoto because of the movie: "I don't take policy advice from films." Former Opposition Leader Kim Beazley joined Gore for a viewing and other MPs attended a special screening at Parliament House earlier in the week.
At the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, the movie received three standing ovations.
The film received a positive reaction from critics. It garnered a "certified fresh" 93% rating at Rotten Tomatoes (as of May 21, 2007), with a 94% rating from the "Cream of the Crop" reviewers. Film critics Roger Ebert and Richard Roeper gave the film "two thumbs up".
And most importantly, The film won the 2006 Academy Award for Documentary Feature.

Of course there is political and economic opposition to things mentioned in this film. To some governments and a lot of corporates profits are much more important than the environment. Remember if we don’t have an Earth to live on then what’s the point of wealth? The Kyoto Protocol is an international treaty on climate change. It assigns mandatory emission limitations for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions to the signatory nations. As of December 2006, a total of 169 countries and other governmental entities have ratified the agreement. Two notable exceptions include the United States and Australia (lead, in my opinion, by two of the greatest idiots in world politics at the moment – George W Bush and Johnny Howard). Australia is one of the biggest emitters on a per capita basis, and the United States was, as of 2005, the largest single emitter of carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto_Protocol

The most recent APEC summit was held just earlier this month in Sydney, Australia. During this summit Bush and Howard cuddled up to each other as usual. They proposed nuclear energy as a solution to global warming. What??!! Does no one remember Chernobyl in 1986?? The "Sydney Declaration on Climate Change" was signed on 8 September 2007 by the leaders present at APEC. It indicates the wish of signatories to work towards non-binding "aspirational" goals on energy efficiency per unit of GDP. Notice the words “non-binding”. Brilliant! That ain’t going to help anything! See this Wikipedia page for more on APEC 2007:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/APEC_Australia_2007

Being a Christian I strongly believe that we are in the last days and that the Second Coming of Jesus is not too far away. So is global warming a result of human’s CO2 emissions or a sign of the last days? Let’s have a look at a couple of scriptures.

Matthew 24:7
For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.

Doctrine and Covenants 88:87
For not many days hence and the earth shall tremble and reel to and fro as a drunken man; and the sun shall hide his face, and shall refuse to give light; and the moon shall be bathed in blood; and the stars shall become exceedingly angry, and shall cast themselves down as a fig that falleth from off a fig-tree.

It could be a bit of both – signs of the last days and human cause. So in both these cases there are things we need to do. Now I don’t want to become a greenie or a “tree-hugging hippy” but there are little things we can do to help out. Perhaps the little things we do won’t help the world’s environment significantly, but it’s a start. We can use those energy-efficient light bulbs. I have a couple in my place. Apparently they last much longer and use up less electricity. Recycle as much of your refuse as you can. They make it easy for us here in the Waipa District by providing special blue bins that we can chuck our old bottles etc into. These bins are free – which is better that putting all my rubbish into bags which cost money! And if you are fortunate enough to live in a city with a good public transport system then use it! Why use up petrol (and patience) by getting stuck in traffic jams every day?! At the same time we need to prepare ourselves for the Second Coming of Christ. Read your scriptures and go to church to find out howJ. Here’s a good article from the Ensign magazine which goes along with this:
http://www.lds.org/portal/site/LDSOrg/menuitem.b12f9d18fae655bb69095bd3e44916a0/?vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=3613b850e318b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&hideNav=1

Whilst I enjoyed the movie and am starting to accept a lot of things that Al Gore was saying, I don’t believe that things will deteriorate as fast as he suggests (such as temperature rise and the rise of sea levels). But if you have not seen “An Inconvenient Truth” then make sure you do. I think it should be a must see for everyone. If you live in Australia then vote for Labor later this year, and if you live in the USA then vote for the Democrats next year!

For more information about the movie see:
http://www.climatecrisis.net/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_inconvenient_truth

Bush's alien overlord peeks through window during speech

Someone pointed out this CNN video of Bush giving a talk on subprime mortgages. Check out the alien behind the window in the background. [Above Bush's right shoulder].

http://www.boingboing.net/2007/09/07/bushs-alien-overlord.html

Sky TV vs TVNZ

You may have heard some rumours recently that TV One and TV2 are no longer going to be on Sky Digital. Well, this is true, but not until 2011. This is when their contract expires.

TVNZ are starting their new channel called “TVNZ 6” and the end of this month, but it will only be on Freeview. This means to see this channel you will need to purchase a Freeview receiver, costing between $200-$300 (not exactly free is it!) However, this new channel is not going to be available on Sky Digital. Now hang on, I understand that $79 million of taxpayers money is going towards TVNZ’s digital channels. So then shouldn’t these new government funded channels be on Sky Digital so that more of the country’s taxpayers can view them? There are far more Sky subscribers in NZ compared to Freeview so why should we fork out for another decoder?? Some of that $79 million is mine too!

But there appears to be some tit-for-tat going on between TVNZ and Sky TV. TVNZ aren’t going to put its TVNZ 6 and TVNZ 7 channels on Sky Digital and Sky TV aren’t going to put Prime on Freeview. A bit childish if you ask me. That’s one main reason why I don’t want to get rid of Sky TV and get Freeview instead because I watch a lot of great programmes on Prime such as Star Trek, Doctor Who, America’s Got Talent, The Late Show, and of course the rugby and league coverage!

So what do they do in this situation in other countries? Let’s have a look at the example of the BBC in the UK. BBC carries all their channels on their Freeview service and on Britain’s Sky TV service! Even Sky TV broadcast some of their channels on Freeview! Wake up Television New Zealand!

But then is it really worth getting Freeview for this new TVNZ 6? Most of the programmes are going to be reruns, such as: Fraggle Rock, Country Calendar, Mai Time, It’s in the Bag, and Shortland Street. Heck, I think I’ll stick with Sky TV!

Here’s some websites about this:

http://www.stuff.co.nz/4187772a13.html
http://www.geekzone.co.nz/Jama/3672
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2007/09/totally_unacceptable_tvnz.html
http://tvnz.co.nz/view/tvnz_6_index_skin/tvnz_6_index_group

A Mormon president?

We all by know that there is a member of the LDS Church running for US president in 2008 - Mitt Romney (aka "Mitt the Mormon"). The church has come under scrutiny with Mitt running and there has been a lot already in the media about it.

Here's a well-written in-depth article by Laurie F. Maffly-Kipp, who teaches American religious history at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. She explores Mormonism and the implications of what it would mean to have an active, practicing Mormon as president. Ms. Maffly-Kipp focuses her attention on what she feels are the three most relevant issues: religious authority, moral values and church and state. To read the entire article on the Christian Century web site go to:

http://www.christiancentury.org/article.lasso?id=3594

I thought this would be a negative article about the church, but actually it's quite good.