News MAP money is coming! Actual grant funding by the federal government, 3.5 years after it was first promised by a Labor opposition two elections ago. Applications to the $67.6 million Journalism Assistance Fund will open in mid-November. #NewsMAP

I'm so excited about this. The @lina.org.au summit is my favourite few days of the year. Getting to host it in Murray Bridge in 2026 is gonna be a career highlight. Can't wait to welcome you all to the Murraylands.

It has been 20+ years since I did my undergrad degree, but I agree with Chrisanthi here: the experience wouldn't have been so formative without in-person, shoulder-to-shoulder learning, including in lecture theatres. (I'm curious about the idea of viva voce too, but that's another story.)

For news publishers, there's a lot to take out of this recent report by Kristy Hess, Angela Ross et al, looking at public broadcasters' partnerships with other media around the world...

Keen to give this whole report a read, but here's a taste. What can public broadcasters do to help amid a crisis for local news?

I'm not a subscriber, but even the free section of this piece by Doug Shapiro is insightful. This is the big-picture thinking we need to survive in media.

"Only if the ACMA now imposes a new condition that breaching the decency standard for a tenth (11th; 12th?) time could affect the licence, might we see an actual commercial consequence." This s*** gives everyone in media a bad name. ACMA, or someone, needs to bring it to heel.

Excited to be bringing ice cream mogul Dimi Kyriazis to Murray Bridge on October 15 for a breakfast chat about his business' expansion plans in the Murraylands.

Chalk another win up for public pressure + local media: a major Murraylands employer has agreed to tighter licence conditions after neighbours complained about the smell.

To my colleagues in Canberra: please be better than this! I know you have professional FOMO. I know it's your responsibility to ensure your readers get access to every story. But not on ridiculous terms dictated by the government or opposition, surely.

"Genuinely open democracies start with the assumption that all info should be freely shared unless there is a strong public interest reason why not. Australian institutions often start with an assumption that you shouldn’t share info unless you have to." I hate how right Tim Burrowes is on this.

From me: How can a community get rid of its bad, old reputation? I ask a couple of Murraylands marketing experts, and put their thoughts to the council CEO.

To watch a publication that came up at the same time as my own, on the same platform (albeit in a market 150x bigger), go on to this kind of success is just incredible. Hats off to @joshiherrmann.bsky.social and his team.

Now the movers and shakers are talking about tax offsets for journalists' salaries instead of a digital platforms levy, or a bargaining code, reports @timburrowes.bsky.social. More than three years have passed since Labor (in opposition!) promised certainty to the media sector. We're still waiting!

Congrats to Belinda Willis as she settles into one of the most important roles in South Australian media.

The identity of a jockey who suffered a nasty fall in Murray Bridge last week has been revealed. Thankfully her condition is stable.

This spring has been a bad time for fires and accidents in the Murraylands. Yesterday it was a shed fire on my old street.

Mis- and disinformation are among the biggest threats to world peace at the moment. Why is our government dragging its feet on addressing the problem?

File this under friggin' cool. I recently wrote a story about an analogue photographer who had produced a book about car culture. During our interview, he shot a pic of me on his old twin-lens Mamiya C330. He just sent me the developed image. Thank you Ethan Klemm!

"Audiences want local news that is related to their everyday lived experiences, initiatives and achievements in their local community, and stories that highlight community resilience." Encouraging bit of research by @skpark.bsky.social and her colleagues.

Finding out what's happening in the world shouldn't be depressing, should it? That's why, at Murray Bridge News, we've introduced a Good News section, with all the celebrations, award wins and sporting victories you could want – not a crime or disaster in sight.

I was delighted this week to chat with James Dibble from Grange Development, and get an update on one of the biggest residential developments in SA's history: Gifford Hill.

Murray Bridge has a reputation as a "meth town". Is that fair? We investigate.

