FAIRFAX – WHAT THE CUTS REALLY MEAN

THE CHASER’S CHRIS TAYLOR LAYS OUT HIS VISION FOR THE FUTURE OF FAIRFAX’S PRINT BUSINESS.

At Fairfax, we were all saddened today to read of News Limited’s decision to axe 1000 jobs. We were saddened in part because of what is says about this country’s increasingly fragile media landscape; but saddened mostly because it was 900 fewer jobs than Fairfax cut, so we look like the bigger cunts. 

There has been much speculation and misinformation in recent days about how the Fairfax cuts will affect our day-to-day business, so on behalf of the board I thought it might be prudent to spell out the likely short-to-medium term impact that the restructuring will have on our much loved newspapers and websites.

LOCAL NEWS 

It’s inevitable that our local news coverage will be affected by the 1900 job losses. We’re particularly sorry that many of these job cuts will come from the Masterchef Recap division, which will be reduced from 400 writers down to just 200. We’ve similarly had to axe 140 journalists from The Voice Recap department, and another 80 journalists from the Test Pattern Recap department. Despite these cuts, Fairfax promises to continue our commitment to serious quality journalism which readers of our daily tv show recaps have come to expect. 

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Similarly, cuts to our Foreign Desk will mean that our online news sites will have to limit their international coverage to only 4 fashion show videos per week. Fashion show photo galleries will also be scaled back, and we’ll now only have 16 full-time staff to source celebrity gossip and humorous viral videos that we can re-post on our websites as news.

THE GUIDE

Michael Idato and Doug Anderson’s daily online videos will remain a flagship feature of the smh.com.au website, but sadly we’ve had to reduce the number of Michael Idato’s chins from four to three. The surplus chin is expected to be redistributed to Fairfax shareholders, with the bulk of it expected to be absorbed by Gina Rinehart, who’s been looking to add an extra chin to her portfolio. 

CRICKET COVERAGE 

With great foresight and selflessness, Peter Roebuck elected to take his “voluntary redundancy” a year earlier than the rest of Fairfax staff, so this cut-back has essentially already taken effect. The remaining cricket writers on staff will be encouraged to take a leaf out of Roebuck’s book, by checking themselves into high-rise hotels and doing the honourable thing by the company.

SYRIA COVERAGE

Our coverage of the conflict in Syria will from now on be contained to a single small item in the World News section. So, in other words, no change. 

GERARD HENDERSON

Under the new paywall arrangements, Gerard Henderson’s weekly column will still be made available in full for free. But readers who wish to be shielded from it can pay a small monthly fee to ensure they never have to see it. 

SYDNEY MAGAZINE

Our popular monthly glossy has also been forced to tighten its belt, undertaking to publish 30% fewer items about Brendan Cowell’s perfect Sunday, or Neil Perry’s top five ways to cook pork belly. The magazine’s mandatory features on Hot Young Butchers To Watch and Sydney’s Top 5 Power Couples will be merged to produce a single monthly feature on Sydney’s Top 5 Power Butchers. 

THE WIZARD OF ID

The half joke that appears in the final panel of The Wizard of Id comic each day will now be reduced to a ¼ joke. Bristow, we’re happy to report, will remain unchanged as jokeless. 

MICHELLE GRATTAN

Michelle Grattan’s glasses will be reduced in size by 30%. Although a stringent cutback, readers can rest assured that her lenses will still be thicker than those used in the Hubble telescope. Sadly, our negotiations to similarly reduce the size (or existence) of Peter FitzSimons’ bandana were unsuccessful.

SAMANTHA BRETT

It’s not all bad news. Samantha Brett will rejoin the organization and, in addition to her weekly Sam and the City column urging women to be more open-minded about rape (“Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it, girls – it could get you that job promotion or that nice pair of Jimmy Choos you’ve been salivating over”), she will also take on the finance round, the environment round and the foreign desk. Additionally, Samantha Brett’s left bosom will replace Elizabeth Farrelly on the opinion page, penning a weekly think piece. This will leave her right bosom free to cover state politics.

