John Drinnan
OPINION: AUCKLAND (New Zealand Herald/Pacific Media Watch): Media coverage of Kim Dotcom and his businesses has missed the point and needs to be "more robust" now he has formed his own political party, says the head of New Zealand's Copyright Council.
Paula Browning, the council's chairwoman, says media have been caught up in public relations hype, and focused on the raid on Dotcom's Coatesville mansion near Auckland and his fight against extradition.
Other issues involving the German-born magnate - the charges against him and the issues surrounding file sharing - had received less coverage.
Media had been fascinated by parties around the Dotcom pool and events heavily promoted on social media, all designed to boost Dotcom's profile.
"Some publications you would expect better of have been less than balanced in their coverage and very open to attending parties at the mansion," she said.
She did not name names, but the New Zealand Herald and TV3's Campbell Live have been the highest-profile media reporting on Dotcom.
The National Business Review has also been focused on his file-sharing ventures, such as Mega.
"Dotcom operates a very good public relations strategy ... but there is not much behind it," Browning said.
Some media had reported on Mega as though it was a pure business. "But any file-sharing site has potential to be used for things that are not legal.
"From a New Zealand rights holder's perspective, it is not easy to find out if your content is there to be taken for free."
Scooped
Selwyn Pellett, whose family interests own 60 per cent of the press-release website Scoop, says items by former editor Alastair Thompson about Kim Dotcom - his new employer - will remain on the site, pending the set-up of a new governance structure.
Some people believe Thompson's new role as Internet Party secretary created a conflict of interest, but Pellett said he could not intervene on his own to decide if the items should stay or go. The new structure would keep editorial control distinct from ownership, and it would be up to the new editor to decide how it would be dealt with.
Pellett, who has informal associations with the Labour Party, is expected to announce plans soon to acquire other media-oriented businesses that will be associated with Scoop.
John Drinnan is the media columnist for the New Zealand Herald.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 New Zealand Licence.
Pacific Media Watch
