Jordan Shanks, better known as FriendlyJordies, is a satirist, a self taught cross media reporter and a heavy hitting political influencer.

Two years ago, Bourke community station 2WEB saved the local newspaper from closure and now operates The Western Herald along with its radio station.

Chairman Ian Cole told the CBAA Conference that local news has become more important that ever as other media companies pull away from local reporting.

“Nothing has been left untouched.”

The ABC’s Director of News Gaven Morris explains the strategy behind the recent cut to the 0745 radio news.

In a detailed interview with Steve Ahern, Morris says there is a bigger picture than just cutting a bulletin, the change is part of the rebalancing of priorities to better serve digital audio services, as well as broadcast radio.

The University of Canberra is undertaking research into the needs of regional journalists and is asking for help from reporters in rural or regional areas.
 
The research is supported by the Google News Initiative, and the research team is sending emails out to regional journalists, inviting them to take part in a short 10 minute survey to better understand the work done and the requirements needed especially in the digital field of news gathering and disbursement.
 

Earlier this week we published Michael Miller's comments on Google's new strategy to deliver radio news on smart speakers.

He wasn't happy with the idea, saying that Google wanted to profit from radio news companies' journalism without paying for it.

Michael Miller knows news, and he knows radio.

He is now the Executive Chairman of News Corp and was previously the CEO of APN, which owns the Australlian Radio Network.

Miller is concerned by a new trend he sees happening in the emerging audio space.

Google is urging radio stations to format and bookmark their audio news content in a way that will enable the world wide search engine giant to slice and dice content to deliver it to its consumers in a way that suits their preferences.

At the start of each new year there are a range of studies and reports looking at media and journalism the past year and in the coming 12 months.

radioinfo has taken a look at four of the latest studies and summarises them for you.

The gift that keeps on giving - Holiday season radio listening.