COLUMN 8

In the new tabloid format, Column 8 will become Column 4, but its passion for blackboard menu spelling mistakes and amusing malapropisms overheard on the bus will remain unchanged. 

GOOD LIVING

Unfortunately the Good Living supplement on Tuesdays will now only be able to write-up three new Surry Hills establishments each week, instead of the traditional seven. Bill Granger’s picture byline will also now look 20% less gay. 

KATE WATERHOUSE

The popular ‘Lunch with Kate’ column in the Sun Herald is sadly also not immune. Budget cuts mean that Kate Waterhouse will only be able to interview half as many of her fashion chums about their rugby league boyfriends, or the two months they just spent in LA trying to get into acting. Budget cuts have also placed the Gazebo Wine Garden “off limits” for all of these lunches, forcing Kate to leave the eastern suburbs for the first time in her life (trips to Thredbo notwithstanding) to dine at Chinese Noodle Restaurant like the rest of us. 

SATURDAY SUPPLEMENTS

The raft of annoying, unwanted lifestyle supplements in the Saturday Age and Herald will be reduced from 15 to 14. We apologise that it couldn’t be more. As a gesture of goodwill towards our readers, the Drive and Domain supplements will now appear in every edition of the paper throughout the week in the place where we used to put the News. Readers should also note that the Jobs supplement will switch from tabloid format down to Post-It note size; this change is owing to the fact that there are no longer any media jobs in Australia left to advertise.

CHRIS TAYLOR WILL BE PERFORMING AT A RATIONAL FEAR LIVE NEXT MONDAY NIGHT 25TH OF JUNE AT THE FBI SOCIAL.

McDONALD’S GETS RE-COMMISSIONED

The Chaser’s Chris Taylor imagines the email exchange between Maccas and Channel Seven in getting Series Two of their “documentary” series on the air.

From: Catriona Noble, CEO McDonald’s AustraliaTo: Brad Lyons, Head of Production, Seven Network
CC: Steve Liebmann
Subject: New format ideas

Brad,

We’re still getting great feedback about the McDonald’s Gets Grilled special the other night. And Steve, you did an amazing job too – possibly your best journalistic investigation since those “alert but not alarmed” fridge magnets ads you did for the Howard government. Sorry, did I say ads? I meant undercover expose, obviously. From McDonald’s point of view we couldn’t be happier with how the show turned out. Sales of fries have already gone up 600% since people learnt we drench them in sugar syrup. But there’s still so much more we’d like to do.

Our TV Development division (formerly known as the Brand Management division) is keen to continue working closely with Seven to develop innovative and informative programming ideas that integrate the McDonald’s brand. I know you’ve already green-lit the Happy Meal Deal or No Deal children’s series for the 4.30pm slot, which is great news, but prime-time remains our main focus. Here’s the first batch of ideas myself and the team have come up with for your consideration:

McDonald’s Playland Gets Grilled

Six everyday kids, aged between 6 to 12, are taken to various plastics manufacturing plants around the country to witness first-hand where McDonald’s sources its playground equipment from. The kids will be able to meet slippery dip suppliers and ask any questions they have about the equipment’s levels of safety and fun. Steve Liebmann to host?

McDownton Abbey

A brand new series of the popular British drama where, at the onset of war, Lord Grantham and his staff must confront the added complication of a visit by the Hamburglar. Could maybe also include a sub-plot where Lady Mary finds herself having romantic feelings for Grimace. Could a shock wedding announcement be on the cards?? (Note: check if Derek Jacobi is available to play Grimace. Or, failing that, Steve Liebmann.)

Always In A Pickle

For Trevor and Sonia Pickle, life didn’t turn out quite how they’d imagined it. (I’ll leave it to your writers to fill in the rest. But basically, we just want something warm and inoffensive starring Rebecca Gibney. People still like Rebecca Gibney, right?)

