If you’re craving compelling stories told by a multi-award-winning journalist—one who detests click bait as much as you do and wants to tell the stories of Australia and Australians wherever they may be, then this podcast series is for you.
This email is my introduction to you for my new podcast series Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project.
Many of you will know my passion for telling stories through sound. Highlighting injustice by revealing stories that don’t get told, and taking them to a wider audience.
My Streets of Your Town (SOYT) podcast is now well established, available on iTunes, Spotify, Soundcloud and many other podcast providers. Many of you who I am emailing here are already subscribers and supporters of my work, and for that I thank you.
Series 2 of SOYT is something special, something that hasn’t been done before, and something that is desperately needed. I need your help to get these stories out to a wider audience. Each email I send you will have the latest episode of the podcast embedded and one click away from playing into your earholes. And hopefully too, those of your friends, as you share the email and the stories, far and wide.
Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project podcast is all about recognising great Australian journos from across this wide brown land. With the media in Australia under increasing attack, there’s no better time to celebrate some of the best journalists from down under. And hopefully by doing that, and spreading the word, we can increase the value and respect people place on the Fourth Estate, and show how integral great reporting is to Australia’s democracy and freedom.
I’m Nance Haxton, and as a two-time Walkley winner, I have the experience and understanding to ask the revealing questions of the best award winning reporters, featuring candid audio insights from the the top practitioners of the craft, and discovering how they work behind the scenes to find the stories that change lives.
What I can promise you is top quality audio content. There will be no shoddy quality Skype interviews here. I will travel around Australia to speak to the best journalists around this country face to face, so that you feel enmeshed in the moment with us, as part of the interview conversation.
This is about revealing the inner workings of Australian life, the deep motivations of people, the risks to our democratic process, and a deep dive into the big issues of why media freedom is not just important, but vital to our society.
For this style of high quality long form audio to continue, it needs the support of people like you who care about independent journalism in Australia, because the traditional model of journalism is breaking down.
The business model of journalism has been vastly changed by digitisation, and quality journalism costs a lot more than media organisations are willing to pay, and more than they can afford.
I believe in quality journalism. I am determined to keep working as a journalist as I travel throughout this amazing country to tell our stories to the world. Podcasts are a worldwide medium, and we can all be part of it.
I am going to find the best stories and I’m going to bring them directly to my audience—you. And you can help me do it.
Thanks for joining me on the journey of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project.
“What Price Would You Pay?” campaign
I am proud to have taken part in helping produce the Walkley Foundation with their “What Price Would You Pay campaign”. In many ways that experience has inspired my latest podcast series The Journo Project. I liaised with the journalists taking part in What Price Would You Pay and am so proud of the resulting advertisement which I think shows the price we should all contemplate paying to provide a voice for the vulnerable and hold those in power to account. Hopefully you’ve seen this ad played as a community service announcement on a range of cinemas, billboards and television stations I liaised with, but if not, please take two minutes to watch.
Launching this Friday!
So get ready for the launch of Streets of Your Town The Journo Project this Friday night (June 28)! As an email subscriber and Wandering Journo supporter, you will receive a special audio preview of the episode ahead of the official release of the podcast on iTunes and Spotify.
In the first episode I speak to renowned investigative reporter Hedley Thomas, creator of the phenomenally successful podcast “The Teacher’s Pet” that has been downloaded more than 50 million times around the world. We chat at the cafe where he wrote many of his podcast scripts, and talk through the process he uses to find the incredible stories that have now won him two Gold Walkley awards. He also talks about why we should all be concerned about the implications of the recent Australian Federal police media raids on the ABC and News Limited journalists.
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Launching The Journo Project: A Tribute to Australia's Best Journalism