Behind The Comedy On The Daily Show

So last night I made my appearance on The Daily Show. For those of you who didn't catch it, the show airs again today at 10AM EST, 8PM, and 11:30PM. There's also a torrent file here if you want to view the segment in MPEG2 format.

I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and in a funny way it seemed like a personal milestone for me. I spent a large stretch of my childhood obsessed with comedians, and the old Letterman Show (even the old, old, Letterman daytime show) was a formative part of my adolescent sense of self. I spent a few wayward years around that point in my life seriously thinking that I wanted to be a talk show host. (I have long since abandoned this idea.) So there was something pretty cool about sitting down on that couch and taking a sip from the obligatory coffee mug.

I'm most proud of something that you can barely see in the clip. When I first walked on stage, as I stepped up onto the main platform, the base unit of my wireless mic detached from my belt, and dropped down towards the floor, almost pulling the mic out of my lapel. A lesser guest might have panicked -- "Cut! Cut! My mic is broken!" -- but somehow I managed to swing the base unit back into my hand and quickly deposit it into my coat pocket while shaking hands with Jon. (I'll call him Jon because, you know, we're terribly good friends now.) I was pretty relaxed and confident going into the interview, but that little catch gave me an extra boost right as we started talking. Whatever doesn't kill you -- or at least whatever doesn't cut out your audio feed -- makes you stronger, I guess...

Doing an interview like that is an intense form of mental gymnastics. I've done my fair share of 5-minute TV interviews -- particularly for this book -- and so I'm familiar with the compressed, self-editing of television time. You can't let an answer go on for more than a few sentences, and in my case I have to repress my natural tendency to go meta on the question before answering it. But for every other TV interview I've done, the host is basically focusing on letting me get my message out; they ask the questions, but it's really my show. With Jon Stewart, on the other hand, there's a genuine interest in the material, but there's also a mandate to be funny, or at least a mandate for him to be funny. And so you're simultaneously trying to figure out on the fly how to compress your book's thesis into television scale, and at the same time, you want to keep the flow of the talk-show banter going. They warn you in advance not to try to deliver prepared jokes, and I can understand why -- the best points in the interview are inevitably the points where it seems like a genuine conversation between two people who happen to tell funny stories or make passing jokes as part of their dialogue.

At any rate, you can be the judge of how it all turned out. A few folks have asked what Jon said to me as we cut to commercial after the interview -- sadly, it was not my fantasy scenario: "That was the best interview I have ever conducted. When I retire, this seat is yours." Instead, he said something nice about wishing that we'd had more time to get into the book's argument and that he'd really enjoyed reading it. He seemed, for what it's worth, like a genuinely nice guy, very much like the persona he has on the show.

Comments

[Anthony]

Very quick reaction time on grabbing that battery pack for the audio (must be that ever-improving nervous system!)

Congrats on an excellent Daily Show interview.

[Danno]

Dude, honestly, A-Team rocked, don't knock the custom GMC van.

[Kristina]

I just started reading your book, yesterday at the gym...Very intriguing so far. =)

Random question...How do you compare Shakespeare in his own day to today's pop culture? Or even Shakespeare in our day?

[Wordlackey]

I haven't seen the show but I've got it TIVOed and you better believe I'm going to watch for your smooth move! Thanks for the insight into the show and Stewart.

[Phil Harnish]

I always wondered what he said after the interviews. Now I need to find out how he "reads" all of these books. Even if he can only skim them he must pick up all sorts of really interesting information in his job.
This entry sort of demystifies the Daily Show and I think that it makes the show more interesting somehow.
Interview went spectacularly. Well played, sir.

[Sarah]

Great interview, Steven! You were very natural and funny. I look forward to reading the book. And on a shallow note... you're also very cute. :)

[Michael]

Currently, in my ninth grade history class, we are working on perparing our own Daily Shows, so recently I've been trying to catch some of the episodes to get an even better feel for the show. And tonight I got the chance to to see the 8 o'clock episode with your interview and I really enjoyed it. To be honest, I never once thought that today's pop culture could have that effect that you were talking about in the interview. Also, like you mentioned in your post about the Daily Show, your conversation did seem very genuine and entertaining so that made it even better.
Also, as part of our Daily Show project we have to keep a blog for our Daily Show groups. My teacher has a blog at www.outsidethecave.blogspot.com that you might find interesting. It also has links to all of our blogs. Well done tonight!

