7 ms·

Tucker had a big pull but it’s still niche and controversial. He doesn’t represent mainstream anything. The recent releases of some of his behind the scenes a

by jasmer 3y ago

Tucker had a big pull but it’s still niche and controversial. He doesn’t represent mainstream anything. The recent releases of some of his behind the scenes actions pretty much put him out of range of mainstream advertisers. That said I am surprised some execs don’t go for him as being in their brand zone.

mrangle 3y ago
Tucker absolutely represents Mainstream public opinion, better than most other pundits for roughly half of the country. To believe otherwise is harmful self-delusion. With the caveat that no pundit is going to be on-beat all of the time.
- jasmer 3y ago
  I think it's delusional to suggest that Tucker represents mainstream public opinion more than other entities. In fact, I suggest a lot of Tucker fans believe that, and that's partly what's wrong with them. That said, Tucker does represents a bigger chunk of America than his naysayers would like to admit. Importantly - it's not fair to say he 'represents' anything. He lies and spins, and says whatever will get him clicks. The SMS releases during the Fox trial very clearly highlighted that they have completely different perspective on-camera than off, and that they are obsessed with both advertiser revenue and throwing red meat to their audience, willing to say things that are completely at odds with reality, and even their own conscience, in order to garner ratings, which has the negative effect of spreading disinformation or lies, such as for example that the 'election was rigged or stolen' - a falsehood which about 1/3 of Americans have come to believe because supposedly legitimate sources such as POTUS and 'News' have been completely corrupted, liked a 3rd world country. Tucker has morphed into a cross between ranting right wing antagonist, Rush Limbaugh, and Alex Jones - taking the 'Hard Alt' position on basically every issue. The difference is that classical right wing were ultra nationalist, Tucker is Alt Nationalist. One of the most interesting revelations is the extent to which he embraces the ultra antagonist perspective, even for the smallest inane things - he was doing it behind the scenes, in meetings, with interns, almost like he was practising his shtick. Note that Tucker didn't used to be like this, and that if you watch Russia One channel right now the main propagandists are uttering some truly fascist stuff on a daily basis (aka 'We should nuke Berlin', or about some government guy 'we should have shot him' etc.) - but almost all of them, less than 20 years ago, would have been considered 'strong reformer liberals'. Even Medvedev was the same - big time liberal reformer - now he's the Tucker of Russia. It's fake, it's a game. Finally, they are all playing characters, even Musk, even Linda, it's a matter of the degree to which the character is legit.
  - mrangle 3y ago
    [flagged]
paulddraper 3y ago
> Tucker had a big pull but it’s still niche and controversial. Objectively speaking... Up until it was canceled, Tucker Carlson was the most watched cable show in U.S. history outside of sports. Maybe not popular for me, you, your friends, or HN. But by any reasonable measure, he was very popular.
- bscphil 3y ago
  That's just not a good argument. Pineapple on pizza can be one of the most popular toppings but still niche and controversial. Right wing media is relatively consolidated: there's one major cable channel that markets to their interests, and they have room for ~one opinion show in a daily primetime slot. Obviously whatever goes in that slot is going to be hugely popular. Or to put it more boring, mathematical terms, the mode is not the same as the median. Even if somehow one in three people were huge fans of Carlson, that would still count as relatively niche - and strongly controversial - because that would be the 1/3 most hard right of the US population.
  - roenxi 3y ago
    > Even if somehow one in three people were huge fans... This definition would make eating pizza itself a niche thing, topping or otherwise. 33% of the population is mainstream and it isn't an option to claim otherwise. Less popular? Yes. Fringe? No. Fringe is something like Linux on the desktop at sub-1% of the market. It is not feasible to ignore or marginalise 1 person in 3. I'm certainly impressed by the position that the most popular show is the fringe one. In theory it is possible, but practically that is a hard sell.
    - jasmer 3y ago
      Not mainstream, but not fringe; he's popular on Cable but not popular overall, especially in a world where people under 50 don't even watch cable news. If you combine with the lack of integrity and the personal toxicity, he locks himself in that small category. Everyone in the US knew Rush Limbaugh but he didn't get GM sponsorships.
  - 3y ago
mbg721 3y ago
I think it's a mistake to treat Tucker (similarly Trump) as the center of a personality cult. There's a great deal of popular support for low-level conservatism that corporate media owners won't tolerate and aren't interested in, so a vacuum builds up and the only thing that's left for that half of Americans to support is bombastic blowhards. "Vote red, no matter who" looks hideous because there's nobody constantly covering up the blemishes.
rayiner 3y ago
Tucker is anything but niche. During prime time when his show was on, he was pulling a solid plurality of Democrats aged 25-54: https://www.thewrap.com/tucker-carlson-liberal-viewership-fox-news/ https://www.thewrap.com/tucker-carlson-liberal-viewership-fo... (39% versus 31% for MSNBC and 30% for CNN). Remember that while democrats are a slight majority (most of the time—right now they’re a slight minority by self-identification) only half of democrats identify as liberal. My mom votes democrat because she’s an immigrant—on race, gender, policing, sexuality, etc. issues she’d be somewhat to the right of Carlson.
- jasmer 3y ago
  That data data does not support your argument aka "Tucker is not niche because his audience has more political balance" than we'd otherwise expect. Except - Cable News audiences are small, and 25-54 Cable News audience is a tiny fraction of that already small audience, not very representative of much. 'TV' is a minority of viewership: Streaming is now bigger than TV. 'TV News' is a small segment of TV and is mostly a 50+ type of program. 'Cable News' is a small tranche of news, compared to local/broadcast. '25-54 Cable News' is a small tranche of Cable News. 'Wheel of Fortune' gets considerably more viewers than Tucker - that show is 'mainstream' and is going to reel in advertisers for obvious reasons. He'll carve out a 'Ruch Limbaugh' type audience on Twitter. In 2005 everyone knew who Rush was, that didn't make him mainstream or appealing to advertisers. I should note that I'm doubtful many even remotely controversial Cable TV personalities are big with advertisers. Also, maybe notable, is that 'empathy and inclusion' is not going to be generally harmful to ad buyers whereas 'concern and judgement' probably are. I'm not saying one of those ethos has moral superiority, rather, one is just an easier thing to ride a message on. Look at LinkedIn: it's all 'happy happy happy, you can do it, go for it, that person is amazing' - there's hardly any criticism.

