Recently in Media Views Category

Another tidbit from the Pew Survey of News Consumption: viewers of the "fake news" programs "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" are more knowledgeable about current events than watchers of “real” broadcast and cable news programs AND daily newspapers.

When asked three current events questions, the national average for correctly answering was only 18%. But 34% of The Colbert Report fans got them right, with 30% of The Daily Show viewers doing so – even though the two Comedy Central shows draw younger audiences which generally scored less well on the "test" than older viewers/readers.

What were the "test" questions?  Respondents were asked to identify which party now controls Congress, who is the current U.S. secretary of state and name the new prime minister of Great Britain.

Results from the Pew Survey on News Consumption were just released, revealing that while more young people are indeed reading newspapers online, their total readership, print and Web combined, has not grown in two years.

According to Pew:

"This year for the first time in roughly 15 years of asking the question, fewer than half of all Americans report reading a daily newspaper on a regular basis. Only 46% say they read the paper regularly – this number is down from 52% in 2006 and was as high as 71% in 1992. In a similar vein, fewer now report having read a newspaper 'yesterday,' a more reliable measure of newspaper readership. Only 34% say they read a newspaper yesterday, down from 40% in 2006."

Nielsen Media Research notes that NBC’s coverage of the 2008 Olympic Games Opening Ceremony in Beijing was the best overnight rating ever for non-U.S. Olympic Opening Ceremony earning a 21.5/37 (8-11:19 p.m. ET/PT).

Additionally, NBCOlympics.com saw its most traffic ever on Friday with 70 million page views, 10 times more than the seven million page views on the opening day of the Athens Games.

NBC Universal will present an unprecedented 3,600 hours of Beijing Olympic Games coverage, the most ambitious single media project in history featuring the most live coverage (nearly 2,900 live hours in total), across the most platforms, of any Summer Olympics in history.

Just when the political rhetoric suddenly cranked up a notch, Paris Hilton stepped in this week with her spoof presidential campaign add, balancing clever wit and slight goofiness -- while wearing fabulous gold high-heels no doubt.  Is the video a call for reason or the platform for (future) political ambitions?

AOL Mail recently released the results from its annual Email Addiction Survey, revealing Americans' increasing -- and strange -- addiction to email.

According to the survey, nearly half (46%) of email users said they're hooked on email (up from just 15% last year) and 51% check their email four or more times a day (up from 45% last year).

Not only are Americans are checking their personal and at-work email on weekends and during vacations, but they're checking it from the strangest places, including the bathroom and even in church!  Other strange places include:

•  In bed in their pajamas: 67%
•  From the bathroom: 59% (up from 53% last year)
•  While driving: 50% (up from 37% last year)
•  In a bar or club: 39%
•  In a business meeting: 38%
•  During happy hour: 34%
•  While on a date: 25%
•  From church: 15% (up from 12% last year)

Looking at this list, I'm struck by the dominance of checking email in public spheres -- social ones to boot -- and I'm left wondering how the f2f discourse is affected by this, especially in places or situations where active involvement is anticipated and sometimes even expected .

In his recent article appearing in The Nation, Associate Professor of English at Yale University, William Deresiewicz, argues that the field of (English) literary studies -- and English Departments themselves -- is "slowly dying," "losing its will to live" as fewer students study or major in English literature.  He also points to the profession's lack of an emerging theoretical school in nearly 20 years as well as a dwindling job market.

Despite a poor job market, Deresiewicz notes that the number of "'service'" positions - Rhetoric & Composition, Creative Writing, Technical Writing, and Communications - seem to dominate the Modern Language Association Job Information List. 

Are English Departments becoming too oriented to the teaching of writing as opposed to the teaching of literature?

In her recent Vanity Fair article, New York Times television critic, Alessandra Stanley highlights the new generation of (television) comediennes, such as Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, and Sarah Silverman, who not only "act, perform stand-up, write, and direct," but also "[dish] out the jokes with a side of sexy," noting that Fey is an example of one who "cultivates a 'sexy librarian' look" on her hit program, 30 Rock with her "foxy glasses and decolletage."

While I find this highly amusing, I would encourage those trying to emulate the 'sexy librarian look' to look no further than my fellow colleague in Libraryland, The Well Dressed Librarian for advice and tips. :-)

With the state primary just over a month away, I was becoming curious as to how the current Democratic presidential primary contenders would woo the great state of Pennsylvania.  Clinton, it seems, has decided to (publicly) reclaim her Pennsylvania roots.  A recent New York Times article and video highlight Clinton's connections to the Keystone state.

In his recent Los Angeles Times article, Joseph Tartakovsky ruminates on the striking, if not amusing, connection between great writers and alcohol, asking "is there really a muse in the bottle?"

Slate Magazine has created the Encyclopedia Baracktannica, a list of words that have been "Obamafied" by Slate.   Included in the entries is "'Obamazon': a passionate female Obama supporter."

The encyclopedia is a widget that can be added to your computer; it's also a Facebook application that can be added to your profile.