1984 Doublethink?

Fathom · 21-03-2018 4:44pm

mzungu wrote: »

No different to Spicer's "biggest crowd ever." His claim of there being more metro ridership on the day compared to Obama was deliberate in leaving out important information by comparing the total numbers for the entire day of Trump's inauguration, as opposed to just the morning for Obama's.

Confounding "ridership" numbers may have occurred as a result of the woman's march hours apart from Trump's inauguration. There were also a great number of empty grand stands along the inauguration parade route. How would this news be labeled?

recedite · 21-03-2018 9:01pm

Fathom wrote: »

How would this news be labeled?

More alternative facts? The article fails to mention what time the seats were seen to be empty, or whether people had arrived later on (noon for the actual inaugeration). As I remember it looked cold and drizzling rain at times, so nobody would want to sit outdoors in those conditions for too long.
But if the seats still remained vacant at noon, then the question as to why seats at a "ticket only" location were vacant would be worthy of investigative reporting. This news outlet hasn't bothered to look into that aspect though, because the shot of the empty seats is enough to suit their agenda, and that's all they wanted to show.

How would this news be labelled?

The Jan. 20 inaugural ceremony was the most live-streamed event on record, peaking at 4.6 million concurrent viewers

Record breaking viewership "in person and around the globe" as Spicer said.
Another alternative fact, exactly as KellyAnne Conway said afterwards.

mzungu · 22-03-2018 12:08am

recedite wrote: »

That sort of thing would be an "alternative fact" alright. Not a falsehood.

I'm afraid that no amount of trying to redefine Spicer's falsehoods/lies/etc as an "alternative fact" will change the fact that he did lie and himself and Kellyanne got themselves in a right pickle over it. At no stage was the turnout Trumps inauguration bigger than Obamas.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdantUf5tXg

mzungu · 22-03-2018 1:07am

Fathom wrote: »

Confounding "ridership" numbers may have occurred as a result of the woman's march hours apart from Trump's inauguration.

There were also a great number of empty grand stands along the inauguration parade route. How would this news be labeled?

recedite wrote: »

More alternative facts? The article fails to mention what time the seats were seen to be empty, or whether people had arrived later on (noon for the actual inaugeration). As I remember it looked cold and drizzling rain at times, so nobody would want to sit outdoors in those conditions for too long.

Two things here. First, the empty seats pictures when first reported were taken around lunchtime and were extremely bare. However, when things had kicked off by 4pm there was a lot more people knocking about. However, there was still quite a few empty spaces so it was not exactly a falsehood.

Link:http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/01/20/empty_seats_at_trump_inaugural_parade.html

Second, Americans are well used to crappy weather. A bit of rain would not be enough to put them off going to an inauguration.

recedite wrote: »

But if the seats still remained vacant at noon, then the question as to why seats at a "ticket only" location were vacant would be worthy of investigative reporting. This news outlet hasn't bothered to look into that aspect though, because the shot of the empty seats is enough to suit their agenda, and that's all they wanted to show.

Inauguration Committee said the stands in front of the White House were empty because the luncheon ran overtime and buses couldn't get there in time.

Alternative fact or falsehood?

recedite wrote: »

How would this news be labelled?
Record breaking viewership "in person and around the globe" as Spicer said.
Another alternative fact, exactly as KellyAnne Conway said afterwards.

That is far from a given. Many sites reported it is the highest ever, but there is good cause to question that. Obama had more streams on CNN in 2009 and Fox have not released their figures. It really is impossible to tell accurately so i guess we will never know.

Spicer cited CNN’s 17 million streams of Trump’s inauguration, which he added to the 2.6 million that watched CNN live on TV. The problem with that is that the 2.6 million figure is not the total number of people that watched CNN, it was the average number of people that watched. The 17 million streams are the total number of streams, not the average number of people watching. That 17 million figure may include people that reloaded the webpage, or that clicked in and watched for 30 seconds, or people where the inauguration started to auto-play on the CNN story they clicked through.

There is also data that suggests that Obama’s inauguration in 2009 saw more live streams, despite the proliferation of live streaming video in recent years.

