Traditional media focuses on royal visit while social media preoccupied with O’Farrell resignation
Source: iSentia
The two big stories of the last week have been the visit of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and the sudden resignation of NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell, O’Farrell’s resignation and its links to a bottle of Grange the more talked about news item across social media according to numbers from iSentia.
ISentia reports that in the period between April 16 and April 23, there was more than three times as many comments about O’Farrell’s resignation on social media than discussing the royals and their visit, however it must be noted that a large portion of that discussion most likely centred around the numerous memes being shared across the internet.
However, there were eight times as many talkback calls discussing the resignation when compared to those wanting to talk about the visit from the UK royals. O’Farrell was mentioned 13,248 on radio while the royals only managed 6,679 mentions on radio.
From a social media perspective, ‘News breaking’ is one of the biggest drivers of social sharing. The motivation here is social utility plus a desire to be first. Humour is another key driver of sharing online so the memes that followed would have driven that.
The Barry O’Farrell resignation was genuinely shocking (and amusing to some) compared to a run of the mill visit of the junior Royals. So on that basis, I think the data pretty much confirms what you’d expect.