Dear Scoop Readers and Subscribers,

Another year older and another year wiser. Scoop is delighted to have reached the beginning of its 12th year of operations today. Our first ever post to the live website was made in the evening of Thursday 10 June 1999.

Since then the Scoop team has published 342,582 stories and thousands of images and audio files - all of which remain online and findable via the search.scoop.co.nz search engine.

Among the highlights of our 11th year has been the first full year of publication for werewolf.co.nz the new flagship online magazine edited by Gordon Campbell.

Earlier this month we published the 12th edition featuring an interview with TVNZ chief Rick Ellis. (TVNZ turns 50 on Sunday).

To you subscribers (& thank you for subscribing) the other major development for Scoop in its 11th year has been a significant upgrade to the Newsagent platform bringing new features and a much easier to use interface to our Home and Professional users alike. Watch this space for additional developments in this area.

The next time you login you will be redirected to the new secure platform at https://newsagent.scoop.co.nz to edit your account settings. (For more information about Newsagent contact info@scoop.co.nz .)

A big thankyou to Billy Naylor our technical developer who has been working on the upgrade for much of the past year.

Thanks also to the Scoop editorial team (and their loved ones) who keep the site running around the clock: my Co-editor Selwyn Manning, News Editor Lyndon Hood, Political Editor Gordon Campbell and Duty Editor Rory McKinnon (and his predecessor Spike Mountjoy). A big thanks also to the part time editors Jackie Little, David McLellan, George McLellan and Althea Francis.

On the sales side Scoop is very grateful to have welcomed Business Development Manager Steven Wood to the team this past year. Thanks also to the team at 3Di Interactive (Toni, Haley, Neal and Kate), plus Regan Cunliffe , Miki Siksai and Mauricio Freitas from the Ffunnell Group.

Completing the Scoop team are BSD Systems Administrator Andrew Thompson and our Accounts Manager Shelley Smith, to whom we also extend our thanks.

Scoop is also very grateful to its content partners, Jonathan Underhill, Pattrick Smellie ( business.scoop.co.nz), Lindsay Shelton (wellington.scoop.co.nz), Jeremy Rose ( books.scoop.co.nz), Michelle Mars and Blair Bishop (sex.scoop.co.nz, Phil Bilbrough ( advertising.scoop.co.nz) and David Robie and the Pacific Media Center ( pacific.scoop.co.nz) - who have so significantly enriched the Scoop content experience in recent years.

We also extend our thanks to the Scoop Media Cartel advertising partners at PublicAddress.net, Kiwiblog.co.nz, Pundit.co.nz, Thestandard.org.nz, Spareroom.co.nz and weeklycoitus.co.nz - unquestionably the best group of bloggers in the country.

Then we extend our thanks to our newsagent professional subscribers, and our advertisers and their agencies who provide the fuel which keeps the wheels of content turning.

Thanks also to the thousands of businesses, PR professionals and editorial contributors who provide so much of the actual content that Scoop carries. You are unfortunately too numerous to name but to you we say cheers - without you there would be no Scoop.

We also extend our thanks to key suppliers including Catalyst IT, Citylink, Orcon, Katipo, Neilsen Netratings, Sitemanager and Dell.

Finally I extend my personal thanks to our shareholders and the Scoop board and its advisors, especially Scoop Chair Magaret Thompson, and board members Finlay Thompson, Andrew McNaughton, Selwyn Manning - and most importantly of all my wife Wendy Cooper - whose assistance, advice and encouragement keeps the good ship Scoop on its tracks.

Best Regards
Alastair Thompson
Scoop General Manager / Co-Editor
alastair@scoop.co.nz

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The decision allowing sale of the Crafar dairy farms to Chinese investor Shanghai Pengxin has been set aside, with the High Court directing Ministers to reconsider the application.

Judge Forrest Miller found that the Overseas Investment Office's recommendation to allow the purchase to occur "materially overstated" the economic benefit of the transaction to the New Zealand economy. More>>