Opinion pieces by non RNZ staff published on website

dukeofurl made this Official Information request to Radio New Zealand Limited

The request was partially successful.

From: dukeofurl

Dear Radio New Zealand Limited,

I have noticed various opinion pieces published online in the last 3 months which contain errors of fact.
This can be minor or major and sometimes pieces are corrected soon after but no details are given of the change.

Could you provide a list of the opinion pieces accepted for publication in the last 6 months and their authors. Only those authors NOT employed by RNZ as employees or staff need be included. But would include those who are occasional paid contributors.

Could you detail those opinion pieces that were corrected or changed after initial publication and the detail of corrections or changes made. Some items may have multiple changes . Include where necessary communications from the author asking for the the change or correction.

Yours faithfully,

H O'Brien

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From: Maggie Hedge

Good morning

Your request has been received by Radio New Zealand. Under the Broadcasting Act 1989, we have 20 working days in which to respond to you and I expect we will have our reply posted to your postal address within that time. If for some reason, such as leave commitments or sickness, we are unable to respond to you within 20 working days, there is a further provision for an extension of time and if that is necessary and I will write to you again if it becomes necessary to extend the time taken.

In the meantime, your oia request will be processed against the standards which you have nominated.

Yours sincerely,

George Bignell | OIA Coordinator
RADIO NEW ZEALAND | LEVEL 2 | 155 THE TERRACE PO BOX 123 | WELLINGTON | NEW ZEALAND 6140 | www.rnz.co.nz DDI +64 4 474 1424 | [mobile number]

-----Original Message-----
From: dukeofurl [mailto:[FOI #7970 email]]
Sent: Thursday, 31 May 2018 4:04 p.m.
To: RNZ <[email address]>
Subject: Official Information request - Opinion pieces by non RNZ staff published on website

Dear Radio New Zealand Limited,

I have noticed various opinion pieces published online in the last 3 months which contain errors of fact.
This can be minor or major and sometimes pieces are corrected soon after but no details are given of the change.

Could you provide a list of the opinion pieces accepted for publication in the last 6 months and their authors. Only those authors NOT employed by RNZ as employees or staff need be included. But would include those who are occasional paid contributors.

Could you detail those opinion pieces that were corrected or changed after initial publication and the detail of corrections or changes made. Some items may have multiple changes . Include where necessary communications from the author asking for the the change or correction.

Yours faithfully,

H O'Brien

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Please use this email address for all replies to this request:
[FOI #7970 email]

Is [RNZ request email] the wrong address for Official Information requests to Radio New Zealand Limited? If so, please contact us using this form:
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If you find this service useful as an Official Information officer, please ask your web manager to link to us from your organisation's OIA or LGOIMA page.

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From: dukeofurl

Dear Maggie Hedge,

Thanks for your reply

I wish to receive all responses by email via FYI

Yours sincerely,

H O'brien

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From: George Bignell


Attachment image003.png
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Dear H O'Brien

 

We respond to your inquiry as follows.

 

RNZ does not hold the information you seek and it would be an enormous job
to compile the lists you are after.  There is the point too that
corrections or changes can be made for a variety of reasons, e.g.  we
might change a headline, edit for length, a photo, a phrasing to make
something make more sense, add in a link, or any / all of the above.

 

All the pieces that we have published are publically available at
[1]https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/on-the-in....

 

So, in a formal sense, your request is refused under s18(f) of the
Official Information Act which cites that "that the information requested
cannot be made available without substantial collation or research" and
the earlier s18(e) which relies on the fact that information may not even
exist.  This refers to the fact that if edits to an article were made, our
content management system, for example, may not capture all those edits.

 

If you can be more specific in the nature of your inquiry, we may be able
to assist further.  We  do not require that inquiries be made under the
OIA as we are happy to respond if the information is available.

 

Kind regards

 

George Bignell| OIA Inquiries Coordinator

RADIO NEW ZEALAND | LEVEL 2 | 155 THE TERRACE

PO BOX 123 | WELLINGTON | NEW ZEALAND 6140 | [2]www.rnz.co.nz

DDI +64 4 474 1424 | [mobile number]

 

[3]RNZ-logo-reo

 

 

 

 

-----Original Message-----

From: dukeofurl [[4]mailto:[FOI #7970 email]]

Sent: Thursday, 31 May 2018 4:04 p.m.

To: RNZ <[5][email address]>

Subject: Official Information request - Opinion pieces by non RNZ staff
published on website

 

Dear Radio New Zealand Limited,

 

I have noticed various  opinion pieces published online in the last 3
months which  contain errors of fact.

This can  be  minor or major and sometimes  pieces are corrected  soon
after but no details are given of the change.

 

Could you provide a list of the  opinion pieces accepted for publication
in the last 6 months and their authors. Only  those authors NOT employed
by RNZ as employees or staff need be  included. But  would include those
who are occasional  paid contributors.

