We now know what Jon Stewart was referring to when he introduced himself as the “captain of this dying medium” at the top of Monday’s Daily Show.
This morning Comedy Central released a new web exclusive clip from Stewart’s pre-show warm up earlier this week in which an audience member asks him how he feels about young people getting all of their information and entertainment from social media.
“Is that true?” Stewart asks, to which the audience member replies matter-of-factly that “TV is dying.”
“What? No!” exclaims Stewart to laughter from the audience.
The two then engage in an exchange where the audience member explains that he watches clips from shows on TikTok.
“Right,” responds Stewart. “But you do understand that that’s still TV… you’re just watching it in a different delivery service. It’s like heroin is heroin whether you snort it or shoot it — it’s still an opiate for the masses.”
He’s not wrong. While linear TV viewers continue to migrate online, traditional studio-created media still accounts for the majority of content consumed online.
As for old fashioned linear TV, Stewart has breathed some new life into it since returning to The Daily Show as part time host. On Monday he delivered Comedy Central its largest Daily Show audience in nearly 9 years.
