Introduction

4min Snip

00:00

Play full episode

Summary

Transcript

Episode notes

Pawris marks talks to Thomas cogling about a new amazon series that will be launched by the time this episode comes out. They also discuss why New zealand has such a large film industry, and whether it makes sense to subsidize hollywood productions so much. And they look at how Amazon is taking advantage of generous tax incentives provided by the local government. If you want to support the work that goes into making ta show every week, you can join supporters like durn from the U.S., slash tech won't save us or become a patron dot com.

Paris Marx is joined by Thomas Coughlan to discuss Amazon’s foray into Tolkien’s fantasy world, the big subsidies it received to film in New Zealand, and how its decision to move the series to the UK is giving fuel to demands to reassess the support for Hollywood productions.

Thomas Coughlan is a senior political reporter at NZ Herald, and formerly was a journalist at Stuff and Newsroom. Follow Thomas on Twitter at @coughlthom.

Tech Won’t Save Us offers a critical perspective on tech, its worldview, and wider society with the goal of inspiring people to demand better tech and a better world. Follow the podcast (@techwontsaveus) and host Paris Marx (@parismarx) on Twitter, and support the show on Patreon.

The podcast is produced by Eric Wickham and part of the Harbinger Media Network.

Also mentioned in this episode:

Thomas wrote for Stuff about the effort by the New Zealand government to attract Amazon to New Zealand and how it hoped the relationship would go beyond the TV series. For the NZ Herald, he also wrote that Amazon’s decision to move the series away from New Zealand will have implications for tourism and wasn’t communicated to the government until the last minute.
Benjamin Clark wrote about how film subsidies have been essential to attracted big Hollywood productions to New Zealand.
Madelaine Chapman dug into how much Peter Jackson has benefited from those subsidy schemes.
Amazon is spending about $464 million on the first season of The Rings of Power.
Amazon announced it was moving future seasons of the show to the UK in August 2021, causing frustration in New Zealand.
There were concerns about safety on the set of The Rings of Power after stunt workers were injured and they didn’t seem to be properly reported to authorities.
In November 2021, Unity acquired the technology division of Jackson’s Weta Digital.
There’s also a growing debate in New Zealand over whether it should be the site of major data centers.