by jasmer 3y ago

mrangle 3y ago

Tucker absolutely represents Mainstream public opinion, better than most other pundits for roughly half of the country. To believe otherwise is harmful self-delusion. With the caveat that no pundit is going to be on-beat all of the time.

jasmer 3y ago
I think it's delusional to suggest that Tucker represents mainstream public opinion more than other entities. In fact, I suggest a lot of Tucker fans believe that, and that's partly what's wrong with them. That said, Tucker does represents a bigger chunk of America than his naysayers would like to admit. Importantly - it's not fair to say he 'represents' anything. He lies and spins, and says whatever will get him clicks. The SMS releases during the Fox trial very clearly highlighted that they have completely different perspective on-camera than off, and that they are obsessed with both advertiser revenue and throwing red meat to their audience, willing to say things that are completely at odds with reality, and even their own conscience, in order to garner ratings, which has the negative effect of spreading disinformation or lies, such as for example that the 'election was rigged or stolen' - a falsehood which about 1/3 of Americans have come to believe because supposedly legitimate sources such as POTUS and 'News' have been completely corrupted, liked a 3rd world country. Tucker has morphed into a cross between ranting right wing antagonist, Rush Limbaugh, and Alex Jones - taking the 'Hard Alt' position on basically every issue. The difference is that classical right wing were ultra nationalist, Tucker is Alt Nationalist. One of the most interesting revelations is the extent to which he embraces the ultra antagonist perspective, even for the smallest inane things - he was doing it behind the scenes, in meetings, with interns, almost like he was practising his shtick. Note that Tucker didn't used to be like this, and that if you watch Russia One channel right now the main propagandists are uttering some truly fascist stuff on a daily basis (aka 'We should nuke Berlin', or about some government guy 'we should have shot him' etc.) - but almost all of them, less than 20 years ago, would have been considered 'strong reformer liberals'. Even Medvedev was the same - big time liberal reformer - now he's the Tucker of Russia. It's fake, it's a game. Finally, they are all playing characters, even Musk, even Linda, it's a matter of the degree to which the character is legit.
- mrangle 3y ago
  [flagged]

paulddraper 3y ago

> Tucker had a big pull but it’s still niche and controversial. Objectively speaking... Up until it was canceled, Tucker Carlson was the most watched cable show in U.S. history outside of sports. Maybe not popular for me, you, your friends, or HN. But by any reasonable measure, he was very popular.

