Hitwise Intelligence - LeeAnn Prescott - US
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March 28, 2006
South Park Scientology Episode Controversy Spurs Searches
Last week Comedy Central pulled its second airing of the South Park episode "Trapped in the Closet," which ridicules Scientology, the religion that Tom Cruise has made famous. In addition, Isaac Hayes, a Scientologist and the voice of the character "Chef" on the show, recently quit over the episode, even though it aired for the first time last November. Last week the share of searches for 'scientology' and 'south park' were up 694% and 132% respectively compared to two weeks ago (week ending 3/25/06 vs. week ending 3/11/06).
The market share of visits to the official Scientology site was up 298% in the same period, at their highest point since 'Trapped in the Closet' first aired, but not nearly as high as during the Tom Cruise/Katie Holmes engagement news, as shown on the chart below. The first site appearing in Google search results for a 'scientology' search is Operation Clambake, and visits to that site were up 298% in the last two weeks. On the chart below, you can see that traffic to Operation Clambake (www.xenu.net) closely follows that of Scientology.org. It appears that searchers are interested in what both sides have to say, as 4.2% of visitors to Scientology.org leave the site for Operation Clambake.
Traffic to South Park Studios was up 96% in the past two week period, and South Park fans are threatening to boycott Tom Cruise's upcoming movie, Mission Impossible:3. Controversy serves only to spur a popularity increase, as in the case of the James Frey controversy, and the season opening episode of South Park last week had record ratings.
Posted by LeeAnn Prescott at 04:47 PM
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