And Thierry Ardisson invented “neo-television”

The various reactions to the death of Thierry Ardisson bear witness, beyond the conventional tributes, to the consecration of a figure who was certainly original, but exemplary of a television in profound transformation, having moved from the age of "paleo-" to "neo-television", according to Umberto Eco's phrase.

Breaking away from the presenters of the previous generation, confined to variety shows, displaying their simplicity in a television press then at its zenith (one thinks of Télé Sept Jours), embodying a lifestyle and consensual family values close to those supposedly held by their audience, Ardisson cultivated, from the start in 1985, a provocative style in opposition to the codes of the public service monopoly which established a clear separation of tasks between journalists and presenters.

Indeed, despite the very real popularity of the latter, the supremacy of the former was then incontestable, custodians of the seriousness of a television then assigning itself the mission of cultivating and informing much more than of entertaining to take up the triptych which was worth specifications.

Coming from the world of journalism (R