Russell Brown

Who is Russell Brown?

Russell Brown is a well-known New Zealand media commentator, and the owner of the Public Address community of blogs, and writes the blog Hard News. Hard News is based on the Hard News radio segment written by Brown from 1991 to 2002 on Auckland student radio station bFM. The text of the radio commentary was circulated on the internet by various means from 1993, and the bulletin officially became a blog with the launch of Public Address in November 2002.

In 1986, he moved to England where he wrote for various publications, before returning to New Zealand in 1991. From 2008 to 2012, he presented the media commentary programme Media7 on the TVNZ 7 digital channel. Following the closure of TVNZ 7 after its funding was not renewed, the show was picked up by TV3 in 2013 and renamed Media3 for one further series, however TV3 declined to produce any more series. As of 2014, it is to re-appear on Maori Television as Media Matters.

Brown was born in Lower Hutt, New Zealand, and now lives in Auckland, with his long-term partner journalist Fiona Rae, and their two sons.