Webware

So either Jon Stewart is really on to something with his mad-as-hell crusade against financial hypocrisy and stupidity, or there are a lot of unemployed people watching Comedy Central clips to pass the time.

Either way, an on-air freakout by CNBC reporter Rick Santelli may have been one of the best things to happen to Comedy Central in months: Fake-news pundits Stewart (of "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart") and Stephen Colbert (of "The Colbert Report") have seen traffic to their Web sites and online video clips soar after the two went on mocking vendettas against Santelli, fellow CNBC personality Jim Cramer, and the NBC Universal-owned business network in general.

Traffic to the shows' Web sites has been at its highest of the year so far in the past week, at over 60 percent their weekly average for 2009. ComedyCentral.com, which hosts video clips of both programs, also had its best traffic of the year, and the digital version of a viciously funny clip called "CNBC Gives Financial Advice" logged over 1.3 million views in a week, the sort of numbers usually reserved for grainy videos of cats behaving unnaturally.

Here's the back story: Santelli was supposed to appear on "The Daily Show" after his tirade about the federal government's economic bailout, but backed out abruptly. That's when Stewart and Colbert--but especially Stewart--turned up the heat. Stewart went on the aforementioned anti-CNBC rant on March 5, putting "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer squarely in his crosshairs. Cramer appeared on "The Colbert Report" the following night.

Now, Cramer is scheduled to make a "Daily Show" appearance on Thursday night.

Stewart and Colbert have been two of the most visible figures in cable television's slow crawl onto the Web. Not only are they wildly popular with young and tech-savvy audiences, but the segmented format of their talk shows lends itself well to being split into short clips and swapped via video-sharing sites, which meant that unauthorized clips of the two were some of YouTube's earliest hits. That's what indirectly led to Comedy Central parent company Viacom's massive copyright lawsuit against YouTube owner Google.

Later on, the full archives of both shows were made available on Comedy Central's Web site, and recent episodes are available in full on Hulu (as well as iTunes and Xbox Live).

Colbert, who started out as a commentator on "The Daily Show" before spinning off his blowhard persona into his own talk show, also owes a big chunk of his notoriety to the Web. Video of C-SPAN's coverage of the White House Press Correspondents' dinner three years ago, in which Colbert performed a shockingly blunt comedy routine that skewered then-President George W. Bush, was a huge hit on the Web among those who wouldn't have considered actually watching C-SPAN in the first place.

Last year, Colbert was honored by the annual Webby Awards as "Person of the Year." Take that, nonbelievers!

Yaaaay! Stephen Colbert on Hulu!

(Credit: Comedy Central)

This post was updated at 11:01 AM PT on Tuesday to clarify wording: television content from Viacom is almost exclusively handled by MTV Networks.

In an unexpected move, video site Hulu will be getting some political loudmouths just in time for the 2008 presidential election: Comedy Central's late-night personalities Jon Stewart of The Daily Show With Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert of The Colbert Report.

We had to check and make sure the press release wasn't a joke, but there are indeed full episodes from both programs available. It comes as somewhat of a surprise, considering Comedy Central parent company Viacom has not officially signed on to Hulu, which launched as a joint venture between NBC Universal and News Corp. and does not yet have any other major networks on board.

But on the other hand, MTV Networks, the Viacom division that encompasses Comedy Central, has made some distribution deals, and both Stewart and Colbert were already available on the Web in one form or another. And Viacom had already made select content available to Hulu rival Joost, but now that the Joost hype has faded completely, experimenting with Hulu's ad-supported distribution seems logical. Making the popular Comedy Central talk shows available could be the media conglomerate's way of dipping a toe in the water.

Additionally, later in June Hulu will start to add select programs from PBS: Nova, Carrier, Scientific American Frontiers, Wired Science, and potentially others.

This bring's Hulu's count of programming content partners up to more than 70.

Stephen Colbert

(Credit: Comedy Central)

Update at 7:19 a.m. PDT: Facebook comment added.

Stephen Colbert should consider naming Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg as his running mate* in his quasi-legitimate presidential campaign; the social-networking site has been the political satirist's prime rallying grounds.

Sometime on Thursday night, a Facebook fan group for Colbert's campaign met its membership goal of 1 million Facebook members--and the group was founded just over a week ago.

The group, "1,000,000 Strong for Stephen T Colbert" (the "T" stands for Tyrone, for the record) was started by a Facebook user shortly after The Colbert Report host announced that he was going to enter the presidential primary in his home state of South Carolina as a "favorite son." It's a take-off on the "1,000,000 Strong for Barack Obama" Facebook group, which has yet to crack 400,000 members after nine months. The equivalent Colbert group took just over a week to hit a million.

"Colbert-Zuckerberg '08" does have a nice ring to it.

Several blogs have asserted that this is the fastest-growing group in Facebook's history. I find that very easy to believe, but there is no official confirmation: Facebook says it neither tabulates how fast groups grow nor offers a central list of the biggest groups on the site. (Facebook execs presumably have other things on their mind, like this whole "Microsoft thing.")

On the more serious side of things, the light-hearted enthusiasm over Colbert's "presidential campaign" could be a sign that young American voters are getting sick of Election 2008's career politicians have already been plastered all over the media. The really scary part: there's still over a year to go in this race.

Meanwhile, Editor and Publisher reports that not only will the mayor of Columbia, S.C., declare this coming Sunday "Stephen Colbert Day" when the "favorite son" comes for a visit, but that polling firm Rasmussen has actually bothered to include Colbert in a telephone survey that pitted him against Democratic front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republican hopeful Rudy Giuliani.

Nation, these are frightening times we live in.

*Yes, yes, I know that it probably breaks election law for the 23-year-old Zuckerberg to appear on a campaign ticket, and I also know that he's probably too busy taking over the world to bother with politics.

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