Sky TV replacing daily news bulletin with 3-year-old episodes of Pawn Stars

Tuesday, 2 July 2024

The pay-TV firm has made clear it remains interested in delivering local news, but also that it has nothing to share now on what that might involve.

Sky Television will replace its free-to-air weekday 5.30pm news bulletins from next Monday with three-year-old episodes of United States reality TV show Pawn Stars, its forward schedules show.

It will replace its weekend bulletins with another US reality show, Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, which tracks American host Guy Fieri as he takes road trips visiting some of the country’s “classic ‘greasy spoon’ restaurants”.

Asked whether it was embarrassed by the line-up, a Sky TV spokesperson described Pawn Stars as a popular show and said the 5.30pm prime-time slots would after three weeks switch to coverage of the Paris Olympics, which is being held between July 26 and August 11.

The broadcaster has been forced to drop its “News First At 5.30” news bulletins, previously called Prime News, from its free-to-air Sky Open channel as they were produced by television channel Three-owner Warner Bros Discovery’s Newshub team.

Warner Bros Discovery announced in February that it would close its Newshub journalism arm, with its last bulletins airing on Friday.

Three’s 6pm news bulletins will be produced by Stuff Ltd from Saturday and rebranded ThreeNews, but no deal has been announced for Stuff to produce a version for Sky.

RNZ chief executive Paul Thompson talks about the state of media in Aotearoa.

Sky TV, which is listed and headquartered in New Zealand, has made clear that it remains interested in delivering local news if it can make that stack up commercially, but also that it has no plans it can currently discuss on what that might involve.

Industry sources believe the Government will announce as soon as Tuesday that it will advance the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill, drafted by the former government.

The law change would effectively force internet giants including Google and Meta to help fund journalism by requiring they enter into licensing deals for news content shared through their platforms on terms that could ultimately be set by regulators.

Media and Communications Minister Paul Goldsmith told The Post a fortnight ago that the Government was moving at a brisk pace to confirm its media policies and would have announcements to make soon.

A source said the Government intended make some tweaks to the legislation that was introduced to Parliament by Labour communications spokesperson Willie Jackson last year.

Those could include giving Goldsmith authority under the legislation to designate the internet firms that would be covered by the regime.