ABC workers strike, Kyle strikes with a lawsuit, and AI-generated PR strikes the wrong chord

Apologies. Our usual mom roller cast programming has been interrupted due to industrial action. In its place we'll be playing classics from the BBC Home Video Library. On this episode of Some Mothers Do Have 'em, Frank's obsession with star charts gets him into a spot of bother. And up next, the Christmas special, Souti Sweep and Sue unionise. Podcast Edit by Abe Zorio. Hello and welcome to the Mumbrailer cast. I'm Abe Udie this week. Mumbrailer actually still at work as ABC's staff go on strike and anti-switches to autopilot. A warning to PR professionals about AI, why agencies need to be thinking about different fee structures and the Kyle Sandeland's court documents pulled apart? I'm joined by Eleanor Dickinson. Hello Abe. Voice over Nathan Jolly. Hello Abe. And Tim Burrows. Hello Abe and how is still on strike in solidarity? I wouldn't have expected anything less from the man. Right, as we're recording this, the ABC union staff have just gone back to work. Nath, why did they walk off in the first place? Well, there's the usual reasons. They want more pay, they want more rights, and they want reassurance that robots won't be doing their job in a few years. So general strike kind of stuff? So the current offer on the table that they have rejected is a 10% pay rise over three years. So they'll get 3.5% in the first year, 3.25 in the second and third years, which the union is arguing is lower than the annual inflation rate, which was 3.8% in January. I believe it'll be around 50 to 60% in the next few months if things get going. But there was also a one-house out of your viewers on economists. Yeah, that's good. As the what's the name, Adelaide of this group as one brothers chief economic officer. Yeah, and they've also rejected the $1,000 bonus that she marks, put to them as well. And on top of that, they want more concrete career progression plans, more job assurance. So no more of those rolling contracts are short term, kind of six months contracts are just renewing you renew and you. And they want night shift penalty rates and reproductive health leave. So humarchs is in his he issued a statement to staff and then you know wider to media or at least we grabbed hold of it. And in that statement, he was very odd. He said, well, he said no one has provided any evidence to me such to suggest ABC staff a paid less than industry standards. In addition, the lead provisors ABC staff receive a generally more generous than many other major workplaces, which is that's all good points. But he makes it seem like working for the ABC is like a kid into doing national service. He's working like listen to this quote. I understand that in the current climate, higher pay would help many individuals, but we must also remain focused on the long term sustainability of the ABC and its relevance to all Australians. And then there's another section like the content and services that we provide to our audience as a paramount. Continue into progress the content and services we make available across the ABC to our audiences must remain our primary focus for the long term benefits of the audience as we serve. We compromise that at our peril. I mean, it's just a job and they just want more pay right to him. Am I missing something? I mean, it's a bit of a balance, isn't it? Because there is something special in different working for the ABC. Absolutely. People love it and that's meaningful. And one of the things that people are there a long time, get out of it is longevity. The fact that I think they get automated pay rises just based on length of service every year, which doesn't happen out there in the, it's slightly unfair to say the real world, but the real world. So they were already kind of, you know, wins and losses. I, the other thing and I'm afraid, you know, just like you doesn't have any evidence and it's a shame he didn't arrive with any sort of knowledge about what nine pay people, for instance, or work before. But the other bit that I don't have evidence on, but just a bit of an instinct from what I've seen and experienced the ABC is, I think the number of people who are on some form of non permanent contract is as a proportion. My instinct is it is higher than the number of ABC seems to be acknowledging. Now I think it might be to do with the form of words they're using or something, but I've got just my instinct is when you talk to people at the ABC, a lot of them are non permanent contracts. Typically, if the phone rings to go and be a pundit or something like that is someone is not on a permanent contract. Yeah, and I think the term you used and you know, don't don't record me or anything was like, no, we were do that. Yeah, it was like long like you said, like 90% of them are on like long term employment. Yeah, yeah, it was very odd. I couldn't help just when you were reading out his comments and it just felt like we don't actually know what huma x is remuneration is. It's not been published, but his predecessor as sky news couldn't wait to point out of his predecessor, David Anderson was 1.2 million, which probably isn't that big when you think of other massive corporate salaries, but you can't help that thing that he was probably not going to be far off. And he's not really in a position, maybe to berate people for complaining about