Bauer Media closures: So many livelihoods, so much devastation

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OPINION: The end, when it came, came quickly.  For me and my colleagues at Bauer Media New Zealand, which owns the New Zealand Listener, the New Zealand Woman’s WeeklyWoman’s Day NZNorth & South and a host of other magazines, the first notice was a text message at 8.30am today saying we needed to be on a Zoom call at 9am. “Your attendance is required”, the text said.

At the Listener, we already knew that we were not publishing a print edition this week. Bizarrely, the Government had announced a few days ago that weekly publications were not allowed to publish because they may be a health risk.

It was so absurd to think that a democratic government would close down any media during a state of emergency that I assumed Bauer would fight the decision or, in the finest media traditions, publish and be damned.  As it transpired, we were damned; we just didn’t publish. Instead, the company seemed to acquiesce with what felt to me to be worrying ease.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120768725/bauer-media-closures-so-many-livelihoods-so-much-devastation