The damage to 2GB’s bottom line from Alan Jones’s tirade about the New Zealand prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, is serious.

According to media tracking service Aircheck, the number of commercials across the station for the first three days this week was down 441 on the same period two weeks ago. Before Jones said Scott Morrison should “shove a sock down her throat”, 2GB had 2,228 ads over three days. This week the number had dropped to 1,787.

On Jones’s own breakfast program, from 5.30am to 9am, the ad tally dropped from 343 spots two weeks ago to 308 this week – that’s 35 paid ads down.

The figures show that when Jones said advertisers who chose to abandon him would be replaced by others, he was wrong.

“I’ve got no comment about the advertisers, they can make their own judgment if they go,” a defiant Jones told Nine News on Tuesday. “There will be others that take their place.”

💧 Mad Fucking Witches (@MadFckingWitch) 🧙🏼‍♀️🧙🏼‍♀️ Witches are SO DISAPPOINTED with @CommBank, as they’re ignoring our concerns and funding Alan Jones’ hate speech. Please read this important witchy post on what you can do next:https://t.co/c3JoA29p1s#ReleaseTheFlyingMonkeys pic.twitter.com/cwSplBCxfR

A social media campaign, bolstered by Mad Fucking Witches, which has more than 51,000 members on Facebook, and activist group Sleeping Giants on Twitter, has led to more than 40 companies pulling their advertising spend from Jones and or the station. Consumers continue to target the advertisers who are still appearing on Jones by bombarding them with comments across social media.

Jones cheerleaders rev up

But Jones still has his defenders in the media, including former Sunrise commentator Prue MacSween and former Labor senator and Sky News contributor Graham Richardson.

MacSween infamously appeared in a widely condemned Sunrise segment that discussed the stolen generations, where she suggested “we need to do it again, perhaps”. More recently she called Nick Kyrgios a “spoilt little Greek brat”.

Richo, for his part, wrote a defence of Jones for the Australian. He also took up the theme of Jones being the people’s hero.

It followed a similar vein to another pro-Jones column Richo wrote just a few months back, which read more like a love letter: “His days start at 3am and most nights find him speaking to an audience rapt in the rapid-fire delivery and the passionate nature of his well-chosen words.”

This week Richo wrote: “Jones does get things wrong but for the most part he champions the causes of people who have little or no clout in today’s society.”

Peter van Onselen (@vanOnselenP) Very hard to disagree with this... 🤷‍♂️ pic.twitter.com/0JoMhZGhFY

The piece was received with howls of derision.

“No he doesn’t,” said ABC journalist Virginia Trioli. “He uses his privilege and power to make people with ‘no clout’ afraid, cynical and distrusting of democratic institutions such as governments, courts, schools and public servants. He’s something akin to an anarchist, really.”

And former News Corp journalist turned critic Tony Koch said: “Richardson talking crap. Alan Jones has made a career out of bullying people, particularly women and the powerless.”

Sponsorship stoush

The widow of the late, great Age investigative reporter David Wilson, Jo Nicholls, says she was was hurt and disappointed after the Melbourne Press Club dumped her family trust in favour of a more lucrative sponsorship from the Commonwealth Bank.

The club hosts the Quill awards for excellence in Victorian journalism across 29 categories including the young journalist of the year award, which Wilson’s family has sponsored for eight years.

Nicholls set up the Wilnic Family Trust after David died aged 58 in 2008 in recognition of Wilson’s work with young journalists in the Age newsroom.

The prize for the award was a trip to the annual Investigative Reporters and Editors conference in the US, as Wilson had been the first Australian reporter to attend the conference and bring back skills about computer-assisted reporting.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest David Wilson, who was the co-author, with Lindsay Murdoch, of a series of reports known as The Age Tapes.

Wilson was the co-author, with Lindsay Murdoch in 1984, of a series of reports known as The Age Tapes, which led to seven separate inquiries, including a royal commission. The Walkley-award winner was head of the paper’s investigative unit, Insight, for 10 years.

Nicholls was blindsided when she received an email from press club chief executive, Mark Baker, telling her the Commonwealth Bank wanted to sponsor the young journalist of the year award to the tune of more than $20,000 a year – but only if they had “branding rights”.

Baker offered her a different award – the student journalist – to sponsor, but she refused because Wilson was not a fan of journalism schools as they existed then. A recent offer from Nicholls to move the family’s sponsorship to the investigative Quill award was rejected and negotiations broke down despite an intervention from club president Adele Ferguson.