their pay. Yeah, I mean, that's always trick isn't it because it's kind of like it's such. Does that sound like a bullshit? Well, I mean, we live within a capitalist society, don't we? And if the ABC wants a well-qualified boss that the competitive sector would pay more, and we already know he was paid probably paid more when he was at 9. But equally when there's a negotiate, you know, it's a negotiation is a battle. The union of fighting a PR battle. So of course, they'll be into it and you know, why wouldn't they? Yeah, I mean, it makes sense. I thought they missed a trick not playing the fourth season one of C-tang yesterday when they had the chance, you know. They had no programming ready. They've got such a rich back catalog. What about candy, and episodes? At least they did play on Triple J, they at least played Express yourself. Yeah, I thought that was nice. They don't want nod to the time they played it was 82 times in a row or something like that. Yeah, I wish they'd done that like yesterday. I have to ask though, do we know if anybody crossed the picket line at all, or do we know if the strike, the walk out was universal across the organisation? There are definitely examples of ABC talent who read Bulletin's for the studs. And I believe Saba Lane was one who said that she didn't believe in striking, so she chose to go on air. So there were some bits and pieces read out, but on the whole, it was not a normal day on the ABC. It was more like they do quite like their Christmas holidays. It was more like the ABC at Christmas. Minus the curls. And the goodwill. Up next, trial by Kyle. Kyle Sandelens has now officially filed suit against ARN. It's going to be an absolute blockbuster. Mumbriller has published the concise statement filed in the federal court on Kyle's behalf. It argues that ARN's termination of Sandelens contract was invalid and that Kyle is still load everything agreed under the 10-year contract. Tim, you've read the statement. What else is Kyle claiming? Look for me. The absolute key thing, which was slightly unexpected, we've had various lawyers talk about, that this week is, is the assumption of being contract is dead, buried. This is now all about reparations, damages or not. That's not actually the initial position of Kyle's lawyers. Their initial position is, no, you haven't terminated it properly, it's still on foot. And then the other thing we learned was, and they thought hand over to you is just how large the number was that he was being paid. I always thought 10 million year was an exaggeration, but it was actually an under duration or whatever the opposite of an exaggeration is. Yeah, so we've got the terms of the deal for the first time ever. So there's a fee of 7.4 million per annum. Get your calculate, hang on, I know. I literally am not, but I'm okay with my head. So it's 8.4. And then there's a, this is the odd one. A Cater consultancy fee. Is that the hip hop youth station? What is Kyle controlling? Yeah, that's the one that used to be the edge. The edge. Yeah, the my theory on that, and this is such a theory, it's an outrageous theory, and just for the lawyers, I accept this is untrue and unwrong. But was it was a sneaky way of paying Kyle more than Jackie by giving him an extra consultancy fee. Yeah, but I accept that that's wrong and incorrect, and I'm not alleging that. Okay, so we are up to 7.6 million so far. And a flight allowance of 120,000 per annum. Okay, that's 7.72. Yep. And this is another odd one. Contra airtime. Value to half a million per annum. That would be if he was coconut water brand and things like that. Yeah. That's exactly what we were thinking when we talked in the office was he, he's got various brands that presumably he gets to sproke. Yeah, right. Yeah. I mean, he used to have his King Kyle record label. Yes. Maybe he does that. Yeah. I know. Oh, the numbers gone out. I had to seven point four at two. Seven point six. I had one is seven point seven two. At that is eight point two two million so far. Yeah. What else was there? And then there is sub license fees totaling two million per annum. Right. So that takes us out for 10, 10 point two two million. What are the sub license fees? What could they be for? I guess for the programmers self because they produce it on behalf. I don't know. Yeah. Because it was IP. So something to do with the service of doing the show. And then some sort of intellectual property. Yeah. They're going around. Quays are IP. Yes. And Quays are is the the the the umbrella. The organization that Kyle owns when he's not being Kyle. I see. Yeah. So it says if the term continues to the end of 2034, a total of more than 85 million will be required to be paid, which is a lot in my opinion. That is. It's a lot in anyone's book. Tim lawyer Michael Bern spoke to Mumbrella this week again after reading Kyle's final filing also appeared on the game changes podcast. I'm not sure who's lawyer he is now whether he's Mumbrella's or game changes. But anyway, what's his reading? We're in first. I'd hate to see the legal bills that consultancy. I'm feeling even more betrayed. I'm occasionally invited onto game changes and they told Michael that he was their favorite guest. It's it's it's going to be very different. Difficult to rebuild this bridge, I think. What's Michael's read on the situation? Look, my, yeah, my type reading what he's written