Nine To Noon for Friday 16 December 2022

09:05 Family-friendly internet service provider blocks harmful content

A new internet service provider that offers fast fibre internet, but blocks harmful digital content, is being launched today. The Good Source is a family friendly internet service, and will allow parents to block any device in the home from accessing content like pornography and violence. It aims to protect young and vulnerable internet users from viewing harmful content. The Good Source has partnered with local tech company, Safe Surfer, which builds online safety and security products. The new web-crawling technology uses smart AI tools to categorise content on the internet, and also allows user to choose their own filters for what sites to block and when. Kathryn speaks with Rory Birkbeck, founder of Safe Surfer, and Steve Turner, one of the co-founders of The Good Source, along with Darryl McConnell and Ryan Kilfoil. 

09:30 How our immune systems change as we age

Kiwi born renown immunologist Michelle Linterman, talks about her research into how our immune system changes as we age. Dr Linterman is a New Zealand born immunologist works at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, England, where she leads a research group and lab facilities for testing responses to new vaccines. Her research programme focuses on how the immune system mounts a good response against vaccination, and why vaccines don't always work as well for certain age groups. Early in the Covid pandemic, her team ran an important preclinical study of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine in aged mice, in order to test how that vaccine would act in older bodies. Dr Linterman is in New Zealand at the moment, based at the Malaghan Institute.

09:45 Pacific correspondent Koroi Hawkins

Koroi has the latest from the Fiji elections where  group of opposition party leaders are calling for a halt to vote counting and an audit of the country's electoral system. This comes after provisional results, displayed on a Fiji Election Office app, showing a clear lead for the opposition People's Alliance Party (PAP). And the Cook Islands has run out of petrol.

 

10:05 Big Bird diplomacy: The challenge of making Sesame Street in Russia

 When the Soviet Union fell, the US poured billions into Russia to help its transition into Western-style democracy. But how could the free-market and capitalist values be sold to ordinary Russians who'd spent decades living by communist doctrine? The answer - according to American politicians - was to be found in the beloved children's TV show, Sesame Street.  But the process of getting Ulitsa Sezam, as it was called in Russia, off the ground was anything but straightforward. There was trouble with financing and finding a broadcaster, assassinations, an armed takeover of their offices - and the kidnapping of Elmo. The Muppet-style puppets didn't go down so well at first - and the initial storylines were a bit grim - D for Depression anyone? Yet Ulitsa Sezam went on to become a major hit and aired for over a decade. Natasha Lance Rogoff was its executive producer and has written a book about her experience called Muppets in Moscow: The unexpected crazy true story of making Sesame Street in Russia.

10:30 Around the motu : Jonathan Leask from Mid-Canterbury

In Ashburton, the District Council is under pressure to get a second bridge across the Ashburton/Hakatere River and - unsurprisingly the price tag keeps going up. A candidate in the recent local body election claims she was subjected to racial abuse during the campaign because of her moko, and has reported the matter to police. And controversy over Ashburton's popular disc golf course, where apparently there are more rolled ankles than holes-in-one.  Kathryn speaks with Jonathan Leask, Local Democracy Reporter with the Ashburton Guardian.

10:45 The Reading

Episode 5 of My Father's Island written and read by Adam Dudding.

11:05  Book review: Swanfolk by Kristín Ómarsdóttir

Olly Clifton of Unity Books Auckland reviews Swanfolk by Kristín Ómarsdóttir, published by Harvill Secker

11:05 Music reviewer Grant Smithies​

For his last music slot of the year, Grant rounds up four of his favourite reissues from the past 12 months. Expect songs from The Pretenders, Nancy Sinatra/ Lee Hazlewood, the late Lee Perry and Brooklyn house producer Galcher Lustwerk.  
 

11:30 Sports commentator Sam Ackerman

Sam mulls over Kane Williamson’s decision to ditch the test cricket captaincy and its implications, looks at who is in the running for the Halbergs - and who he thinks should be, and casts an eye to what should be an epic FIFA world cup decider.

11:45 The week that was

Comedians Te Radar and Michele A'Court with the Christmas gifts teachers actually want from students, and it's not cups and mugs!