December 6, 2006

WAR! ...of Words

It's time for all good men to come to the aid of their medium.

It's finally time for me to introduce the War of Words.

The War of Words is a Google-powered tool which compares the number of occurrences of particular words on news agency web sites. I created the tool after noticing interesting patterns in the way popular news agencies described certain issues. For example, do you think the MSM more frequently describes those opposed to abortion as "pro life" or "anti abortion?" Now we can see...

Interesting, huh? The New York Times uses "anti abortion" at a nearly two to one rate over "pro life." ABC has written about abortion fewer times, but they use "anti abortion" at a dramatically higher rate.

What else can we find out?

Does the MSM more frequently write about Republicans or Democrats?

How about Conservatives versus Liberals?

One thing I've learned while developing the tool, however, is that looking for broad "counts" of words like Conservative or Liberal is only slightly interesting. We can glean more interesting data by adding a common word to both queries.

Check out how many times the MSM uses the words Conservative and fascism versus how many times they use Liberal and fascism.

So do you think this means the MSM more often describes Conservatives as fascists?

Here's an interesting review of the alleged FOX News bias...

Bias or balance? You decide.

Enough of my picking the low hanging fruit. Go get involved in the War of Words!

Posted by Richard at December 6, 2006 9:04 PM

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