Burger Security

A fly-on-the-wall reality series which follows airport Customs officials crack down on people bringing inferior hamburgers (read: any Hungry Jacks products) into the country. Could perhaps also examine McDonald’s increasing use of “lettuce mules” – air passengers to Australia who bravely swallow condoms full of lettuces to ensure that, even when ingredients are out of season, McDonald’s hamburgers still use the freshest available produce. Steve Liebmann to narrate?

Home & Away

Very happy to keep the existing show as is, but our Marketing Division wondered if we could tweak the language on the show a bit. So, for instance, instead of “flamin’ mongrels” could Alf Stewart perhaps make more references to “flamin’ grilled McChicken burgers”?

Better Homes and Drive-Thrus

The team explores Australia’s ongoing love affair with renovating McDonald’s drive-thru ramps. With expert everyday tips on design, landscaping and how to position the Order Box so it’s still harmonious with the environment.

Australia’s Got Nuggets

Self-explanatory really. A nation-wide search for Australia’s most intriguingly shaped nugget. Steve Liebmann to judge?

Channel 7 News

From our end, we’re very happy to arrange several armed hold-ups or aggravated assaults at McDonald’s stores to give you content for the 7pm news. Our in-store CCTV cameras will guarantee you “good pictures” that your rivals won’t have. In exchange we’d ask that each story include at least one vox pop with an eyewitness who remarks on the excellent value of the new Loose Change menu. (Sample grab: “With all your favourite McDonald’s treats now available for less than $2, I can’t believe anyone would need to rob this store!”)

Dancing with the Stars

Again, no major tweaks needed to show’s format (why fix what ain’t broke, right?), but in all on-screen graphics and supers could the host Daniel MacPherson please in future be referred to as Daniel Big Mac-Pherson? Likewise we’d like Todd McKenney to be called Todd Big Mac-Kenney. We’d also like the judge Helen Richey fired because we can’t make a McDonald’s-based pun out of her name.

 Celebrity McDonald’s Gets Grilled

Same as the original show, but with celebrities doing the “grilling”. I heard that Go Back To Where You Came From on SBS has got Peter Reith on board for their next series. How about we do the same, and get celebrity politicians to taste test McDonald’s? Has anyone got Amanda Vanstone’s number?

Obviously if any of these projects were commissioned we’d appoint an independent production company to make the series, to ensure absolute objectivity at all times. Please let me know what you think. We hope you’re as excited about these ideas as we are.

Kind regards,

 Catriona.

PS. I know I said let’s do lunch at McDonald’s next Friday. But is there any chance we could move that to Rockpool instead?

From: Brad Lyons, Head of Production, Seven Network
To: Catriona Noble, CEO McDonald’s Australia
CC: Steve Liebmann
Re: New format ideas

Catriona,

Thank you for your ideas. We’ll take them under consideration. Scheduling is a little tight at the moment, as we’ve just commissioned a new investigative documentary series Why Qantas Is Great, as well as the new 13-part family drama Telstra Gets Some Long Overdue Praise. We’re also still trying to find space for the exciting new sitcom Easy Off Bam! starring Kat Stewart and Martin Grellis.

 But we value your input and your ongoing role as a major advertiser/content provider on the Seven network. See you at Rockpool next Friday. But, please, don’t invite Steve.

Sincerely Yours,

Brad Lyons.

PS. Andrew O’Keefe LOVED your idea for Happy Meal Deal or No Deal re. getting all the models to hold Fillet-O-Fish burgers instead of briefcases. Unfortunately the burgers aren’t holding up too well under the hot lights, so we’ve had to go back to the briefcases. Our apologies.

Chris Taylor will join Dan Ilic for A Rational Fear LIVE on April 16th, 7:30pm, FBi Social, Level 2 Kings Cross Hotel, 248 Williams Street, Kings Cross.

A RATIONAL FEAR LIVE 2.0

CLICK FOR: FACEBOOK EVENT 

A Rational Fear LIVE: April 16th

“A Rational Fear LIVE” is back for a second helping of satirical comedy and muckraking.