[Gord Fynes]

Did you kick his ass at PS2 in the green room?

[jeffrey veen]

When "The Daily Show: Steven Johnson" popped up on the Tivo today my first reaction was, "No, that can't be the Steven from Feed Magazine. Must be some NASCAR driver I've never heard of."

But sure enough, there was the guy I remember from the Old Days. Nice job with the interview. Glad you threw in the reference to 9-year-olds blogging. You're officially my first RSS/basic cable crossover.

[Larry Ely]

Steve,

Looking forward to seeing the Daily Show at 10:00 tonight. I'm becoming a fan of yours, working my way through your books. Completed Emergence and now enjoying your book, Mind Wide Open.

I have a question for you. Would Gene Meyers famous computer program, the one that extrapolated and mapped the human genome for Craig Ventner's amazing team at Celera, be an example of the "bottom up" self organizing program strategy you discuss in your book on Emergence? If so, might that be one of the most successful case studies on "emergence" programming around? That stuff was also is part of fascinating and controversial story worthy of your attention. Here's a link to Gene Meyer's home page. http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/~gene/ Would be curious about your thoughts.

Thanks,

Larry

[suzanne]

so much fun to see you sittng there. and fun to watch jon stewart wax confessional. pop culture doesn't seem to have stunted either of you that much.

[b e n m c c o r k l e]

i thoroughly enjoyed the interview...having just finished the book, i also thought you did a good job, as you say, of condensing it into tv-friendly soundbytes. one question, though: how does it feel to have sat in a seat most recently occupied by that old spitfire newt gingrich?

[John Beeler]

Nice work! I read your post first and was worried that the interview might have come off as stilted, but it didn't at all. Excellent job.

I have a question regarding the laugh tracks, which seemed particularly annoying in that episode. Have you noticed a discrepency between the laughing in studio and when watching it? Are there moments you recall where no one actually laughed but this was added later?

[Jason McCabe Calacanis]

At 30,000 feet right on SAS to Copenhagen for reboot 7 (you remember that event right Veen?) and I'm downloading the torrent right now! Congrats old man (37... shit... we were just 27 weren't we?!?!).

One of our blogs, TVSquad, does a daily recap of the Daily Show (how meta)... here it is:
http://www.tvsquad.com/2005/06/08/the-daily-show-june-7-2005/

rockon!

[Roger]

Steven,

I just saw your interview on The Daily Show, and for as many concerns as you seem to have had ( from reading this entry that is ), you handled it like a pro.

Tonight is the first night I heard about your book and I can't wait to get my hands on it. So in advance, thanks for the good read!
:D

[GrandPooOfAwesome]

I knew you'd be a blogger!

Excellent interview. I haven't read your book, but I'll definitely pick it up.

I was feeling really confident about myself with all you had to say. Finally, someone is affirming my suspicion that keeping up with pop culture makes you smarter.

I'm not sure I can say it makes you saner. At one point during the interview I actually said "Clap, Clap, Clap" aloud while picturing an emoticon.

Kudos!

[steve s]

Steven, I, too, was pleasantly surprised when I sat down to watch my daily dose of TDS and saw that you were going to be the guest.

As a long-time veteran of UI design (designing interfaces since the days when HyperCard was the tool of choice - actually, it was the only choice then), I have always recommended your book "Interface Culture" to students, and anyone else who would listen, as *the* manifesto on interface design.

Sadly, I've not had the time to read your other books yet, but intend to do so now and am particularly interested in this new one since I so disagree with the premise. I've been formulating the opinion over the past couple of years that our digitized pop culture has reduced humanity to the extent where we only know one another by our oddly spelled screennames and the shadowless cellphone snapshots of our faces and when we lose power in a lightning storm, sit there blankly not knowing what to do.