While CNN had 17 million streams in 2017, in 2009 it said it had more than 21 million streams, which, when combined with CNN’s higher TV viewership in 2009, would seem to undercut Spicer’s claim. CNN did peak with 2.3 million simultaneous streaming viewers, up from 1.3 million simultaneous viewers in 2009, but that may be due to the fact that live streaming technology has improved to the point where networks are simply able to handle the higher bandwidth today than they were eight years ago.

It is fair to assume that streaming numbers for Fox News improved in 2017, just as its linear TV viewership improved, but Fox has not made those numbers available, and again, there is no easy way to compare them directly to TV ratings.

That lack of transparency and lack of apples-to-apples comparison means that it is essentially impossible to know whether enough people watched Trump’s inauguration online to overtake Obama’s in 2009, which also had some substantial online streaming.

Link: https://www.politico.com/blogs/on-media/2017/01/trump-inauguration-streaming-audience-234056

Fathom · 22-03-2018 5:00pm

recedite wrote: »

"The Jan. 20 inaugural ceremony was the most live-streamed event on record, peaking at 4.6 million concurrent viewers." Record breaking viewership "in person and around the globe" as Spicer said. Another alternative fact, exactly as KellyAnne Conway said afterwards.

Ustream claims over 200 million viewers which makes the Decorah Eagles the most popular live streaming video ever (Forbes April 17, 2012).

recedite · 22-03-2018 8:57pm

Fathom wrote: »

Ustream claims over 200 million viewers which makes the Decorah Eagles the most popular live streaming video ever (Forbes April 17, 2012).

That wasn't the number of concurrent live stream viewers though, just the total viewership ever.

As Mark Twain said of the different kinds of lies; "there are lies, damned lies, and statistics". He would have loved the label "alternative facts".

BTW those eagles don't move very much, do they :pac:
I saw equally boring eagle chicks through a telescope in Mountshannon about 2 years ago, sitting in their nest, but sadly they seem to have died from bird flu since then.

Fathom · 24-03-2018 4:07pm

recedite wrote: »

That wasn't the number of concurrent live stream viewers though, just the total viewership ever.

For Twitter streams? Does web viewership now replace physical attendance?

recedite wrote: »

As Mark Twain said of the different kinds of lies; "there are lies, damned lies, and statistics".

There's nothing wrong with statistics. Only how they are sometimes used. Darrell Huff covered this.

recedite wrote: »

He would have loved the label "alternative facts".

Probably.

Black Swan · 26-03-2018 3:59pm

Although old in terms of timeliness of content, the context and general meaning of Huff's How to Lie with Statistics was invaluable. It's become cliche to comment that statisticians lie, but there certainly are some that abuse statistics, both statisticians and non-statisticians. Huff shows how.

Fathom · 26-03-2018 7:13pm

Non-science types quoting percentages in arguments. When they have no data to back up the percentage. Just off-the-cuff. "99% of the reason why..."

recedite · 26-03-2018 9:11pm

Fathom wrote: »

Non-science types quoting percentages in arguments.

I agree 110%.

recedite · 26-03-2018 9:13pm

But seriously, there is a difference between a misleading statistic, and a false one.
The former falls into the realm of alternative facts.
The latter is a lie.

Fathom · 27-03-2018 5:11pm

recedite wrote: »

Record breaking viewership "in person and around the globe" as Spicer said. Another alternative fact, exactly as KellyAnne Conway said afterwards. "The Jan. 20 inaugural ceremony was the most live-streamed event on record, peaking at 4.6 million concurrent viewers."

60 Minutes reports that Sunday's Stormy Daniels interview streamed (concurrently) over 20 million viewers world wide.

recedite · 27-03-2018 5:31pm

With ratings like that, she should run for President

Idiocracy is a great movie. Not quite as serious as George Orwell's dystopian vision of the future, but like all the best comedy its based on some very pertinent home truths.

Black Swan · 28-03-2018 7:18pm

"Idiocracy is a great movie." Thanks for the recommendation.

1984 Doublethink?

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