Live on stage at the FBi Social and live on FBi radio

Join Hungry Beast’s Dan Ilic and Lewis Hobba, with DJ Tom Loud and Sydney’s best comedians including Scott Abbot (Political Asylum), Veronica Milsom (Triple J, TAYG), Mark Humphries (Raw Comedy), David Bloustien (GNW, Randling) as awell as special guests Chris Taylor from the Chaser and twitter / PM host Mark Colvin as they rip apart, openly mock and analyse the truth behind the news.

It’s fast, it’s funny, at ten bucks on the door it’s incredibly good value. 

A Rational Fear:there’s always something to be scared of.


9 Monorail Facts You Didn’t know.

Humorist, Writer and multiple Logies attendee Virginia Gay shares some unknown facts about Sydney’s metal snake.

Like the Loch Ness Monster, I have heard tell of the mythical ‘Monorail’, snaking through the city at night, slithering between tall buildings like some crack-headed-metal-cased Batman villain, tormenting tourists with it’s complete inability to get you anywhere useful. I even saw it once. Touched it. Yes, once I rode ‘El Mono’ as the locals call it. Took my cash, rode the shrieking, wailing banshee of uselessness all the way into oblivion, or, ‘Darling Harbour’ as the mystics termed it. I sailed it, in a Hunter S. Thomson flurry of peyote, visions and antiseptic handwash. I rocked myself to sleep in it’s yielding, fluro-lit embrace, all the while calling it by its sacred shamanic names, my Steel Snake, my Futuristic Fantasy, My Tapeworm of Tiresomeness.

I lived in Sydney for 20 odd years and only thought about the damn thing once, when somebody asked me, in delightfully accented nonsense, ‘how to mount it’. I told them it was up those stairs over there, pointed to a blank wall and sent them on their merry way.

Here, in its demise, are some Very True Facts about The Great Meccano Up-Python.

  1. You can legally have sex in any of the first five carriages but not the final one, and only if the train is moving. If you charge for your services, 35% of your total take goes to Sydney City Council. Found that out the hard way.
  1. The monorail was named after Marilyn Monorail, a fragile, highly-sexed, full-body-robot screen siren. She had that movie made about her recently. You know, Cowboys v Aliens.  
  1. The monorail is suspended on two rails, hence it’s name: ‘mono’ … wait.
  1. It is drawn by sixteen invisible horses, fed and watered hourly on PopRocks and Dr Pepper. They now have only the Harry Potter franchise to keep them in work. Hey, State Government? You never think about the welfare of the INVISBLE HORSES, do ya?
  1. Originally named the ‘elevated people mover’, this linguistic glitch meant that only Royalty, the Dalai Lama and those recently knighted could travel on it. It has since been amended to the ‘everybody people mover,’ the ‘some, usually-not-from-around-here people, mover’ and finally the ‘not people mover’ 
  1. When the monorail was originally erected there was national celebration. Everybody loved it. It has made a huge profit every single second of its being open and was considering running for election to public office. Sadly, The Scandal, has ruined those chances, but it would like you to know that no-one ever found the goat, so really, there is no case to answer, and everybody should stop asking about it.
  1. The disease ‘mono’ is named after the fact that you are most likely to catch mono on the monorail, as your parents would never let you see your first boyfriend in the house and nobody understood how much you loved each other and see point Number 1.
  1. It is a literal impossibility to even think about the monorail without singing all of The Simpsons’ monorail song from whoa to go. If you don’t know the song, you were not a child of the nineties and HAVE NEVER KNOWN TRUE JOY.
  1. The ‘monster-rail’, as Mike Carlton charmingly termed it, is, actually, a full functioning monster. An ancient curse was visited upon an earthworm by a spanner and it was doomed to roam the sky, feared as a god and hated like a kitten that’s done a stinky poo somewhere you can’t find. It has superpowers, can read your mind and shoots lasers from it’s front windows. We should all be Very Worried about revenge attacks. Once it’s off the rail, who knows where it will go? * Insert Tasmania joke here. *

Will I miss it? Of course. Every city loves a shared shame, something to complain about when the weather’s perfect, the politicians are honest, and the surf’s just right.