The irony of Ferguson winning a Gold Walkley for her exposure of the Commonwealth Bank’s “unconscionable banking practices” is not lost on anyone.

Baker told Weekly Beast the unfortunate dispute meant the award had no sponsor this year and the Commonwealth Bank decided to come on board as a premium sponsor instead of an award sponsor.

“We tried tried sincerely to continue the relationship with Jo by offering her the sponsorship of the student journalism of the year award to honour the memory of David Wilson, who was a close friend and colleague of mine at the Age,” Baker said.

Snap verdict

It didn’t take Andrew Bolt long to be outraged by the decision of the Victorian court of appeal to dismiss George Pell’s appeal. “I am appalled”, he wrote on his Herald Sun blog within minutes of the decision being handed down. Which almost certainly indicates he hadn’t read the 300-page judgment. Bolt was soon popping up on Sky’s breaking news coverage from outside the courthouse in Melbourne, where he told Kieran Gilbert he did not believe Pell was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. He was shocked and disappointed because he had hoped the court would “stand against the mob and the media witch hunt” to set Pell free.

In his column the next day Bolt highlighted the clergy who had been wrongly convicted, and said he had lost all faith in the justice system.

“They say it’s an insult to victims to doubt an accusation, but Pell would not be the first priest who has been unfairly accused,” Bolt said.

Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) Sky News host Andrew Bolt says he is “shocked, appalled and disappointed that one judge was outvoted by two others and Cardinal George Pell will remain in jail”. https://t.co/puSgptMVOA

Conservative commentator and men’s rights campaigner Bettina Arndt produced a mock movie poster starring George Pell as the wronged hero: “a [sic] exploration of modern day hysteria”.

Bettina Arndt (@thebettinaarndt) Never any hope of justice for George Pell. He was too big a scalp for the howling mob. pic.twitter.com/SZ4zovDMIM

Too good to be true

There was a heart-warming yarn in Newsweek this week that got a lot of attention. The story went that the Cathay Pacific chief executive, Rupert Hogg, refused to give up the names of staff to the Chinese government when he was asked to provide a list of employees who were involved in the Hong Kong protests.

Newsweek reported that Hogg provided the list – “but it included only one name: his own”.

Sadly it wasn’t true. Hogg quit after protests in Hong Kong led to a plunge in the airline’s share price and it came under pressure from Chinese authorities to rein in employees who were supporting the pro-democracy demonstrators.

Stephen McDonell (@StephenMcDonell) Wow! Have Newsweek stood this story up? That Cathay’s CEO Rupert Hogg when asked to give staff names to Beijing for anyone who’s backed the pro-democracy moment he supplied a list of one name: his own. #HongKong #China https://t.co/7YQ0NwrCGs

Later the magazine added a correction of sorts to the article. “This story has been updated to reflect that Taiwan News was the source of the story about Hogg’s refusal, and to include the new Cathay Pacific CEO’s comments.”

Not quite shipshape

An intriguing correction on the ABC website disclosed that a radio report and an online article managed to scramble a news story by confusing the country of origin of a tanker that was detained in Gibraltar.

“On 21 August, 2019 one radio news story and a related online story incorrectly stated that an Iranian tanker was detained in Gibraltar in retaliation for the seizure of a British ship. The British tanker was seized in retaliation for the seizure of the Iranian ship.”

Final question for McEvoy

The founding executive producer of Q&A, Peter McEvoy, is retiring ahead of a shake-up of the Monday night forum after the departure of host Tony Jones later this year.

McEvoy, the winner of five Walkley awards, including the Gold Walkley, created the program 13 years ago and has steered it through 400 episodes and its endless controversies and run-ins with government, including when the then prime minister, Tony Abbott, banned his ministers from appearing on the show.

Abbott said it was “out of control” and a “lefty lynch mob” after former terrorism suspect Zaky Mallah asked Coalition MP Steve Ciobo a question.

ABC managing director David Anderson said Q&A was the most successful discussion-based national affairs program in ABC history.

“Peter has made an incredibly significant contribution to public broadcasting and national current affairs,” he said.

News director Gaven Morris told staff McEvoy’s move “means a period of significant change for Q&A and an opportunity for us to take a fresh look at this important program”.

Sources say the refreshed show will be produced out of Melbourne and Sydney next year, possibly with two hosts sharing the duties.

Q&A has been dogged in recent years by the tag “the bad show” by critics who say it is trivial, populist and gives a platform to people who are divisive and ill-informed.