Rabbit Holes: Authentic Independent Media or Controlled Opposition?

Have UK Column and NZ Reality Check Radio been captured? Who can we trust with our hard-earned cash?

Have you fallen down any rabbit holes recently? An unfilled chasm at the centre of my own ‘clean, green’ paddock is the question of funders of the ‘alternative’ media outlets - who controls their output? UK Column and Reality Check Radio have been two of my favourite go-to alternative media for news and comment over the past few years. Unfortunately, it looks like I might be changing my subscriptions…

Signage at the town of Te Aroha, NZ’s dog park. Source: author

Exposés about the Censorship Industrial Complex describe how entities like the Google News Initiative captured not only all the legacy news outlets (BBC, ABC etc) but also those independent investigative journalists too, like previously reliable The Intercept and even the International Consortium Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). Cue the move to ‘old reliable’ independent news outlets, like UK Column News, and the creation of ‘new’ ones like RealityCheck.Radio. But are these kinds of ‘smell-of-an-oily-rag’-type platforms able to avoid being captured by biased funders, with their own agendas?

A local NZME newspaper office stands empty - closed, due to the ending of NZ Gov Funding and a lack of public trust.

Now that our Government-funded legacy media outlets are consolidating, downsizing and closing-down, a range of independent media is crucial to stay informed. How can we be sure our hard-earned cash is being well-spent by these alternative media outlets who seem to constantly be seeking more and more financial support?

UK Column News

From their website:

The UK Column is an independent news organisation founded in 2006 by Brian Gerrish, our co-editor. Established with no financial backing or external investment, the UK Column remains completely independent of any advertisers, foundations and political parties. All of our funding comes from our viewers, listeners and readers who support us through memberships and donations. (my emphasis)

As a Pom, I’ve had a soft spot for UK Column News for a while. There’s a quaintness about their old-fashioned didactic delivery and Plymouth base. I’ve published some important articles for them, e.g. about Google capturing our education systems here and about declining trust in our colleges and universities, here. I was particularly keen to watch the weekly segments from retired-nurse-presenter Debi Evans (who interviewed me about life in NZ here). She’s has an amazing work ethic and unending curiosity which makes her an excellent researcher of complex, unethical healthcare sectors and other covid-related issues.

Last week, members of UKC News were shocked to be told via a short, somewhat insensitive email from co-owner Mike Robinson, that Debi was no-longer associated with UKC. Inevitably, reasons for Debi’s sudden departure became the subject of speculation on UKC forums and elsewhere. Anyone watching UKC recently would have witnessed the transformation over recent months, of (salaried?) new presenters, a new location for their offices, and some live in-person events being organised with prominent speakers. I genuinely (perhaps naively?) assumed this was because of voluntary and subscriber-input and increase in donations.

But maybe not?

My attention was drawn to this article by Richard Jeffs, where he claims his IP for funding a new media platform was stolen via ex-TNT presenter, James Freeman and passed onto UKC. I don’t know any of these characters personally, so I can only report what I read. However, there are some legitimate reasons for concern. For instance, UK Companies’ House confirms that Akita Media (which trades as UK Column News) recently included YMS Market Access Ltd as a shareholder:

So who is this apparently Hong Kong-based company YMS, presumably invested into UKC? Is that claim on UKC News’ website that they receive ‘no financial backing or external investment from advertisers or political parties…’ still correct'? If not, why weren’t subscribers consulted/informed about this change in tactic? How can we remain trusting of platforms like UKC if an unknown company/individual is in any way involved in steering the content or structure of the programming? I have posed the questions to various UKC channels and will report back with any response in due course.

My very best wishes go out to Debi Evans with our sincere thanks for all the hard graft she put into those all-too-short segments on UK Column over the years. I hope she can be supported to continue to get important news about the MHRA meetings and covid-related accountability published. Her recent tweet about the covid jab injuries is definitely front of our minds, especially after watching Prof Angus Dalgleish being interviewed by

Doc Malik Honest Health

:

Meanwhile, one of the reasons I am doubtful about receiving any valid response from UK Column News, is because I have been here before.

De Ja Vu

About this time last year, our ‘independent’ online Kiwi radio station, realitycheck.radio ‘RCR’ unexpectedly fell silent. RCR is part of the Voices for Freedom company, registered as NZ Media Holdings 2023 Ltd. Although in their FAQs they claim to be a not-for-profit, as far as I know, they are a commercial enterprise, with no financial information released. Apparently - and strangely, even without warning to their own regular financial subscribers - they had ‘run out of money’ and urgently needed to fund-raise to keep going. Frantic to hear our favourite presenters interviewing important freedom-fighters, many of us donated cash to get them up-and-running again asap. Some generously donated large sums.

