The Guardian: Cenk Uygur on the success of The Young Turks (& Being Blacklisted by Harry Reid!)

[ihavenobias]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/apr/26/cenk-uygur-young-turks|Cenk Uygur on the success of The Young Turks>
The Guardian, Monday 26 April 2010

...TYT covers news and entertainment, and Uygur runs a tight ship, with just six full-time and three part-time staff and a monthly budget of $45,000. Income comes from subscriptions and YouTube revenue sharing, and between June 2008 and December 2009 it doubled to more than $60,000 a month, with margins increasing steadily since then. TYT has no advertising budget: its fans, the TYT Army, provide promotion by tweeting links or posting clips on social networking sites.

In fact, if you're looking for a job, the TYT army is recruiting. "At this point," Uygur says, "we only hire from our audience … We're trying to give you news so you're part of the process – the viewers are the Young Turks. If I get something wrong on air, I get 1,000 emails correcting me instantly and most of our story suggestions come from viewers."

The show has been able to keep pace with the mighty networks it competes with by using its popularity to book http://www.youtube.com/user/TYTInterviews|a wide variety of guests>, some of whom may not return: "I heard from Harry Reid's office, after his interview, that we were effectively blacklisted for future interview requests. I didn't really shed a tear. We're gonna be all right."

In terms of technology awards, TYT beat the competition, including the BBC and Rush Limbaugh, the leading talk radio host, to win http://vodpod.com/watch/2697550-tyt-wins-best-political-podcast-award-for-2009|Best Political Podcast 2009> at the Podcast Awards and http://mashable.com/owa/|Best Political News Site 2009 at the Mashable Awards>. The show was also nominated for the http://vote.streamys.org/|Audience's Choice Award 2010 at the Streamy Awards>...

So how will TYT evolve? Expansion, he says. He and the team have recently launched a sister network, http://www.youtube.com/user/whattheflickshow|What the Flick?!>, on YouTube, which is hosted by the film critic Ben Mankiewicz. He plans to build more online networks: TYT sports, TYT Moms, TYT food – "Whatever matches our brand, and our brand is just: genuine, real and generally progressive"...

[theFrankFactor]

1. Cenk is the Voice of Reality and Real Progressivism!

[krkaufman]

4. eh, I love Cenk ....

... but I wouldn't yet label him the voice of "Real Progressivism" ... though he's coming along nicely. There's still quite a bit of free market/free trade misinformation that needs to be shaken out of him.

[Capitalocracy]

16. But at least he's willing to admit when he's wrong

Like when he was talking about how it sounded reasonable to him to allow buying insurance across state lines like the Republicans were proposing, but when it was pointed out to him that that would lead to all the insurance companies moving their "main office" to the state with the most favorable regulations, like the banks did when I think it was South Dakota removed all usury laws, then he came out and said yeah, I was wrong, that's a bad idea.

[krkaufman]

22. Agreed. n/t

[FiveGoodMen]

2. Hmmm. What got Harry so upset?

[no limit]

5. I would like to know this too. I cant find the interview

[ihavenobias]

9. Well, here's one interview but...

Note: I set the video to skip to the 4 minute, 8 second mark (explanation below).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xZLqOcWxeM#t=4m8s

It's Cenk and Jonathan Kim from July 2008 and it doesn't challenge Reid. The only interesting part of this particular interview is the last few minutes in light of the Obama Admin's recent stance on drilling in the context of these 2008 comments.

[no limit]

11. I still don't get it. So why would Reid place them on a black list?

[ihavenobias]

12. Keep in mind that a lot of the older interviews weren't posted as YouTube clips.

In fact most of them weren't. The TYT Interviews channel was launched July 21st 2009, and unfortunately there are only a handful of 'classic' interviews that were saved and posted. A lot of people don't realize TYT is a 3 hour Monday-Friday show, not a "YouTube show". The YouTube channels are just small excerpts clipped out from the web stream (also on XM/Sirius).

At any rate, I'm sure Reid wasn't too happy about this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foCd8RY6B0o

Or This: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teivM2FRg4o&feature=channel

[Capitalocracy]

17. It was definitely a good idea to start putting the interviews on YT

I know they probably get fewer views than the entertainment stuff, but probably attract more people who will be interested in the political content of the show

[ihavenobias]

20. A LOT less views.

It's funny because a lot of people complain about fluff and a lack of in depth analysis on topics. But when you dedicate a channel to just that (longer, substantive interviews with members of congress, economists, authors, activists, etc.), the viewership is significantly lower.

[krkaufman]

6. Yeah, that's a bit of followup that I'd like to hear more about ...

... as well as learning about such nonsense much sooner. If some politician is so bold as to literally tell a media outlet that they're "blacklisted," this info needs to be made public, at least to the show's audience, so that proper, timely feedback can be directed to the politician.

[OhioChick]

3. K&R n/t

[libodem]

7. Superb

Superbamundo baby.****WOO H00****:woohoo: ****WOO HOO****

[krkaufman]

8. Ok, at what camera angle did the photog shoot that pic ... ??

... to insure that Cenk edged-out JR et al in height? Or was a physical soapbox involved?

[Blue_Tires]

10. ttt

[20score]

13. How cool is that?! K&R

[BeyondGeography]

14. Great for Cenk, great for us

K&R

[Rhiannon12866]

15. Terrific article!!! K&R! And in The Guardian, no less!

Wow! :wow: This is awesome! :woohoo:

[BlueMTexpat]

24. I love The Guardian!

And Cenk is indeed coming along nicely. But it's literally tragic that our own MSM are so far out of the loop. We have to look to foreign media to find an article like this.

:banghead:

[Rhiannon12866]

25. Isn't that the way it's been for way too long?!

That's why we have to turn to the internets... :-(

[Capitalocracy]

18. If the MSM won't do their job, they can and will be replaced. K&R nt

[WillyT]

19. Way Cool !!! - K & R !!!

Proud Member of the TYT Army!

:patriot:

:kick:

[ejbr]

21. k & r !! n/t

[Turborama]

23. K&R Great exposure!

PS I'm looking for a job. Seeing as I'm in a totally different time zone (15 hours ahead of LA) I could be gathering news while everyone's asleep...

I'm also a published writer and have experience of proof reading and copy editing, if that helps.

[ihavenobias]

27. Thanks for the offer but right now we're fully staffed.

The last several people that we hired in the expansion were all volunteers for some time first (and fans of the show). And we're set on gathering news and proof/reading, etc.

The only paid thing we're looking for related to technical items, for example, someone to create a TYT app for Boxee (iPhone as well, although we're supposed to have an iPhone app developer).

[florida08]

26. good for TYT

Should have won the streamy. Harry is probably mad because Cenk called him a liar about taking the P.O vote. Remember when Harry said no to bringing it to the floor.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgSy5RXSjY8

[CherylK]

28. K & R!!!

:toast:

[pleah]

29. That is great!

Sorry I missed the window on K&Ring this. :(

[ihavenobias]

30. That's all right

I appreciate the kick.