Weekly Roundup – Week of October 14th, 2024

"In 2024, the media future doesn’t need to be seen through a glass darkly: For the younger generation of news consumers, it has basically arrived. But it isn’t embodied by cereal-eating YouTubers, Russian-funded disinformation operations or even the Silicon Valley-enforced progressive censorship that many conservatives feared four years ago.
Instead it’s embodied by the sex-and-relationships podcaster and the bro comedians who scored important interviews with Kamala Harris and Donald Trump this month — with the host of “Call Her Daddy,” Alex Cooper, tossing Harris questions about abortion and student loans, while the comics Andrew Schulz and Akaash Singh chatted with Trump about his nicknaming strategy on their show, “Flagrant.”"

Our Take: Candidates are eschewing legacy media in favor of new media darlings. From Theo Von to Alex Cooper, popular podcasters command huge audiences and are subtly changing the media roadmaps of presidential races.

"Congress is expected to vote on the AM Radio For Every Vehicle Act later this year. The bill would require all new automobiles to be equipped with an AM radio tuner and accessible to listeners at no additional cost. The proposed law comes at a time when several electric vehicle models including those from Tesla, Volkswagen, BMW and Volvo have not made AM radio available. The reason cited is the electromagnetic signals in EV’s result in a distorted and low-quality sound on AM radio. Other EV models have been circumventing the issue by using cable shielding or placing the wires in an area that avoids the interference of AM radio."

Our Take: Terrestrial radio proving itself to be a vital resource in the aftermath of Helene seems to be clinching factor in the bill's successful passage through congress.

"As cord-cutting continues to rise, one cable company is partnering with streaming platforms in an effort to keep its customers. Charter Communications announced Wednesday that its new, multiyear distribution deal with NBCUniversal — the parent company of NBC, Telemundo, Bravo, SYFY, and USA Network — will give subscribers free access to Peacock NBCUniversal’s streaming platform.
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The cable company already offers access to Disney, ESPN+, Paramount+, AMC+, BET+, ViX, Max, and Discovery+ to its Spectrum TV Select video customers."

"Americans continue to register record-low trust in the mass media, with 31% expressing a “great deal” or “fair amount” of confidence in the media to report the news “fully, accurately and fairly,” similar to last year’s 32%. Americans’ trust in the media -- such as newspapers, television and radio -- first fell to 32% in 2016 and did so again last year.
For the third consecutive year, more U.S. adults have no trust at all in the media (36%) than trust it a great deal or fair amount. Another 33% of Americans express “not very much” confidence.
Gallup first asked this question in 1972 and has measured it in most years since 1997. In three readings in the 1970s, trust ranged from 68% to 72%, yet by Gallup’s next readings in the late 1990s and early 2000s, smaller majorities of 51% to 55% trusted the news media. The latest findings are from a poll conducted Sept. 3-15, which includes Gallup’s annual update on trust in the media and other civic and political entities in the U.S."

Our Take: Americans might not trust news media overall, yet they still ravenously consume news media, especially in election season.

Our Take: Consumers regularly report fatigue with the news yet they still can't stop consuming something they report they are tired of. The same trend is true with social media. These studies reporting 'fatigue' or 'dissatisfaction' are more revealing of contradictions between expressed attitudes vs. actual behaviors than they are of media usage in a general sense.

In the latest edition of the Harker Bos Group Media Minute Sean Bos writes about how radio listeners are most likely to purchase/consider a service or product advertised over radio compared to any other medium.