for from Mumbrella and listening to talk to game changes is and these aren't the words he used, but my read was he was quite impressed by the filing. You know, it felt like he was at least partly persuaded by the argument. You know, and I think a bit surprised that they were trying to argue that the contract had not in fact been terminated, which wasn't what he was expecting. But he seemed to be fine that it was argue or bull. Now, the one thing I found myself thinking about is over the years and forges a very small number, but I have been the recipient of one or two of these filings in previous kind of Mumbrella legal skirmishes. And the fact is that it come these they come in from one side of the lawyer and they're really persuasive and it's God, wow, yeah, yes, really. There's no arguing with that. And then the other side has an equally good lawyer and that side comes in and then all of a sudden the world looks quite different. So I, you might remember a couple of weeks back, I kind of talked about kind of asymmetrical warfare. Someone said to me, that's what Kyle would do. This is what he has started to do to ARN already. If you think about the fact that ARM were already to announce to the ASX that they had terminated Kyle, what did he do? He made sure that just before I went on the today show at 10 past seven in the morning, I got the announcement that he had been terminated. So that was how it reached the public domain. It wasn't through the ARN ASX announcement. What happened this week? We saw this concise statement of claim drop into the media. He is already fighting ARN not by the traditional rules because normally, you know, you, you file with a court and you wait for the court to publish it. So I, I think that's going to be one of the really interesting aspects of this is, is how he fights the fight outside of the court. Yeah. And I found it really interesting that, and this is what Michael Bernsage, he did, like, he was basically when he made his initial statement saying, like, I am ready for work. I want to work. I want to work. That's all part of like him saying the contract is still valid. And like he even made the point that they're probably still invoicing for the services. So they're basically continuing on as if he's contracted it and he's being benched. Like they just are basically gone, no, you haven't terminated the contract because it's unlawful. Like it doesn't count. It's like a, you know, a wedding in Hawaii or something. I didn't know the wedding is an Hawaii didn't count. You learn something every day. Yeah. Up next, the robots are coming for PR. For anyone working across media, advertising, marketing, PR and EdTik, you've got an extensive suite of resources ready at your fingertips with a membership to Mumbrela Pro. Not only can you access Mumbrela's 17 year archive soon to be 18 years. And maybe after that 19 years, you'll get exclusive access to in-depth analysis, a directory to see which agencies work with which brands and a library of audio and video event content. And that's not all becoming a member of the Mumbrela Pro community means you can save 20% of tickets to all Mumbrela events. Start your free 7 day trial today. Head on over to mumbrela.com.au/pro for the full picture. The audience at this week's Mumbrela's comms con heard that AI generated press releases just don't work. His media nets Amarita Sidhu. 73% of journals told us they received suspected AI generated pictures often or occasionally. Make no mistake about it though. Our thematic analysis shows the majority will lose trust in the pitch. They will lose trust in you if they suspect it to be AI generated. Because what do they think of AI generated pictures? For them, an AI generated pitch is a lazy pitch. It's a non-research pitch. It's a potentially false pitch. There goes the trust. Now, Eleanor, it doesn't seem rocket science that AI can just be more slot that's easily ignored. But can journalists actually detect that a pitch is AI generated? Well, first thing to say is, and this actually really surprised me, the media net survey that was the focal point of this research surveyed 800 journalists, both based in Australia and Australian journalists based overseas. So for me, I was surprised there was even not many of us even to fall in part of a survey. But apparently, half of them said in the media net research that they can tell. They can tell when a pitch is AI generated. Could you? Me personally, I can't, but the thing is, I am very much like, when I look at my inbox, I go relevant, irrelevant, irrelevant. I don't have much time to do much more than that. So I'm not really not getting into the nuances of how M-dashes are used and how dynamically evolving the market is and stuff. But yeah, I mean, look, I'm pretty, I'm pretty born on stage. It was a very blunt message for the audience. And there was some absolutely banging headlines from that, PSLOP just was the pinnacle of that. One of the things I found myself thinking about is there are definitely examples of people using AI to write press releases and by the sounds of it, to write the pitches that go with the press releases. We've already heard plenty of examples of people using AI to write their news stories. In our little space, obviously there's MI3 fast news. You've got vinyl group of boasted about the fact that they're using AI to write 10 times as many news