 

Could you  detail those  opinion pieces that were corrected or changed 
after initial publication and the  detail of corrections or changes  made.
Some items may have multiple changes . Include where necessary
communications from the author asking for the the change or correction.

 

Yours faithfully,

 

H O'Brien

 

-------------------------------------------------------------------

 

This is an Official Information request made via the FYI website.

 

Please use this email address for all replies to this request:

[6][FOI #7970 email]

 

Is [7][RNZ request email] the wrong address for Official Information
requests to Radio New Zealand Limited? If so, please contact us using this
form:

[8]https://fyi.org.nz/change_request/new?bo...

 

Disclaimer: This message and any reply that you make will be published on
the internet. Our privacy and copyright policies:

[9]https://fyi.org.nz/help/officers

 

If you find this service useful as an Official Information officer, please
ask your web manager to link to us from your organisation's OIA or LGOIMA
page.

 

 

-------------------------------------------------------------------

 

 

 

 

Radio New Zealand Disclaimer

 

Emails sent by Radio New Zealand Limited (RNZ) or any related entity,
including any attachments, may be confidential, protected by copyright
and/or subject to privilege. If you receive an email from RNZ in error,
please inform the sender immediately, delete it from your system and do
not use, copy or disclose any of the information in that email for any
purpose. Emails to/from RNZ may undergo email filtering and virus
scanning, including by third party contractors. However, RNZ does not
guarantee that any email or any attachment is secure, error-free or free
of viruses or other unwanted or unexpected inclusions. The views expressed
in any non-business email are not necessarily the views of RNZ

 

[10]www.rnz.co.nz

References

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From: dukeofurl

Dear George Bignell,

Thanks for your reply. I dont think you understand my request. Of course there may be minor changes which are inconsequential , but surely you have a vetting or editing process by your staff before publication. Maybe you even use spell checkers and other edit support software like Grammarly and the like. As your contributors are busy people with other work Im only interested in changes that they request.
It seems strange to me to suggest ways of finding that out but maybe you could start with the providing the original copy and the final online version as it is today leaving it up to me to 'compare them' Maybe you could provides emails (and other correspondence) from the contributor asking for changes or corrections as I imagine thats how its done. Surely you have some sort of version tracking software showing changes, even Wikipedia can do that ( maybe legal requirements make that essential but Im not looking for that sort of thing.) Any way that sounds too complicated to unravel so First and Last version would do , or the emails from contributors requesting changes.
As a final suggestion, you could show online the major corrections as they appear so readers understand there has been an oops.

Yours sincerely,

H O'Brien

Link to this

From: George Bignell

Good morning
Your OIA request has been received by Radio New Zealand. We have 20 working days in which to respond to you and I expect we will have our reply posted to your postal address within that time. If for some reason, such as leave commitments or sickness, we are unable to respond to you within 20 working days, there is a further provision for an extension of time and if that is necessary and I will write to you again if it becomes necessary to extend the time taken.

Yours sincerely,

George Bignell | OIA Coordinator
RADIO NEW ZEALAND | LEVEL 2 | 155 THE TERRACE
PO BOX 123 | WELLINGTON | NEW ZEALAND 6140 | www.rnz.co.nz
DDI +64 4 474 1424 | [mobile number]

-----Original Message-----
From: dukeofurl [mailto:[FOI #7970 email]]
Sent: Wednesday, 4 July 2018 5:05 p.m.
To: George Bignell
Subject: RE: Official Information request - Opinion pieces by non RNZ staff published on website

Dear George Bignell,

Thanks for your reply. I dont think you understand my request. Of course there may be minor changes which are inconsequential , but surely you have a vetting or editing process by your staff before publication. Maybe you even use spell checkers and other edit support software like Grammarly and the like. As your contributors are busy people with other work Im only interested in changes that they request.
It seems strange to me to suggest ways of finding that out but maybe you could start with the providing the original copy and the final online version as it is today leaving it up to me to 'compare them' Maybe you could provides emails (and other correspondence) from the contributor asking for changes or corrections as I imagine thats how its done. Surely you have some sort of version tracking software showing changes, even Wikipedia can do that ( maybe legal requirements make that essential but Im not looking for that sort of thing.) Any way that sounds too complicated to unravel so First and Last version would do , or the emails from contributors requesting changes.
As a final suggestion, you could show online the major corrections as they appear so readers understand there has been an oops.

Yours sincerely,

H O'Brien

-----Original Message-----

Dear H O'Brien

We respond to your inquiry as follows.

RNZ does not hold the information you seek and it would be an enormous job to compile the lists you are after. There is the point too that corrections or changes can be made for a variety of reasons, e.g. we might change a headline, edit for length, a photo, a phrasing to make something make more sense, add in a link, or any / all of the above.

All the pieces that we have published are publically available at [1]https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/on-the-in....

