2024 Leaves No Doubt: Television Age Is Over

At the New York Times, Ross Douthat takes note of one of the signal features of the 2024 election cycle:

For older voters who remember Barack Obama “slow-jamming the news” with Jimmy Fallon, or Bill Clinton playing saxophone on The Arsenio Hall Show, Douthat observes that these new appearances are of a different genus. The candidates, Trump especially, have recognized that many voters are accessible mainly through “a vast terra incognita of YouTube stars, podcasters and social media communities, across which algorithmic waves sweep back and forth mysteriously.” The share of Americans tied to more traditional media — Face the Nation, Meet the Press, or the New York Times — is shrinking. As that demographic reduces further, Douthat writes, “it will become more and more of a niche in its own right, a small constellation in the larger, weirder panoply.”

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Ian Tuttle

Ian Tuttle is a research fellow at the Aspen Institute’s Philosophy & Society Initiative.

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At the New York Times, Ross Douthat takes note of one of the signal features of the 2024 election cycle:

For older voters who remember Barack Obama “slow-jamming the news” with Jimmy Fallon, or Bill Clinton playing saxophone on The Arsenio Hall Show, Douthat observes that these new appearances are of a different genus. The candidates, Trump especially, have recognized that many voters are accessible mainly through “a vast terra incognita of YouTube stars, podcasters and social media communities, across which algorithmic waves sweep back and forth mysteriously.” The share of Americans tied to more traditional media — Face the Nation, Meet the Press, or the New York Times — is shrinking. As that demographic reduces further, Douthat writes, “it will become more and more of a niche in its own right, a small constellation in the larger, weirder panoply.”