I'm not really up with current music any more, not like I was back in my 20s. But I tell you what, I'm excited to give the new album by the Beths a spin. Top shelf songwriting.

Individual organizations can survive in a destroyed ecosystem, but for publishers to thrive, they need to figure out how to both address the rise of AI, which feels inevitable, and connect directly with audiences who are hungry for information.

When Georgina Sutton started flying, there were no female pilots for her to look up to. Things are different now, as the first women to serve as chief pilot of an Australian airline looks back on her career.

Ethan Klemm's grandfather likes working on old cars – he has a 1947 Chevy Fleetmaster. Ethan likes analogue photography – he sometimes shoots on a Mamiya C330. Both hobbies require dedication and purpose. Now Ethan has found a way to combine them.

It was wonderful on Friday to be at the opening of the Moorundi Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Service's swish new clinic. The dream of a health centre for the Ngarrindjeri nation has taken 23 years to realise, and I'd been following it for more than half of that time.

I also wrote this week about the death of Dawn Matthews, one of the most caring community leaders you could ever meet. It felt like she was everybody's aunty, I wrote in 2022, when she launched an unsuccessful mayoral campaign. She'll be missed.

It has been one of the most depressing news weeks I can remember here in SA's Murraylands. The lowlight has been this unimaginably awful story about two 21-year-old women who were in a car accident on Tuesday. One died at the scene, the other survived the trauma but now faces criminal charges.

Congratulations to @timburrowes.bsky.social on four years of Unmade! And all that has happened since. I applaud his commitment to radical transparency in state-of-the-nation posts like this.

Doing a podcast has always felt like it would be a lot of extra work. But two minutes, you say...?

It's a good time to be in outdoor media, Mumbrella reports.

Bit of a dry political yarn from me, this one.

Confession: Before I studied journalism I was sure I'd be a fiction writer. I was ~140,000 words into an original space opera. I even had Fiona McIntosh encourage me to press ahead (not that she actually read any of it). One day maybe.

I normally try to steer clear of medical facilities, but it was nice to visit a brand new one at Mannum this week.

Powderhand #IncreaseABand

“If we continue to see media policy through the frame of entrenching incumbency, we really risk having a future landscape of just a few commercial players employing fewer and fewer journalists. I think that’s the wrong answer.” Man, first Hywood, now I'm agreeing with Chris Janz.

"I don’t see how it would be possible for most people to have a shared grasp of reality..." Kick off your Friday morning with some unsettling observations from Brian Morrissey!

Another day, another destiny.

Here's a good column from Anna Pujol-Mazzini which tries to articulate what's wrong with the news industry. "The hours spent staring in despair at my phone were hours I wasn’t spending building communities, movements and projects with people."

A question I've faced: when new subs start to plateau, how can you wring more value out of the supporters you have? “We’ve already got that audience ... What do we offer them that’s actually worth more?” –Adi Ignatius www.therebooting.com/hbrs-adi-ign...

"...Murray Bridge, Mr Murray told Murray Bridge News..." There's such a thing as using a word too many times in a sentence, isn't there

How did @publicinterestnews.org.uk secure an equivalent of Australia's News Media Bargaining Code for the UK? Short answer: years of policy work and advocacy. And that's just to get to the starting line for designation, which could lead to actual funds flowing to publishers...

A last-minute lifeline thrown by the federal government to the Local & Independent News Association (LINA) has kept the doors from shutting on one of Australia’s most active supporters of small news publishers. piji.com.au/blog/lina-fu... Via Public Interest Journalism Initiative

After spending much of this week at the River Reflections conference in Murray Bridge this week, I've got a glut of water-related stories coming through...

Ladies and gentleman, we have a contest. Former independent candidate Airlie Keen, who came within a few hundred votes of making things interesting in 2022, confirms she'll have another go at winning Hammond from the Liberals at the 2026 SA election.

I lived through 2007 and I have no memory of this song.

This is patently absurd. You can't tell me there are 14 better Australian songs than this.