http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE50K6E320090121

Obama inauguration got unprecedented news coverage
Wed Jan 21, 2009 4:36pm EST  

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's inauguration generated 
an unprecedented 35,000 stories in the world's major newspapers, 
television and radio broadcasts over the past day -- about 35 times more 
than the last presidential swearing-in -- a monitoring group said on 
Wednesday.

The Texas-based Global Language Monitor said there had also been 6 
million new Obama-related mentions on the Internet since December 31.

By comparison, the last U.S. presidential inauguration, of George W. 
Bush in January 2005, resulted in about 1,000 stories in major media 
worldwide, Paul JJ Payack, president of Global Language Monitor said.

"The Obama numbers are unprecedented and speak volumes to the global 
fascination with the new American president, his wife and young family," 
Payack told Reuters. "Obama is the biggest story of the century so far."

U.S. television audience ratings for Tuesday's inauguration ceremony, 
which was shown live on major broadcast networks and cable news 
channels, are expected to show record numbers tuning in when they are 
released later on Wednesday.

Payack said that according to his group's monitoring, the Obama campaign 
and election story had generated 717,000 citations in print, television 
and radio across the world in 2008 and 254 million mentions on the 
Internet and in Web blogs.

That surpassed media interest generated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, 
the global financial meltdown in 2008, the Iraq War in 2003 and the 
September 11 attacks on New York and Washington, Payack said.

The tallies were calculated using the group's proprietary algorithm 
which tracks the frequency of words and phrases in the global print and 
electronic media, the Internet and major databases.

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Cynthia Osterman

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