4 ms·

Jon Stewart Returns to an Older, Smaller Audience

24 points by cdme 3y ago

johnthuss 3y ago
This is great hard data to back up common perception. But I wonder how YouTube views for the Daily Show clips have changed over that same time period? Looking... They are rarely over 1 or 2 million views on YouTube, so yeah, that's a big decline.
- IncreasePosts 3y ago
  That sounds reasonable, almost all daily show clips are about some thing that was happening at a specific point in time. I bet the interview segments they have where it's just a weird person ends up getting a lot more views because that is mostly evergreen content. Very few people care what the political drama du jour was in January 2007.
  - chatmasta 3y ago
    > Very few people care what the political drama du jour was in January 2007. ...which begs the question why so many people care what the political drama is today. February 2024 is just March 2041's version of today's January 2007...
    - drc500free 3y ago
      I'd imagine some sort of hyperbolic discounting on importance, plus the perception that you can still do something about it. Great question to ponder.
    - talldatethrow 3y ago
      Sometimes YouTube shows me news or political commentary from several years ago and I'll watch for fun or even by accident. And I'll remember watching that segment years ago and thinking it mattered, and now years later I realize it didn't matter at all. Makes me feel stupid for caring about today's news.
    - redwall_hp 3y ago
      In the words of Craig Fergusson's opening theme: "Tomorrow's just your future yesterday."
  - cushpush 3y ago
    "drama du jour," your talents do not go unnoticed
- FrustratedMonky 3y ago
  Exactly this. I missed the episode, and caught it days later on YouTube. I've always wondered how a company like Neilson Ratings can make any measurements with every streaming service and YouTube. While at same time, the streaming services have ton of user data, probably down to exactly how many times, and for how long, you paused it to grab a beer, but don't really like sharing it.
- hedora 3y ago
  I looked up viewership numbers for relevant streaming platforms: AppleTV: 30M (2022; probably closer to 45M now) Paramount+: 65M Prime Video: 145M (US) Netflix: 245M (Worldwide 2022) They're putting the daily show on paramount+, so they're reaching less than 25% of streaming households. From a viewer perspective, it's basically $6 / month just for this one show (and you have to sit through ads don't even get to watch broadcast CBS on it). You have to get a $12 / month bundle to skip the ads. I can't see sitting through ads or paying that much just for one program. (Star Trek is great, but holy crap, there's nothing else decent on that service, and, other than the Lower Decks, the new stuff is really, really rough -- this is coming from someone that watched everything up to and including Enterprise.)
thinkingtoilet 3y ago
I wonder how this will play out. The first episode was released on Comedy Central's website in full so if that keeps happening I'll watch it there. If not, I will absolutely pay Paramount Plus $6 a month to see John once a week.
fetzu 3y ago
https://archive.is/xjJhE https://archive.is/xjJhE Because for the first time in a long time, this page was absolutely unreadable on mobile.
seydor 3y ago
I could never watch it with the new guy. He just feels fake to me
- Supermancho 3y ago
  *Trevor Noah My wife and I can't stand him.
  - dvngnt_ 3y ago
    I thought he was hilarious in the clips I've seen online
    - cyanydeez 3y ago
      [flagged]
  - aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 3y ago
    Noah's last show was in December 2022.
  - kibibu 3y ago
    Trevor Noah doesn't understand "punching up"
- joshstrange 3y ago
  Agreed, and I tried hard to like him. I had watched every Stewart episode and then my watching of TDS fell off a cliff with him. I went back a number of times to try again but I didn’t find him as passionate or funny as John. Even the clips that rose high on news aggregators/TikTok/YT Shorts all felt “meh”. In contrast I absolutely loved Monday’s episode with Stewart again, it was a huge wave of nostalgia and it was like “this is what I’ve been missing”. John just feels way more genuine and that he actually cares about the things he says. Trevor always felt fake or that he was trying too hard.
- hedora 3y ago
  I could never figure out how to watch it when Trevor Noah hosted. The John Stewart show on Apple TV was basically unwatchable. I don't have high hopes. Hopefully, they decide to air it somewhere with a decent sized audience (so, not whatever "Hulu Live TV" or "Fubo TV" are, and certainly not Paramount+), and the writers from the original Daily Show are still there / coming back.

