The Spinoff won some awards!

A belated reflection on some lovely recognition plus some crack up yarns

Mōrena and welcome to The Weekend, a short one. Given the short week I thought I’d take the opportunity to toot a few horns as The Spinoff was recognised at the Voyager Media Awards a couple of weeks ago. The Voyagers are the premier journalism awards in the country where entries are reduced to three nominees and then one winner on the night. This year, our work in 2023 was specifically recognised with five nominees. Then on the night, we had two winners and one runner-up.

Often with these awards it can be hard to remember what specific work is actually being recognised, and at the same time it’s hard to ignore how much work goes unrecognised every year. Below are our finalists and winners and the specific articles they were nominated (or won) for. All are worth revisiting and if you haven’t read them before, consider this a Best Of compilation.

Gabi Lardies – winner, junior feature writer of the year
- A morning at the death cafe
- Where did the age of consent come from, and how does it work today?
- The march of the armyworm (published by NZ Geographic)

Toby Morris – winner, cartoonist/animator of the year
- The Side Eye: The trans tipping point
- The Side Eye: Case of the missing dads
- The Side Eye: A climate change reality check

Madeleine Chapman – runner up, best columnist, opinion or critique
- On protest and the limits of empathy
- The language double standard
- For Pacific voters, there was no good option

Toby Manhire – finalist, feature writer of the year
- Goodbye Kim Hill: a day with the doyenne of NZ radio
- The fall and rise of David Seymour and the Act Party
- Inside a Restore Passenger Rail civil resistance recruitment session

Charlotte Muru-Lanning – finalist, junior feature writer of the year
- Cushla Tangaere-Manuel can sing – but are the voters listening?
- The many hats of Debbie Ngarewa-Packer
- Why are cafes still charging extra for coffees made with non-dairy milk?

Gabi Lardies delivering the speech of the night when accepting her award

I survived in another country without a smartphone. This is my story. 

I lost count of how many times I laughed out loud while reading this delightful feature from Alex Casey, who spent a weekend in Melbourne, travelling as if it was 2009. Here’s the first paragraph as a taster:

The flip phone was fucked, and apparently so was I. In the line for customs at Melbourne airport, I flipped open my ancient bright orange Alcatel to reveal an alarming number of crosses on the screen where the signal should be. I tried to send a text, and it failed. I tried to call one of the three numbers I had written on a post-it note and stuck to the back of my passport for safe keeping. Nothing but a long angry beep. I had forgotten to Google the emergency number in Australia before I left, so I couldn’t even call the police.

Read the full saga here.

Behind the Story

Spinoff staff writer Gabi Lardies recently had a big win at the voyager media awards, for best junior feature writer. Gabi first worked at the Spinoff in 2022 so is categorically a junior writer, but as she confesses, she’s secretly 33 years old and has a colourful work history prior to becoming a journalist.

Her recognised work focuses on observational feature writing, stepping into a very specific scene and painting a picture of it for the reader. And this week, Gabi painted a picture of a hunger strike, particularly Will Alexander’s, who announced a strike for Palestine on May 18 and called it off after 19 days at the request of Palestinians. Gabi joined me on Behind the Story to talk switching careers, the importance of mentoring and what happens when your story is overtaken by events.

A delightful new music format

I’ll be honest, this “new” format is actually a few weeks old but it’s going from strength to strength. Who are your favourite artists’ favourite artists? In this weekend’s edition of Perfect Weekend Playlist, SPYCC from SWIDT details his favourite songs for cooking, drinking and recovering. He makes great recommendations (which you can listen to as a playlist on Spotify too) and is crack up. For example:

George Strait – ‘You Look So Good In Love’ 

This is one of my go to songs for a sober or horsey karaoke session (even though people be hating). It’s just one of those timeless joints that will have you singing it like you wrote it. Honourable mentions: Audioslave ‘Like a Stone’ and Backstreet Boys ‘I Want it That Way’ (if you don’t hit AJ’s “desire” adlib in the second verse, then you not a real one). 

See the full playlist here.

A good day in the capital

Thank you to everyone who supported The Spinoff Welly 500 over the last couple of weeks. Not only did we reach our target in record time, but the additional donations and messages of support make it possible for us to sustain our work in Wellington. You can check out our recent Welly coverage here.

Are New Zealand’s youngest voters really shifting right?

Max Rashbrooke, who I’m happy to announce will be writing a fortnightly column for us going forward, looked at international trends and local data to see if there was any truth to the speculation that younger voters are leaning more conservative. His findings? Yes but not for the reasons you think.

The stories Spinoff readers spent the most time with this week

• The sitcom life of a Wellington twenty-something with a bizarre cast of characters and no laugh track.

• Duncan Greive talked to David Seymour about the state of media and journalism, and two Seymours emerged: one who leads a party that cheers for the downfall of the news media and one who is among the most thoughtful defenders of the press in politics.

• Joel MacManus assesses the political risk for Wellington mayor, Tory Whanau, in successfully getting the votes to sell the council’s shares in Wellington airport

• Liam Rātana astutely explains why he is tired of King’s Birthday, honouring colonisation, colonisers, and an establishment that represents all that is wrong with the world. 

• This week’s edition of our popular Cost of Being series drew a few comments and raised eyebrows, but that is the beauty of a series that just plainly presents a range of different relationships with money.

More recommended reads for your weekend

• Help Me Hera: Three quickfire questions about freckles, consent and report cards

• Hayden Donnell reports on the disaster that is… Auckland housing being marginally more affordable at the moment

• The arguments for and against a Māori parliament by Liam Rātana

• Anna Rawhiti-Connell argues with herself about AI

• A wrap of the NZ Book Awards for Children and Young Adults shortlist from books editor Claire Mabey

Reader feedback of the week

On the celebration of the birth of the country’s royal figurehead

On little libraries and book dumping

Thanks for reading and see you next week,

— Madeleine Chapman