Your first book went a long way in helping me design better interfaces for everything from mobile phones to airplane cockpits, perhaps your new one will give me some insight into how to better understand my two college-age, highly distracted sons.

[Aubrey]

I'm a game designer. I think I speak for a lot of designers when I say that we're tired of having something we truely believe is a brgeoning artform being seen as just another "idiot box". You mentioned the complexity of game. Although I'm the sort of person who fights unnecessary complexity in games, I don't think that's what you were talking about - perhaps you were describing how the better games give you non trivial involvement?

Either way, I thank you very much for making the point on telly, and in your book, which I'm now going to have to take a look at!

[Gen Kanai]

Your fans in Tokyo are thanking Mr. Haughey for his torrent.

Congrats Steven!

[Oldmanbatten]

I recently watched the episode and I realized, you are a genius, no longer will I haved to take the eye rolls and scowls personally for I am devloping problem solving skills. For that I owe you and I humbly call you my hero.

[Todd Dominey]

I PITY THE FOOL WHO TALKS TRASH ABOUT MY SHOW!

[KarmaFarma]

HI Guy,
Very well played. Good for you. I wish you all the best and look forward to finishing your book.
Peace & Love,
Eddie Reynolds
(The~Karma~Farma)~ @pyrgt2001*

[Matthew De George]

I can't seem to download torrents from my Hong Kong appartement. I think it's one of the few cities to make an arrest for torrent use so that's probably for my protection.

I'm finally reading Emergence. It has a lot to say which connects with my ManageWithoutThem model. I wonder if Steven has any books which already discuss emergent organisational management more directly.

In a way I hope he doesn't because I'm writing one! But in another way I would like to read his!

[BSNRN]

I thoroughly enjoyed watching you on The Daily Show. I found your theories about pop culture so intriguing that I purchased your book, "Everything Bad Is Good For You," from my local bookstore (curiously filed in the self-help section).

Your descriptions of the increasing complexity of certain aspects of pop culture are presented in a very logical, well thought-out manner.

However, as a Registered Nurse, I am confused as to why you chose to discuss the narrow topic of nutrition, instead of the broader topic of general health status, when investigating things possibly correlated with higher IQ scores.

How does one measure general health status? According to "Comprehensive Community Health Nursing Family, Aggregate, & Community Practice," 6th ed. (Clemen-Stone, McGuire, & Eigsti, 2002, p. 511):

Infant and maternal mortality rates are critical indicators of a nation's health health. These rates are used world-wide as global indicators of the health status of the population as a whole because they are closely related to socioeconommic and environmental conditions. A nation's maternal and infant mortality rates are a measure of its success in combatting poverty, adverse environmental conditions such as health care access issues and water pollution, and morbidity.

According to your book, the post World War II period in the United States shows the most dramatic spike in IQ.

How does this correspond with infant and maternal mortality rates?

According to the National Center for Health Statistics, Vital Statistics of the United States, the infant mortality rate is as follows:

Year 1940-- 47.0 per 1,000 live-born infants
Year 1945-- 38.3
Year 1950-- 29.2
Year 1955-- 26.4
Year 1960-- 26.0
Year 1965-- 24.7
Year 1970-- 20.0
Year 1975-- 16.1
Year 1980-- 12.6
Year 1985-- 10.6
Year 1990-- 9.2
Year 2000-- 6.9

According to an article entitled, "Annual Summary of Vital Statistics: Trends in the Health of Americans During the 20th Century," by Guyer, Freedman, Strobino, & Sandik in the December 2000 issue of "Pediatrics" (pp. 1307-1317), the maternal mortality ratio has dropped by 90%, from 83.3 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1950 to 7.1 in 1998.

I propose that the general health of the United States population has greatly improved in the post World War II era, and this might be associated with higher IQ scores. We cannot assume that pop culture alone is making us "measurably smarter."

But I loved your book, and I finished it in only a couple of days. I'll be looking for other works done by you.