stories. And then I think the next stage is we're going to have people using a gentica AI to check out their inboxes and summarize things for them. So there's a very real possibility that AI will write a press release. There's then a second possibility that AI will write the news story to go with it, followed by the third possibility to the AI then reads the thing. Without a human being involved any stage. It's mad to think that there will be these robotters ping pong in backwards. I think a question for you Tim, can you tell if a pitch is intended for Mamma Mia instead of my brother? Because we get an awful lot of those. We do. We get quite a few parenting ones. I also had a really good one this week or good example this week, where someone sent me an R2. Hey, I was so interested in and then it was it obviously just pulled something in from the website that we had written about, but not me. And then the second line was anyway, I wanted to talk it was completely unrelated. And I was so fascinated. I actually felt like we're playing and saying, I'm just curious what system do you use? But I just felt that it would come across as so snarky that they would never apply to me. You snarky Tim. I know. I know. Well, I restrained myself because I'm getting older and more restrained now. I do think so. This could seem quite a non-issue unless you're a journalist, but I think it's probably worth pointing out what I'm re-tour also said was that journalists are actually using press releases as a primary source of finding stories now. This is putting it above social media, which to be honest is a bit worrying anyway. But also, you know, what you would really hope is your best stories as a journalist, gentrically, come from your contacts. And that wasn't even really mentioned. It's press releases, bit of social media. And so look, I mean, that's obviously making the point that the press release. whether we like it or not is an important part of the media ecosystem. I mean, to spell it out, the stat was that for the first time, the single biggest source of news is press releases, which is, as you say, is a bit shocking. Yeah, and the way she described it was journalist-ass squeezed by a lack of resources and facing uncertainty, so PR is seen as a helping hand to get access to stories. That's okay, but it is worrying, and look, I've been in an organisation like this before, where you are churning for press releases, and it's honestly, as a journalist, it is so distroyingly awful. Up next, why agencies need to think differently. (upbeat music) Do you know what that sound is, Abe? I would say it's something from my sound effects library, Tim. That's right, Abe. It's the Mumbrailer 360 Clackson. You're now in the final hours to secure $600 worth of early bird savings to attend Mumbrailer 360, lock in your tickets before prices go up at the end of the week. Across three days and 10 colossal streams of content, 2,000 media and marketing professionals, and that could include you, are set to descend upon carriage works in Sydney, at the end of May for Mumbrailer 360. It could be the launch pad for the next chapter of your career, new ideas, new energy, and new ways of working, a catalyst for the next wave of creativity and innovation. Check out the global and local industry leaders already confirmed on the bill. Go to mumbrailer.com. that I use slash Mumbrailer 360 for more info. (upbeat music) Last week, Tumble Turn Marketing Advisories, Jen Davidson, penned a piece from Mumbrailer that Tim is right for Naked Communications 2.0, the legendary agency that pioneered unbundling strategy from execution. She spoke to Eleanor about her vision. Here's how the conversation played out. Jen Davidson, thank you for coming on the podcast. How are you? Pleasure. Great to be with you. Just to start off with, for readers who are unfamiliar, can you outline what Naked was originally Naked Communications and what kind of impact did they have on Australia's creative scene? So yeah, I do remember it very vividly because I came across when I was running Coca-Cola for Universal Mechanical Media Business and we came up against them in a pitch and we'd never heard of this company called Naked. And they're essentially a, it was an independent strategic planning unit. And it was very far and very new and known behold. They won probably what was the biggest pitch that year, which was a Coca-Cola account. They didn't take the buying, they didn't pitch for the buying, they just pitch for the planning. And what it was, so that's when we first came across this whole notion of strategic planning as separated from buying. And what they came up with was a whole sort of channel neutral creative ideas that really shook the market and then they went on a run of a few years where they pretty much won a whole lot of big accounts and expanded really quickly. But it was the first time that we saw planning and buying split. It was a big deal and I can't remember what year it was. I want to say it was 2000 and four, maybe you're five. - So Naked obviously closed a few years ago and it was folded into a narrow, but you wrote in your piece, whereas in Mambraila that now is the ideal conditions for a Naked.2, can you outline what has helped you develop this thesis? Why do you think now the conditions are optimal for a Naked style agency? - Yeah, we work with clients a lot and how this