bscphil 3y ago
That's just not a good argument. Pineapple on pizza can be one of the most popular toppings but still niche and controversial. Right wing media is relatively consolidated: there's one major cable channel that markets to their interests, and they have room for ~one opinion show in a daily primetime slot. Obviously whatever goes in that slot is going to be hugely popular. Or to put it more boring, mathematical terms, the mode is not the same as the median. Even if somehow one in three people were huge fans of Carlson, that would still count as relatively niche - and strongly controversial - because that would be the 1/3 most hard right of the US population.
- roenxi 3y ago
  > Even if somehow one in three people were huge fans... This definition would make eating pizza itself a niche thing, topping or otherwise. 33% of the population is mainstream and it isn't an option to claim otherwise. Less popular? Yes. Fringe? No. Fringe is something like Linux on the desktop at sub-1% of the market. It is not feasible to ignore or marginalise 1 person in 3. I'm certainly impressed by the position that the most popular show is the fringe one. In theory it is possible, but practically that is a hard sell.
  - jasmer 3y ago
    Not mainstream, but not fringe; he's popular on Cable but not popular overall, especially in a world where people under 50 don't even watch cable news. If you combine with the lack of integrity and the personal toxicity, he locks himself in that small category. Everyone in the US knew Rush Limbaugh but he didn't get GM sponsorships.
- 3y ago

mbg721 3y ago

I think it's a mistake to treat Tucker (similarly Trump) as the center of a personality cult. There's a great deal of popular support for low-level conservatism that corporate media owners won't tolerate and aren't interested in, so a vacuum builds up and the only thing that's left for that half of Americans to support is bombastic blowhards. "Vote red, no matter who" looks hideous because there's nobody constantly covering up the blemishes.

rayiner 3y ago

Tucker is anything but niche. During prime time when his show was on, he was pulling a solid plurality of Democrats aged 25-54: https://www.thewrap.com/tucker-carlson-liberal-viewership-fox-news/ https://www.thewrap.com/tucker-carlson-liberal-viewership-fo... (39% versus 31% for MSNBC and 30% for CNN). Remember that while democrats are a slight majority (most of the time—right now they’re a slight minority by self-identification) only half of democrats identify as liberal. My mom votes democrat because she’s an immigrant—on race, gender, policing, sexuality, etc. issues she’d be somewhat to the right of Carlson.

jasmer 3y ago
That data data does not support your argument aka "Tucker is not niche because his audience has more political balance" than we'd otherwise expect. Except - Cable News audiences are small, and 25-54 Cable News audience is a tiny fraction of that already small audience, not very representative of much. 'TV' is a minority of viewership: Streaming is now bigger than TV. 'TV News' is a small segment of TV and is mostly a 50+ type of program. 'Cable News' is a small tranche of news, compared to local/broadcast. '25-54 Cable News' is a small tranche of Cable News. 'Wheel of Fortune' gets considerably more viewers than Tucker - that show is 'mainstream' and is going to reel in advertisers for obvious reasons. He'll carve out a 'Ruch Limbaugh' type audience on Twitter. In 2005 everyone knew who Rush was, that didn't make him mainstream or appealing to advertisers. I should note that I'm doubtful many even remotely controversial Cable TV personalities are big with advertisers. Also, maybe notable, is that 'empathy and inclusion' is not going to be generally harmful to ad buyers whereas 'concern and judgement' probably are. I'm not saying one of those ethos has moral superiority, rather, one is just an easier thing to ride a message on. Look at LinkedIn: it's all 'happy happy happy, you can do it, go for it, that person is amazing' - there's hardly any criticism.