So, in a formal sense, your request is refused under s18(f) of the Official Information Act which cites that "that the information requested cannot be made available without substantial collation or research" and the earlier s18(e) which relies on the fact that information may not even exist. This refers to the fact that if edits to an article were made, our content management system, for example, may not capture all those edits.

If you can be more specific in the nature of your inquiry, we may be able to assist further. We do not require that inquiries be made under the OIA as we are happy to respond if the information is available.

Kind regards

George Bignell| OIA Inquiries Coordinator

RADIO NEW ZEALAND | LEVEL 2 | 155 THE TERRACE

PO BOX 123 | WELLINGTON | NEW ZEALAND 6140 | [2]www.rnz.co.nz

DDI +64 4 474 1424 | [mobile number]

[3]RNZ-logo-reo

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Please use this email address for all replies to this request:
[FOI #7970 email]

Disclaimer: This message and any reply that you make will be published on the internet. Our privacy and copyright policies:
https://fyi.org.nz/help/officers

If you find this service useful as an Official Information officer, please ask your web manager to link to us from your organisation's OIA or LGOIMA page.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Radio New Zealand Disclaimer

Emails sent by Radio New Zealand Limited (RNZ) or any related entity, including any attachments, may be confidential, protected by copyright and/or subject to privilege. If you receive an email from RNZ in error, please inform the sender immediately, delete it from your system and do not use, copy or disclose any of the information in that email for any purpose. Emails to/from RNZ may undergo email filtering and virus scanning, including by third party contractors. However, RNZ does not guarantee that any email or any attachment is secure, error-free or free of viruses or other unwanted or unexpected inclusions. The views expressed in any non-business email are not necessarily the views of RNZ

www.rnz.co.nz<http://www.radionz.co.nz>

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From: dukeofurl

Dear George Bignell,

There seems to be an error. This is not a new request, but the same one I earlier submitted.
As your reply didnt answer the questions I just clarified the request at your suggestion

Yours sincerely,

H O Brien

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From: dukeofurl

Dear George Bignell,

You said in your last correspondence that you were treating it as a new OIA, which I objected to.
However the 20 working days from the date(5/7) has passed. Which is outside the obligatory response time.

Yours sincerely,

H O'Brien

Link to this

From: George Bignell
Radio New Zealand Limited

Dear Ms O'Brien

Your reply has been delayed due to me having a period away on sick leave arising from a flu virus , my apologies.

I have now had an opportunity to look at your follow up request and our response remains as it was in the first instance, i.e. your request is refused under s18(f) of the Official Information Act which cites that "that the information requested cannot be made available without substantial collation or research" and the earlier s18(e) which relies on the fact that information may not even exist.

To explain further, articles are submitted in a variety of ways to a number of different editorial staff in our organisation. There is no one standardised way in which an article, from its first draft, can be or is tracked through "a system" at RNZ. That is simply not how we operate.

To ask editorial staff if they still retain the first version of any article on our website is problematic too because of different housekeeping regimes. Some of these systems are automated, especially in our dedicated News system ,so we would simply have no way of knowing which version, if any remained, was the first one.

I am sorry we cannot be of more assistance to you with your inquiry.

Yours sincerely

George Bignell| OIA Inquiries Coordinator
RADIO NEW ZEALAND | LEVEL 2 | 155 THE TERRACE
PO BOX 123 | WELLINGTON | NEW ZEALAND 6140 | www.rnz.co.nz
DDI +64 4 474 1424 | [mobile number]

-----Original Message-----
From: dukeofurl [mailto:[FOI #7970 email]]
Sent: Thursday, 9 August 2018 11:53 a.m.
To: George Bignell
Subject: Re: Official Information request - Opinion pieces by non RNZ staff published on website

Dear George Bignell,

You said in your last correspondence that you were treating it as a new OIA, which I objected to.
However the 20 working days from the date(5/7) has passed. Which is outside the obligatory response time.

Yours sincerely,

H O'Brien

-----Original Message-----

Good morning
Your OIA request has been received by Radio New Zealand. We have 20 working days in which to respond to you and I expect we will have our reply posted to your postal address within that time. If for some reason, such as leave commitments or sickness, we are unable to respond to you within 20 working days, there is a further provision for an extension of time and if that is necessary and I will write to you again if it becomes necessary to extend the time taken.

Yours sincerely,

George Bignell | OIA Coordinator
RADIO NEW ZEALAND | LEVEL 2 | 155 THE TERRACE PO BOX 123 | WELLINGTON | NEW ZEALAND 6140 | www.rnz.co.nz DDI +64 4 474 1424 | [mobile number]

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Please use this email address for all replies to this request:
[FOI #7970 email]

Disclaimer: This message and any reply that you make will be published on the internet. Our privacy and copyright policies:
https://fyi.org.nz/help/officers

If you find this service useful as an Official Information officer, please ask your web manager to link to us from your organisation's OIA or LGOIMA page.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

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