24 points by cdme 3y ago

This is great hard data to back up common perception. But I wonder how YouTube views for the Daily Show clips have changed over that same time period? Looking... They are rarely over 1 or 2 million views on YouTube, so yeah, that's a big decline.

IncreasePosts 3y ago
That sounds reasonable, almost all daily show clips are about some thing that was happening at a specific point in time. I bet the interview segments they have where it's just a weird person ends up getting a lot more views because that is mostly evergreen content. Very few people care what the political drama du jour was in January 2007.
- chatmasta 3y ago
  > Very few people care what the political drama du jour was in January 2007. ...which begs the question why so many people care what the political drama is today. February 2024 is just March 2041's version of today's January 2007...
  - drc500free 3y ago
    I'd imagine some sort of hyperbolic discounting on importance, plus the perception that you can still do something about it. Great question to ponder.
  - talldatethrow 3y ago
    Sometimes YouTube shows me news or political commentary from several years ago and I'll watch for fun or even by accident. And I'll remember watching that segment years ago and thinking it mattered, and now years later I realize it didn't matter at all. Makes me feel stupid for caring about today's news.
  - redwall_hp 3y ago
    In the words of Craig Fergusson's opening theme: "Tomorrow's just your future yesterday."
- cushpush 3y ago
  "drama du jour," your talents do not go unnoticed
FrustratedMonky 3y ago
Exactly this. I missed the episode, and caught it days later on YouTube. I've always wondered how a company like Neilson Ratings can make any measurements with every streaming service and YouTube. While at same time, the streaming services have ton of user data, probably down to exactly how many times, and for how long, you paused it to grab a beer, but don't really like sharing it.
hedora 3y ago
I looked up viewership numbers for relevant streaming platforms: AppleTV: 30M (2022; probably closer to 45M now) Paramount+: 65M Prime Video: 145M (US) Netflix: 245M (Worldwide 2022) They're putting the daily show on paramount+, so they're reaching less than 25% of streaming households. From a viewer perspective, it's basically $6 / month just for this one show (and you have to sit through ads don't even get to watch broadcast CBS on it). You have to get a $12 / month bundle to skip the ads. I can't see sitting through ads or paying that much just for one program. (Star Trek is great, but holy crap, there's nothing else decent on that service, and, other than the Lower Decks, the new stuff is really, really rough -- this is coming from someone that watched everything up to and including Enterprise.)

thinkingtoilet 3y ago

I wonder how this will play out. The first episode was released on Comedy Central's website in full so if that keeps happening I'll watch it there. If not, I will absolutely pay Paramount Plus $6 a month to see John once a week.

fetzu 3y ago

https://archive.is/xjJhE https://archive.is/xjJhE Because for the first time in a long time, this page was absolutely unreadable on mobile.

seydor 3y ago

I could never watch it with the new guy. He just feels fake to me

Supermancho 3y ago
*Trevor Noah My wife and I can't stand him.
- dvngnt_ 3y ago
  I thought he was hilarious in the clips I've seen online
  - cyanydeez 3y ago
    [flagged]
- aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 3y ago
  Noah's last show was in December 2022.
- kibibu 3y ago
  Trevor Noah doesn't understand "punching up"
joshstrange 3y ago
Agreed, and I tried hard to like him. I had watched every Stewart episode and then my watching of TDS fell off a cliff with him. I went back a number of times to try again but I didn’t find him as passionate or funny as John. Even the clips that rose high on news aggregators/TikTok/YT Shorts all felt “meh”. In contrast I absolutely loved Monday’s episode with Stewart again, it was a huge wave of nostalgia and it was like “this is what I’ve been missing”. John just feels way more genuine and that he actually cares about the things he says. Trevor always felt fake or that he was trying too hard.
hedora 3y ago
I could never figure out how to watch it when Trevor Noah hosted. The John Stewart show on Apple TV was basically unwatchable. I don't have high hopes. Hopefully, they decide to air it somewhere with a decent sized audience (so, not whatever "Hulu Live TV" or "Fubo TV" are, and certainly not Paramount+), and the writers from the original Daily Show are still there / coming back.