sort of started. I've often thought, actually let me take a step back when we run a lot of pictures and it's really clear, even in 2026, that strategic thinking is the core differentiator when it comes to pictures. It's not about price, it's rarely about pricing. It's always the winning idea or strategic thought is always what separates excellence from good. So it's still a big thing, the whole strategic piece. So we see that day in, day out. And then over the last couple of years, we've seen probably more emphasis on the implementation of media and we've often thought strategically, that's where the magic is. And it seems to be stalled down a bit and everything shifts to implementation and then programmatic and platform buying and all this sort of a big shift to programmatic execution. So then, so that's like the backdrop. And then about two months ago, in the space of a fortnight, I had three CMOs call me looking for somewhere they could go. They had agencies, they're all very happy, but they were looking for some independent thinking. And they all had very different sort of, different sort of things that they were looking for. But what they wanted was one wanted to work out new growth strategies, one wanted a new, new audience strategy. All of it was after something that they could have got from their traditional agency, but they wanted something that was unencumbered from what they got day to day. So that was in the space of a couple of weeks. I had these three different CMOs after this advice and it was reignited this whole sort of thought process of, gosh, people really do, clients want independent, great thinking. It's what they're obviously not getting it and they really want it. And that's the start of us talking about. It's time for Nekid 2.0. - Nekid obviously boomed and had this real presence both in the UK and Australia, but after its closure and after obviously its acquisition, it never really seemed to catch on in the strategy or a model seen by other agencies. And interestingly enough, Adam Ferrier, when the brand was finally ceased in 2019, he said he anticipates Nekid 2.0, will pop up somewhere. But we haven't really seen that though yet. Why do you think, sorry? - I don't know why we haven't seen it. It's to me it's a mystery. I think I will say though, there is great strategic talent in the market. So I think it still does exist and it's a lot of independence. Some absolute standout talent in the holding companies. So it's all still there, but we haven't seen it. And I just, I don't know why, but I do think though, now more than ever, it's the market's desperate for it. - Yeah. One of the, I don't know if you managed to catch up, but your piece spats a lot of debate amongst our readers and with one interesting comment on Mumbraela that I thought I would just point out, nobody will build this because nobody will pay for it. So I don't know if that answers my earlier question, but I think that I want to take so what you've been saying from what your clients have been talking to you about. - I do think people will pay a premium for this. And even if you have a look at it, the whole platform, the migration to platform media is the price comes down with technology supporting it with AI solutions, the implementation is going to be checked up. It has to be. So by default, you can literally divert that, those funds that you're saving there upstream into putting more money and more emphasis behind strategic thinking. And I do think clients would pay for it. - One interesting point as well. And this may be why we haven't seen it be adopted on a wider basis. How do you create an ideal payment structure, especially if we are moving towards what people call outcomes-based remuneration? How do you assign that value to creative and strategic thinking? That must be a very hard conversation to have. - It's not necessarily a difficult conversation. I think this will always want the best strategic talent that they can get out of an agency as part of their structure. It's very unusual for clients to down down or want less of strategic involvement. So I think that they're prepared to pay for it. And I do think you have to have a totally different structure for that. But I do think that is probably a retained model. Whereas the output or outcome-based model is going to be more structured on exactly what the delivery or the execution is. So not necessarily a media commission, but the campaign-based activity or always on-based activity. What's the price per unit that we're going to pay for that? So I do think they're two very different models. I don't think you can have a retained model that captures both. - That's interesting. Well, if you were to advise any agencies out there to how they can start having those initial conversations with a client about thinking about a new model, something that is more focused on that strategic arm, what would you assume of your advice be to them? - I do think that ring things, even in the whole course, I'm surprised that none of the whole course have set up a difference, like strategic unit, like taking all of the sort of strategic excellence from each of the agencies as they start to consolidate different businesses. You could absolutely do it with it a whole code where you have one strategic unit that's responsible for everything. I'm surprised no one's done it because I do think having