Next Episode of Media Watch is
Season 2026 / Episode 34 and airs on 28 September 2026 11:20
Media Watch is Australia's leading forum for media analysis and comment.Conflicts of interest, bank backflips, deceit, misrepresentation, manipulation, plagiarism, abuse of power, technical lies and straight out fraud: Media Watch has built an unrivalled record of exposing media shenanigans since it first went to air in 1989.The media provides the information we need to make decisions about our lives, but how reliable are the media reports that shape our views of the world?Media Watch turns the spotlight onto those who literally 'make the news': the reporters, editors, sub-editors, producers, camera operators, sound recordists and photographers who claim to deliver the world to our doorsteps, radios, computers and living rooms. We also keep an eye on those who try to manipulate the media: the PR consultants, spin-doctors, lobbyists and "news makers" who set the agenda.
Images of the flood tragedy in the Himalayas circulated the globe, except in China, where state-owned media tightly controlled what people saw. The horrific case that gripped the internet, fuelled in part by an algorithm that rewards conspiratorial thinking. Plus the Productivity Commission's assessment that the WA GST deal is a 'costly mistake' has poked the west-coast bear.
How the media fell for government spin, and celebrated a film funding cut, as a funding 'boost'. The Beetaloo gas project finds a cheerleader in the NT News, with very little scrutiny. Plus the ABC runs the wrong photos of Tupac's killer, and how Seven, Ten, (and even us) replayed images of the wrong floods.
Drug-use revelations levelled at One Nation's Victorian leader sparks debate about 'gotcha' journalism. The hard-right AfD won a German state election by weaponising mainstream media attacks. Plus a News24 presenter pranked.
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