Would I have missed it more if I remembered it was there in the first place? I’m gonna have to be honest with you. Monowhat?

Searching For My Favourite Bland…

The Cults... worst band name ever

There’s more to naming your band than just picking a noun and adding “The”. Chief Music Correspondant Danny Yau gives new bands some free SEO consultation. 

In horse racing, there is a name registry. This international body, a group of no doubt highly awesome men who I imagine look and dress like the cast of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, make sure that no two horses have the same name. That’s why horse names are so awesome. Like the three time Melbourne cup winner Makybe Diva, whose naming story is now one of the best trivia questions ever.

And so why do we have a band called Cults?

I know almost nothing of this band. They might be quite good. But their wikipedia page tells me they are a) an indie pop band and b) from New York. So, already a target for much derision. I know one other thing about them. They’ve never heard of the Cult.

Maybe you’ve never heard of the Cult either. They are a British hard rock band that had a big hit with a song called She Sells Sanctuary. Their singer, Ian Astbury, was also the Jim Morrison replacement for the Doors Of the 21st Century. The Doors of the 21st Century, which features two members of the Doors, were sued for using the word Doors in their name and are now known as Manzarek–Krieger.

So Ian Astbury probably has a good band name lawyer in his rolodex. Look out, Cults.

And before you start saying that ‘The Cult’ and ‘Cults’ are two completely different words, let’s just imagine a world where there is a band called the U2s, the Coldplays or Beatle. And Cults is close, but there are plenty of examples of direct lifts. Two bands I have played in – The Hummingbirds and the Reservations, have new bands out with those names. Bastards.

There is a practical disadvantage too, in this day and age. Searching for band names on Google, Spotify, Amazon etc will only bring up your competitors. Sites like Last.fm can’t handle duplicate band names at all. Perhaps this is beyond those bands, as they clearly lack the ability to use Google correctly.

But there is another reason that I hate the name Cults. It’s because it’s such a terrible serach term anyway. In recent years we’ve seen a wave of bands with minimalist names that are impossible to find. San Fran band ‘Girls’ are the top offender. I love the band, but just try searching for them. I heard they were touring and I tried to google ‘Girls Sydney Dates’, and I almost breached the Electronic Communications Policy as set out by my workplace. To add insult to injury, their album was called ‘Album’.

Musicians are creative people. And creative people need boundaries. The horse people, they also look out for similar names, and they also reject bad names (although possibly only names in bad taste or outright rude). But a board that tells bands that their name doesn’t cut it and to go back and try again could lead to some wonderful band names. Like Makybe Diva.

Read more from Danny Yau at Leaps and Bounds.

Queensland’s new reality… Indeed!

Courteney Hocking resides in Melbourne but as a comedian and writer she’s always got one eye on our cousins up north…. 

The defining moment in Saturday night’s Queensland election coverage was watching Antony Green sit on the end of the ABC panel, face twitching with his usual Rain Man-esque excitement, repeating over and over: “They’re gone, they’re gone; they’re all gone as well”. He was like a commentator live at the side of the Titanic, watching the seats slip from Labor’s icy grasp into the deep, dark ocean of the LNP. 

It was obvious from the outset that things weren’t going to go well for the ALP. But just how historically bad things went, who (aside from an adrenalised Tony Abbott fresh from the bike convoy of no conscience, pumped up on scare mongering and Gatorade) could have guessed just how bad it would end up? Queenslanders were cross with Anna Bligh for selling off the family heirlooms without asking and her party was fighting an “It’s Time…To Turn Back Time” groundswell from the LNP after almost 20 years in power. Worst of all, Bob Katter had come out all guns blazing with his Australia Party and we all know that the closer you get to the equator, the more madness from old dudes in hats seems to make rational sense.

