Compiling the best reading of the week from your friendly local website.
Natalya King: Aaron Smith got screwed – and Stuff could end up getting sued
“In the legal sense, an invasion of privacy is the “highly offensive” disclosure of private facts. That is, if Aaron had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the facts of the event, and if the average person considered that the publicity given to those facts was highly offensive then Stuff (or the couple who enthusiastically recorded the incident) may well find themselves on the wrong end of an invasion of privacy claim.”
Hayden Donnell: Wow: Secret memo reveals the true ruler of Stuff.co.nz
“Finally news agencies are abandoning old-fashioned questions like “What’s going on today?”. That may explain why the Herald runs a non-stop feed of month-old viral videos!!!
All hilarious owns aside, in news meetings of yore, stories were weighted according to their mix of reader appeal and importance. The Stuff method appears to elevate the holy value of clickiness above all.”
Morgan Godfrey: He Aituā, Helen Kelly: a force of nature, a national treasure, my comrade and my hero
“Even when you know death is coming, when cancer invades the body’s cells and tumours announce their foul intentions, the event is still a shock. I’m not sure I can imagine a country without Helen Kelly nudging it along, prodding its conscience. I’m not sure I want to imagine a country without Helen Kelly.”
Toby Manhire: Hillary vs Donald, digested: the second US presidential debate in five minutes
“Ken, an Ordinary American: Obamacare is not affordable.
Trump: You go first, Hillary, I’m a gentleman.
Audience: Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha, oh Donald, so funny!
Clinton: I’ll fix it. Not repeal it.
Trump: Repeal it. I’m walking around the stage, staying awake, also composed, and I’m saying it’s bad, very bad, very expensive, unbelievable. Repeal it and replace it with a thing that is absolutely less expensive and not bad.”
Janet McAllister: Why I have trouble believing Andrew Little on child poverty
“He didn’t mention money
Families are poor because they don’t have enough money. It’s not because somehow, randomly, this generation is more financially feckless than any other. The gaps between rich and poor are growing so fast even the OECD, not the most rabidly pinko outfit, is telling us we need to redistribute more wealth.”
The Spinoff: History is made: Sparks fly when Chris Warner meets Alf Stewart (VIDEO)
What happens when you put of two of the most enduring soap opera characters together in one room? After years of wondering, we finally found out in this exclusive video.
Hayden Donnell: Media stoush: Stuff editor hits back at Spinoff hack
“It seemed concerns of Facebook shareability had taken a central place in Stuff’s news meetings. Though that wasn’t all terrible news, I thought it could be bad for the future prominence of non-Zuckerberg friendly content, like court, local government stories, or investigations. Top level Spinoff sources (me) understand my article made a lot of people – particularly at Fairfax – very angry. I interviewed a slightly annoyed-but-polite Stuff.co.nz editor Patrick Crewdson about what’s really in the heart of New Zealand’s biggest news site.”
Iris Gonzales: Thousands dead, bloodied streets and a leader likened to Hitler: 100 days of Duterte’s war on drugs
“Mabag, a mother to two little girls, calls herself a diehard Duterte supporter. She is one of the 16 million Filipinos who voted for him because she believes he could eradicate crime and get rid of the drug criminals.
But for 26-year-old Harra Kazuo, the story is different – and so is the sentiment toward Duterte’s war on drugs. Kazuo is eight months pregnant with her second child. Her eldest is just two years old. Her husband Jaypee Bertes, 28, was killed by police officers in July as part of Duterte’s anti-drug campaign.”
Tessa Prebble: Are we sleepwalking into a world without Down Syndrome?
“We are looking at this whole situation backward. There is nothing wrong with Down Syndrome, or the people who have it. There is something wrong with the rest of us. Instead of ensuring that children born with conditions like Down Syndrome, or in my daughter’s case, CHARGE Syndrome, are supported in every aspect, we make it so hard on families that terminating seems like the best possible option.”
The Spinoff: Donald Trump is finished: four Twitter threads that say it all
