A story in today’s IDS talks about a study done by Indiana professor Julia Fox (Telecom) indicates that “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” was as politically substantive as the major news networks in covering the 2004 Presidential election.
The study, which involved coding hours of video for various news sources, analyzed how much real news per second each show broadcast. TDS matched up well in substantive news per second with the national evening news shows on NBC, ABC and CBS. Fox’s research actually goes back to 1988, but a combination of the lack of information in network news and the rise in popularity of Jon Stewart’s offering on Comedy Central prompted her to do a comparison for the most recent Presidential race. She will be following up this study with another one trying to correlate laughter with information absorption.
Two thoughts on this.
First, obviously the context of the news delivery and the motivation for its inclusion are quite different between TDS and network news. The latter treats news as the business product, which implies a strategy of teasing viewers into watching through high-level, sensationalized repetition of current events. The networks devote considerable screen time, both in program and outside of it, to this tactic in the hope of getting people to tune in. In theory, they also will be spending more time talking about the details of a single story, and therefore don’t have as much time for greater breadth. The former is out for laughs, or at the very least entertainment, and is thus motivated by quantity. By the admission of the show’s producers, there is an assumption of prior knowledge by the audience going into the show — not to mention at least a day’s delay in presenting the material — that allows the references to be both plentiful and meaningful. I’m not about to defend the content or motives of any television news show, but this is still apples and oranges when the context is considered and not just a count of news references.
Second, I remember in high school when the academic bowls started up. My chemistry teacher organized a team, and we had a lot of fun doing trivia. During one of the practices, he asked a question about Bishop Desmond Tutu. I answered, and Dr. Dave was quite impressed. “Where did you learn about Desmond Tutu?” I answered, “Eddie Murphy did a bit on Saturday Night Live.” Dr. Dave was no longer impressed, but he should have been.
Shopping for multiple sources of news is a sign of informed usership. I would be worried if anyone got all of their news from The Daily Show (and, in truth, I’m not far off these days) but neither do we want a society putting one source, or worse a genre like network news, above the others. This is why blogging is so effective and dangerous, and why it’s good to link off of posts to other things in the world. People have to make up their own minds, ultimately, and we want a society that encourages it — and is even impressed by it.
So kudos, America’s youth. Just make sure that, after you enjoy the jokes about Mark Foley, you are certain you understand what pedophilia means and what the laws say about related matters.
