knowledgable people

who-knows-news-what-you-read-or-view-matters-but-not-your-politics

Somehow I'm not surprised that NPR or New Yorker are the top dogs here..although those 3 questions are pretty lame. Colbert pointed out the amusing factoid that his viewers knew the PM of Britain at a higher clip than the BBC viewers...who would tend to live in Britain..There were several vague categories that I'm not sure what they mean: political magazines, business magazines, online news, etc.


This reminds me of 'the economy' being the top issue. It would be helpful if this were broken down, or at least broken down after the fact. Into things like this
1) my job
2) my retirement
3) my savings
4) future prospects
5) home value/real estate/mortgage
6) gdp growth
7) foreign trade
etc. All of those are specific elements which are somewhat more accurate than 'the economy'. I would even find it amusing if there were a question comparing 'this economy' to 'the economy'. Why don't they do this?...because of the next section of the poll: the average education and age of the viewers

Only NPR, New Yorker, or 'business magazines' were the only ones that surpassed 50% college graduates. The amusing part is the less than 'elitist' measures of say, Rush Limbaugh, Hannity, Daily Show (Colbert was higher...hmm), which were all pretty close to that 28% national average. Maybe that's not a clear indication of the likely intellectual abilities, but it may indicate the type of intellectual interested in such shows. Other statistical quirks: apparently only angry old men watch Lou Dobbs. Which explains the appeal of his persistent xenophobic messages. And almost no old people are watching Daily Show/Colbert (or getting news online). Also Katie Couric isn't doing so well at educating her viewers in basic information.
So if the base audience isn't 'educated' (28% nationally?..no wonder they push the go to college angle every year...and fail), they're not going to sell news for the educated. New Yorker or NPR more or less exist to feed the need of educated viewers for news. I'm guessing the other outlets exist for other audiences, but not for the purpose of informing their viewers/listeners/eyeballs.

Also..I have decided to comment on two commercials. The nike football one with the Good/Bad/Ugly song in it amuses me because I like the song..but don't watch the commercial (because I can't tell what the commercial is for).. and those stupid i deserve a car commercials. Which also doesn't have much to do with what they're selling (considering the entire commercial is guy shouting, a url, and a half naked lady. I've had quite enough of commercials.