The Wire with Joel

Recently, across the motu, we have seen a variety of fires, most recently being the fire on Māngere Mountain, which had resulted in smoke warnings for 40 kilometres, reaching all the way to Piha in West Auckland.

News and Editorial Director, Joel, spoke to Senior Lecturer in the School of Biological Sciences at the Victoria University of Wellington, and Fire Ecologist, Dr Nicola Day, about our susceptibility to wildfires amidst the climate crisis, and what needs to be done to better prepare for events such as these recent bouts of blazes in the future.

Following the pandemic, hybrid remote and in office work has become more prevalent. According to data from StatsNZ on the September 2024 quarter, more than 40% of businesses offered a work from home option, while 898,700 people worked from home.

In 2023, 5 academics (and work friends) published a study on the nature of workplace friendships in the absence of physical presence. The study indicated several benefits of having work friends, as well as revealing foundational elements to maintaining these friendships.

Producer Athena spoke to Senior Lecturer Dr Stefan Korber, from the University of Auckland Business School, about the benefits of having work friends, and the ways workplace friendships can flourish.

The US is currently deciding the fate of the short-form video content sharing app, TikTok, in its country.

The ban is currently in a grey area — over the weekend, US users were unable to use the platform, being greeted with a message about the legislation put in place, however, that ban has been lifted for the time being.

US President-elect, Donald Trump, who is set to take office later today as the nation’s 47th President, who had also previously supported banning TikTok’s operations in the country, has since shifted opinion, vowing to give the app a 90-day reprieve for more time to establish a deal between the nation and ByteDance: the Chinese-based company that operates TikTok.

The reasoning for the ban stems from what the US states are national security threats.

News and Editorial Director and Monday Wire Host, Joel, spoke to a Lecturer in the Communication Studies Department at the University of Otago, Dr Olivier Jutel, about the US’ ban of the app, and whether he believes the app has reasonable grounds to be banned in the nation.

As well as this, ahead of the potential ban, many non-US based content creators are questioning what implications they could see if the United States does deny TikTok’s operations to the millions of US users on the app.

Joel also spoke to Sam Ashton, otherwise known as ‘Smashton,’ who not only co-hosts 95bFM’s Top Ten, but is also an Aotearoa-based TikTok content creator with over 307k followers.

They spoke to him about whether he is concerned about what will happen if this move goes ahead, and what changes he might expect as a content creator based in New Zealand.

For our weekly catch-up with the Labour Party Wire Host Caeden speaks to Labour’s Shanan Halbert about the Treaty Principles Bill submissions, Regulatory Standards Bill, and Labour’s plans for 2025.

For State of the States this week they speak to Andre Fa’aoso from the Yale Daily News about the devastating Los Angeles Fires and president-elect Donald Trump’s threat to annex Greenland and Canada and take back the sovereign Panama Canal for the United States.

For City Counselling this week producer Sofia speaks to Councillor Julie Fairey about Council’s submission on the Local Government New Zealand issues paper exploring electoral reform and Auckland Council’s plans for 2025. 

She also speaks to President of PATHA - the Professional Association for Transgender Health Aotearoa - Jennifer Shields, about public consultation on puberty blockers closing next week.