Now the dust has almost settled on the worst election result for Labor in living memory (well, aside from when we voted Kevin Rudd in but that was a different sort of mistake). As of Tuesday morning, with 25% of the votes still to be counted, the LNP hold 72 seats, while the ALP with a swing against them of over 15%, now hold… six.  Six seats. A cursory Google informs me that the only game requiring six players is Resident Evil 6, which ironically happens to be the very one Queensland ALP now has to play. The LNP have been seriously rejuvenated by their new leader Newman (which must always be said with a Seinfeldian fist shake) and without a bicameral system to keep their ambitions in check, will no doubt take to the task of running the state with great vigour and cries of “unprecedented mandate”.

Queensland can now look forward to using the Great Barrier Reef as the Great Restaurant Fish Tank, several months of people like Joe Bloody Hockey drawing breathless comparisons between Queensland and Juliar’s fate, and all the other states getting together to see if it’s legally possible to force Queensland to secede. But really, it’s just a matter of time: elections and huge eye-bleedingly painful losses to new leaders come and go in a relatively predictable cycle, which I’m sure will serve as some comfort to the 45 (45!) ALP members who lost their seats. No doubt it will be a useful stop to anyone contending that this election is proof that Labor has lost it’s way, which couldn’t possibly have happened (mostly because it’s not actually going anywhere in the first place).

The last word of the night must go to a newly elected LNP candidate that I cannot remember the name of because by the time he came on I was drunk, who said, “This election result is exciting because the people who got elected have different views of reality”. Different views of reality, indeed… Stay tuned for the part where it bites.

Follow Courteney Hocking on Twitter 

Buy Me A Kony

A Rational Fear’s chief Minister for Bullshitting Scott Abbott dresses down the #kony Kampaign

So you guys all know about Joseph Kony? Ugandan warlord, dropped out of school, formed the Lord’s Resistance Army, spent the last 25 years pillaging the central African countryside and now is the most hated man on the planet.  The message here for the kids… stay in school.

I love facebook campaigns.  I love how everyone on facebook is so progressive….. except when it comes to changing facebook.  Everyone on my facebook feed is all “open borders, legalise drugs, free Uganda!”  But when they make some tiny change to the facebook layout everyone goes “Death to Zuckerburg!”

Now the Kony campaign all started because this guy made a promise to a victim of Kony’s saying that he promised he would get Kony.  Now as a child I was always told “Don’t make promises you can’t keep”.  Another good rule to live by I think is “Don’t make promises you need the American Army to help you keep”

In the video the film maker explains the situation to his 5 year old son and and his son agrees that we should get Kony, and he uses this as evidence to support his campaign.  I was thinking “Is this really a responsible model for troop deployment? - basing American military strategy on what can be understood by a 5 year old?”  “Didn’t we try this under the bush administration?”

So with the Kony Campaign our job is to get in touch with 20 ‘culture makers’ and 12 policy makers.  These people lean on the American Government, who keep US advisors in Uganda, who then help the Ugandan army get Kony.

One of the interesting choices for Culture Makers we are meant to contact I thought was Bono.  They are actually asking us to contact Bono about this.  Say what you like about Bono, but my guess is that Bono already knows.  Can you imagine Bono getting all these tweets from 12 year olds all over the world?  “Dear Bono, I don’t know if you realise this, but bad things are happenning in Africa”  “P.S Africa is below Europe, I have attached a map.”

There are some strange choices for Policy Makers too.  George W. Bush is number 1.  Do you think George W. Bush is going to appreciate getting all these messages from the worlds left leaning humanitarians.  “Dear President Bush, we’ve come up with this great new policy, everyone is onboard, I think you’re going to love it.  We call it …. American Military Intervention! How it works is, we sent American troops into a sovereign country and get the bad guys… I dont know why someone hasn’t thought of this earlier”

The other one I thought was a interesting was someone who was omitted from the list of policy makers.   Former US Secretary of State Condelleza Rice, on the list.  Former US President Bill Clinton, on the list.  Current US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, nowhere to be seen.  “Quick, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, theres trouble in a far off land and the world needs you… to contact your predecessor and your husband.” 

No no, don’t bother yourself with it Hillary.  If you really want to help just share this video on facebook.

And do you have George Clooneys number?