This TVNZ documentary captures the early days of NewstalkZB, shortly after Radio New Zealand gambled on relaunching it with an all talk format. Previous breakfast host Merv Smith has taken most of his audience to rival Radio i; his replacement is Paul Holmes. The former king of the Wellington airwaves is soon grappling to make an impact in Auckland. Competition amongst the stations is cutthroat, but Holmes is the focal point here. He’s under pressure and surrounded by a battery of often conflicting opinions. By 1988 he'd hauled the show from ninth to second in the ratings.

All Black great Grant Fox is given the big red book in this award-winning episode of This is Your Life. The first five-eighth’s record points tally and marshalling of stars like John Kirwan made the playmaker a key cog in the 1987 Rugby World Cup-winning All Blacks and champion Auckland teams. His distinctive goal-kicking ritual became as reassuring as a metronome for fans. The diminutive Auckland Grammar old boy meets family and teammates, discusses discipline and his single All Blacks try, and gets busted by coach John Hart. Fox would become an All Blacks selector.

This long-running chat show gathered a loyal following for its recipe of sports fandom mixed with playful pratfalls. Regulars in the circus wrangled by producer Ric Salizzo included larrikin ex-All Black Marc Ellis, straight girl Lana Coc-Kroft, 'That Guy' Leigh Hart, and Graeme Hill. This 23 November 2005 final features plenty of sporting guest stars and ‘best of’ moments: from World Nude Day to a litany of laddish moments from Ellis. Rumours of presenter intoxication would only have been stirred by the mayhem of the closing set destruction, accompanied by band The Exponents.

Big hair, big shoulder pads and big earrings feature in this video celebrating Three’s 30th birthday. On 26 November 1989, TV3 — the first privately owned TV channel in New Zealand — transmitted from its Auckland studios for the first time. The promo opens with fresh-faced news reporters/presenters hamming it up for the camera, including Joanna Paul, Eric Young and Genevieve Westcott. The rest of the clip celebrates Three's successes (Outrageous Fortune, bro’Town, 7 Days) and takes a light-hearted look at its failings, revisiting times it went into receivership.

Independent television network TV3 launched its prime time news bulletin on 27 November 1989, a day after the channel first went to air. Veteran broadcaster Philip Sherry anchors a reporting team that includes future politician Tukoroirangi Morgan (probing kiwi poaching), Ian Wishart (investigating traffic cop-dodging speedsters) and future newsroom boss Mark Jennings (torture in Timaru). Belinda Todd handles the weather, and Janet McIntyre reports on TV3's launch. The Kiwi cricket team faces defeat in Perth (although history will record a famous escape there). 

TV3 celebrated its launch with a two-hour special featuring music, montages, and a Māori welcome. Aotearoa's first new television channel in more than two decades went to air on 26 November 1989, after years of meetings, hard graft and competing bidders. This clip of TV3's first ten minutes creates a party atmosphere of smiling happy faces. Dave Dobbyn and dancers get energetic in promotional song 'Get the Feeling', then Governor-General Sir Paul Reeves pulls the launch lever. Also featured are appearances by a wide array of Kiwis, from children to soldiers to Sam Hunt.

TV1 celebrated Christmas by throwing most of its big names into this 1977 comedy/variety show. Ringleaders Roger Gascoigne and Nice One Stu's Stu Dennison are joined by a cavalcade of newsreaders hiding under Santa beards. Among the loopy 70s oddities on show: Brian Edwards in school uniform, channelling The Goons; Selwyn Toogood doing an It's in the Bag sketch that would nowadays likely be deemed too un-PC to make it to air; plus racehorse expert Glyn Tucker talking reindeer races. Madcap band Mother Goose also appear. 

This archival compendium of Kiwi newsreaders in the hot seat compresses 21 years of footage into four minutes. Sixties BBC-style newsreader Bill Toft tells viewers about a court trial involving pirate station Radio Hauraki; Philip Sherry covers the 1970 shooting of four students at Ohio's Kent State University; and pioneering female newsreader Jennie Goodwin talks weather matters, using graphics and a roller-door style arrangement that now looks sweetly low-tech. The footage also includes the late Angela D'Audney, and long-serving news team Richard Long and Judy Bailey.

To mark its first 25 years, TVNZ commissioned independent producer Ian Mackersey to chronicle a day in its life as the national broadcaster. Coverage is split between the often extreme lengths (and heights) gone to by technicians maintaining coverage, and the work of programme makers — including the casts and crews of McPhail and Gadsby and Country GP. The real drama is in the news studio during the 6.30 bulletin (with light relief from the switchboard) in this intriguing glance back at a pre-digital, two channel TV age during the infancy of computers.  

With stints as an All Black, Springbok triallist, sports presenter, National MP, and sometime celebrity chef, Grahame Thorne has experienced his share of fame. But perhaps his hottest 15 minutes came after he dared to present the sports news one day in 1983 ... with a perm. The ensuing national trauma inspired headlines, irate phonecalls, and “curls are for girls” banners at rugby games. Sadly the perm’s freshest incarnation is lost to the archives, and this slightly grown-out version is the only extant evidence of a key moment in Kiwi fashion history.