a strategic hotbed where culturally you're building great strategic thinking. You've got analytics embedded in there. potentially your market mix modeling, everything's all of the thinking is taken upstream and then created almost briefs out of that unit that's just sent over and to the implementation team, which could be a totally different area and a different remuneration structure and paid for separately. So I do think it's clients are open to it. They're definitely open to it because they There's very few clients that would say strategy isn't important to me and if anything as we get into more sort of platform-based execution strategies coming upstream to finding the audience, defying the messaging architecture, all of that is even more important than ever. You've got to put more emphasis upstream than you do on the implementation. So I do think there's a very clear rationale for it and it's just sitting down and talking clients through it. I just don't think you get much pushback. I think as well you made a point in your piece that and this is something I've seen in my reporting recently obviously there's a big proliferation of agencies and the platforms especially investing in and to end campaign delivery. So anything from campaign execution production optimization and obviously you know you media buying, you media spending. So that if that takes away some of that grunt work. There is definitely more room for us to be having these high level conversations you would think in theory. I am pretty confident that we'll do it and given the feedback I had personally and across my LinkedIn there's definitely more than a few people that are looking at it. I spoke to the marketer as one part of the equation though and I suppose this is something you must come against a lot. There not be only decision makers. Yeah and I think to be like there's also I think the market's very much moving more towards project based activity. So if you prepare to start a business accepting that a fair bit of your revenue could be project based. That's I think a big shift then probably what make it was 20 years ago is that there's a lot more sort of strategic projects. So there was a lot more sort of clients as I mentioned the three calls I had earlier this year clients are just looking for every clients after growth. And they're not necessarily wanting to go to the same place that they get their day to day campaign advice form to understand where they can find category or audience growth. I do think that the independent sort of nature of what a new name could be could provide that independence strategic advice. The technology conditions may be right but I do wonder at the moments but in 2026 we've had obviously unpredictable few months and a streak from a geopolitical standpoint and economic. Do you think this might be the right time as a marketer or can you budget for the year and looking at the predictability at the moment. In this environment arguably it's never been more important. You differentiate it is always going to be great strategy and great thinking and now more than ever this is the time to invest in it. The other thing it's amazing how categories brands within categories all seem to act the same way. Like you can see when you look at competitive reports it's literally incrementality at certain times of the year but everyone seems to be doing the same type of activity, the same type of messaging, the same type of media weight. So it's almost like when you're operating in a category that's a sea of sameness strategic upstream thinking has never been more important. So if more than ever now's the time to do it. I know you may not want a single anybody out in particular but just if there's anybody at all that you think comes close to operating the same way as what Naked did in its heyday. Is there anybody in Australia who springs to mind? No, there's individuals that's the thing and there's definitely individuals who could bring this together quite quickly. I think I did put in the article is it a consulting company? I thought the Accenture team would have done this the Accenture media team given their skills and capability certainly back in initiative. I thought that would have been a very that could have been a good place for them to test out the Naked model particularly that the premium nature of it that they went for service. But beyond that, no, maybe there's plenty of independence who could do it or a creative agency. I think there's some great indies in the creative space with some good strategic talent that could be bolstered. That could be another interesting way in. Just to sum up, what would you say is the single most important idea from Naked that today's agency is not fully embracing and that is more important than ever? I think ideas and strategies that are channel neutral that sort of latch on to a core idea or a core insight and really breaks them all. I think a like strong emphasis on deep creative thinking before it just turns into a media plan or follows a market mix model. Something that's really a true creative inspirational breakthrough campaign. That's what we need. That's TumbleTowns, Jen Davidson and thanks for joining us today. It's goodbye from me, A Beauty from Aves Audio and thanks to Eleanor, Shex Kiss Abe, Nathan, thanks Abe, and Timothy Burrows Esquire. Turtle Pepe Aves. Podcast Edit by Aves Audio.