The Daily Show is as Substantive as the “real” news

Eric Bangeman:

The Daily Show is much funnier than traditional newscasts, but a new study from Indiana University says it has the same amount of meat on its bones when it comes to coverage of the news. The brand of news coverage Jon Stewart and the rest of The Daily Show’s staff brings to the airwaves is just as substantive as traditional news programs like World News Tonight and the CBS Evening News, according to the study conducted by IU assistant professor of telecommunications Julia R. Fox and a couple of graduate students.

The researchers looked at coverage of the 2004 Democratic and Republican national conventions and the first presidential debate of the fall campaign, all of which were covered by the mainstream broadcast news outlets and The Daily Show. Individual broadcasts of the nightly news and corresponding episodes of The Daily Show were analyzed by the researchers, who found that the “average amounts of video and audio substance in the broadcast network news stories” were no different from The Daily Show. Perhaps more telling, The Daily Show delivered longer stories on the topic.

Good News for Inexpensive Flights to Europe

IAG:

In a move bound to drive British Airways and its Irish CEO nuts, Ryanair has launched a surprise takeover bid for Aer Lingus. The deal values Aer Lingus at 1.48bn euros (1.9bn dollars). Predictably, the spin started immediately. “This offer represents a unique opportunity to form one strong airline group for Ireland and for European consumers. We will expand, enhance and upgrade the Aer Lingus operations,” said Ryanair Chief Executive Michael O’Leary in a statement. “This offer, if successful,means both companies will continue to operate separately and compete vigorously in the small number of routes on which we both operate, currently around 17 of the approximately 500 routes operated by the two airlines,” he added.