But I became suspicious when I couldn’t see any transparency in the ‘target’ amount of ‘donations’ needed vs received and what RCR’s projected costs were. Their extreme marketing strategy was apparently the result of an undisclosed ‘external consultant’ and seriously undermined trust from their own subscribers. The longer it continued, the more obviously unethical it became. We were told they had attempted (and failed) to get charitable status, so that donations could be tax-exempt. As a commercial company, there was no requirement to release their accounts. No offer of assistance with these financial bureaucratic matters seemed to trigger any response.

A few weeks after their hiatus, when apparently RCR had ‘received enough money (?)’ to allow them to return to the airwaves, their location had changed from being ‘virtual’ (the presenters were located in various parts of the country) to having a physical location in Queenstown. Yes. Queenstown. THE most ‘elite’ and expensive area of NZ, in South Island, where the population is particularly sparse (approx 25% of the country’s total population) and globalists like Peter Thiel own several properties. Strange?

Then, in June 2024, came the announcement that they were recruiting number of paid staff, for admin, marketing, producing, researching and other media-related roles:

This was a bit odd, bearing in mind I had previously offered my researching skills to RCR for free, and I’m sure I wasn’t alone in being able to offer voluntary assistance? But sadly, I was not even given the courtesy of an acknowledgement.

I’ve tried numerous times to engage in a conversation with RCR founders about these confusing issues of choice of HQ location, presenters, unethical marketing strategies, transparency in donations and salaries…to no avail. Other questions pile up too: why have an (unpopular) ex-MP like Simon O’Connor on the payroll, rather than an experienced radio presenter? There’s also been popular political contributors like Cam Slater suddenly leaving the platform to go it alone (again).

Seems there are rocky roads ahead for any media platform claiming they are fully independent and reliant upon subscribers for their existence. Trust with legacy media is at an all-time low, so no newly-fledged media platform is going to win big followers if they aren’t entirely honest and transparent in their approach. When I was still listening to them, RCR repeatedly claimed they had an email database of “>100k” but they seemed reluctant to use that audience for anything other than self-promotion (genuine freedom-related issues were apparently off-limits).

Don’t get me wrong, I support RCR and want them to do well. I thoroughly enjoyed being a part of their journey and being invited for interviews. The marvelous Paul Brennan talked with me about our failed education systems, the covid jab exemptions, the shocking coercion of pregnant women to take the jab by the University of Auckland, and also the Nudge Unit’s interference in NZ policy. Frustratingly, I can’t seem to post any of the direct links to those interviews any longer, because with their newly-released website/app, apparently all listeners have to be signed-in (?) This is another unanswered question to RCR - why would they deliberately reduce sharing ability from their website (unless they were data harvesting)? But anyway, here’s the general search link here. And here’s an image from their website:

The paradox of these so-called ‘alternative’ media platforms and companies is that as they grow, they become much more likely to become targets. Not only of explicit takeovers, but also of clever psyops from intelligence agents. It’s easy to get conned - as we know all-too-well. Get too popular and independents inevitably get bought-out by larger corporates seeking to grow their own audience and empire - especially when they have ‘played the game’ of keeping to community rules to retain their social media presence. This is the model for Stakeholder Capitalism where self-censorship manipulates free market economics so it’s replaced by entities that are captured by political agendas, seeking larger profits for its stakeholders.

Seems timely now, as I’ve mentioned him, to post Richard Jeff’s excellent 45 mins doco overview of the WEF agenda 2030 here - so valuable for those just waking up to this demolition of our democracy (40 mins):

I fully understand how tough it must be for some of these platforms like UKC and RCR to ‘stay afloat’. Yes, they may need equipment, a location and to pay presenters for their skills and time. But why can’t they just be transparent about it? RCR in particular have seemed secretive and coercive - something we are all trying to prevent! Honesty is always the best policy when subscribers are your main/only source of income.

There are volunteers worldwide who are literally working day and night, committed to getting news and views ‘out there’ and raising awareness about the censorship and propaganda. It seems at the moment, the only way to ensure that we support authentic, crucial, freedom-fighting journalism, is to focus on individuals who we trust and who are often (unwillingly) working alone. You know who they are?!

By the way, if you don’t yet realise how captured GB News and Unherd and Reclaim the Media are, please read more of my posts! Like this one.