New World, NZME and Positively Wellington Tourism each nab a place on the podium this week.

NZME has since the beginning of this year released over 12,000 videos, which have accumulated 42 million views, and the media company is looking to further consolidate its video offering with the launch of a production studio called NZME Vision and a new content hub dubbed WatchMe. Rolled out earlier this week, the WatchMe website has already been populated with a collection of comedy shows; a combination of established and upcoming talent, all produced through NZME Vision. StopPress chats to NZME about why it’s making this move.

Earlier this week, NZME took an entertaining trip back into the mists of time as part of its ad:tech sponsorship. Now some more ‘found footage’ from ‘1987’ has emerged, and it shows ‘Matt Harrington’, editor of ‘Bits and Bytes’ magazine, “walking the streets of the future in an interactive 3D hologram”.

This year’s edition of ad:tech again saw some of the most influential members of the industry assemble for a day of brain expansion/occasional brain explosion. And as part of its sponsorship of the event, NZME has delved into the back catalogues and uncovered some fantastic footage showing a panel of speakers (with a remarkable resemblance to several current NZME radio personalities) sharing their thoughts on the future of the video game industry. In addition to sensational graphics and a great example of a sweater on the shoulders, the clip provided scintillating debate, as well as some classic contrarian opining by one speaker.

“Data journalism is absolutely critical to our future,” said NZME managing editor Shayne Currie when speaking to StopPress about the restructure of NZME’s news teams. As part of the shift to a more digital-centric publishing operation, Currie said NZME would be investing more into data journalism in the near future. And this seems to have now come to fruition with the launch of Insights, a website dedicated to the Herald’s data journalism.

Internet giants Google and Facebook continue to dominate online ratings for New Zealanders but increasing numbers of New Zealanders are visiting Stuff.co.nz and the NZ Herald, according to the latest Nielsen figures.

NZME confirmed today there would be a total of 15 redundancies across the business as part of its decision to bring news staff across radio, print and digital together in a single newsroom, which will house 280 employees.

NZME has officially announced the launch of a new women’s lifestyle magazine called Spy, which will be inserted into the Herald on Sunday every week from 25 October. The media company has pitched the move as an attempt to fill in the market left by New Idea after the publishing partnership between Pacific Magazines and NZME came to an end. And while NZME has said the publication will be covering much more than just celebrity news, it will see former co-workers Simich and Glucina going head to head for scoops in this space.

Earlier this week NZME announced plans for its print, digital and radio news teams to come together as an integrated 24/7 operation led by managing editor Shayne Currie, whose role has been elevated to report directly to NZME chief executive Jane Hastings. And as is usually the case with restructures, there will be a few staff changes, some of which were announced by Hastings and Currie to the newsroom on Wednesday afternoon.

As the host of Seven Sharp, a columnist on the Herald, a talkback presenter on Newstalk ZB and a generous giver of opinions, Mike Hosking has reached saturation levels across Kiwi media channels. And the frazzle-haired media machine has in the last week extended his brand’s reach across social media, with his likes on the official Mike Hosking page increasing by 90,000 in the space of a few days. So what exactly drove all this engagement?