Did Nine have the cattle footage first? The talk in Sydney media circles, we hear, is that 60 Minutes turned down the Indonesian cattle yarn, which was offered to them first — before being taken to Four Corners. That seems to hold water given in 2006 the same people, Lyn White and Animals Australia, gave 60 Minutes the same story about live exports to Egypt. The story was done by the late Richard Carleton who, media watchers say, would not have let this one get away if he was still with us.

Which bank won’t give you money? Another chapter in bank IT failures: apparently the Commonwealth Bank has been unable to process any withdrawals from its “Commonwealth Investment Fund”. One customer reports: “System down for two days now and resolution time unknown. Manager unavailable as locked in meetings trying to understand system failure. This is a very large fund but Commonwealth customers are barred from accessing their money, with absolutely no timeframe for resolution available. Was told to call back on Monday — until I pointed out that this was a public holiday!”

Qantas Sydney office under reno. Qantas has been in the news for all the wrong reasons of late, but at least staff at its Sydney corporate offices in Mascot will enjoy nicer surrounds. According to one spy, the office refurbishment was costing some $400 million — which is “absurdly inaccurate” according to a Qantas spoksperson, who pointed out the reno is being made by the owner of the building (Qantas is only a tenant). “In fact the Qantas tenancy of seven buildings on the site will be consolidated into four buildings,” Qantas told Crikey.

The Sydney bubble may have burst. One Crikey reader received an email from a real estate agent re a Double Bay apartment, which began: “With regard to your previous interest in this property, you may recall that our price indication was in the low $2Ms. You may therefore now be interested to know that the vendors have revised their expectations and would consider offers.” Never a good sign …

Paper free-for-all: the saga continues. Crikey gets flooded with tip-offs about newspaper publishers dumping their product for free to boost circulation. We consider it a service to pass these on — why pay for your paper if you can get one for free? One for the Herald Sun readers now: apparently Melbourne Rebels members (that’s the city’s Super 15 rugby team) have been getting free copies a few days a week. As our tipster unkindly adds: “As the Melbourne Rebels line up for the wooden spoon, another losing mob have joined them.” So keep them coming — where are you reading the paper for free?