The News in New Media

Month: October 2022

South Carolina: Election news and updates

October 31, 2022

As a way to incentive voters to make it out to the polls, early voting has been adopted across the United States. Since October 24, 2022, seems to be taking advantage of expanded access to early voting.

According to Chase Laudenslager and Hanna Powers of Count on News 2, several counties have taken to early voting in lower South Carolina. Some of these include – Berkeley County: 9,219; Charleston County: 26,751; Colleton County: 1,839; Dorchester County: 9,002; Georgetown County: 6,173; and Williamsburg County: 1,542.

In some of these counties, poll workers have seen an increase in wages in order to incentivize the longer working hours of this election.

Within the past week, using the Sprinklr Analytics platform, South Carolina Election has had over 19,000 mentions and 114 million reach.

As we mentioned last week, many of these tweets revolve around the candidates for each position as well as several of the controversial policies across the state.

Moving closer to the final election day, social media platforms like Twitter and Instagram will be the content to analyze sentiment about results and opinions!

Author: Louisa Glazunova

Early Voters Head To The Polls in Georgia and Texas

October 28, 2022

Midterms are upon us, and early voting has begun. Many states have different rules regarding early voting, but a majority allow voters to vote early anywhere between 45 days to  5 days before election day. South Carolina generally allows voters to cast an absentee in person ballot 30 days before election day.

Voters are showing up to the polls this midterms season. According to a CNN article published on October 25th, over 9.2 million people in 40 states have cast an early ballot. Currently, Florida has the highest number of early voters, closely followed by California and Georgia.

A keyword search for “early voting” was done using Sprinklr. Our search took place over this week, October 23rd to the 28th. The top themes of discussion surrounding the term “early voting” included Georgia, and Texas both of which have begun their early voting periods this month. Overall, this term was mentioned 339k times and reached 3 billion users in this one-week period. Users were primarily females in the United States, with the largest density of users being in Texas.

Top influencers in the “early voting” keyword search were news outlets such as The New York Times and The Washington Post, but also politicians such as, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Beto O’Rourke, and Hilary Clinton.

To investigate the aforementioned top themes a little closer, we are going to take a look at two states making waves in the sense of early voting, Georgia and Texas. Using Sprinklr we searched “Georgia Early Voting” and “Texas Early Voting”, respectively for these searches.

The race for government between Stacey Abrams (D) Brian Kemp (R) is being watched closely by the whole country since the state turned blue in 2020. As of right now FiveThirtyEight has Kemp leading by 6 points. However, we must mention that Stacey Abrams has been credited with the increase in voters in Georgia, especially in the 2020 election year, and it seems this cycle is no different as Georgia is seeing record numbers of early voters.

Georgia also has been in the front of the news cycle for its senate race between Herschel Walker (R) and Raphael Warnock (D). FiveThirtyEight currently has Warnock ahead by 1 point. To see who is talking about these races were went to Sprinklr to analyze conversations surrounding early voting. Our keyword search revealed that the term “Georgia Early Voting” was mentioned 30K times and reached over 242 million users. Demographically, users were females with the most users being from California or Georgia.

The next keyword search showed that the term “Texas Early Voting” was mentioned over 64K times and reached over 490 million users. This term saw an increase in more than double its mentions, from 12,000 to 30,000 on October 24th – this being the first day early voting began in the state. The demographics of users discussing early voting in this state were females in Texas. Conversations mainly focused on the race between Beto O’Rourke (D) and Greg Abbott (R).

Overall, content posted in each of these searches was similar. Most of it being voters showing their pride in showing up to the polls and politicians urging their constituents to engage in democracy. The following are examples of both gubernatorial candidates in Texas.

The Social Media Listening Center will continue to monitor elections through the rest of the midterm season.

Author: Michelle Brazeau

Fair Elections, Voter Intimidation Top Concerns for Midterm Elections

October 26, 2022

As November’s general elections loom ever-nearer, public opinion across the United States remains divided on candidates and the state of the nation – often publicly and vocally divided, in fact. These midterm elections will be the first elections since president Joe Biden took office and will provide a watermark for how Americans are feeling about his – and his allies’ and opponents’ – work thus far.

As The Guardian reminds us, Biden will not be on the ballots, but a variety of national and local politicians will be vying for office. Every single one of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives is up for grabs, as well as 35 seats in the Senate, 36 state governorships and three territorial governorships, and myriad local positions such as mayors, regional judges, and council-members. Ballot measures are also up for vote, including state legislature regarding abortion following the repeal of Roe v. Wade in June 2022.

We recently looked at the three candidates for the office of the governor here in South Carolina and their presences on Twitter. However, these three are only a small part of the wider electoral landscape at large across the country. What are some of the opinions and discussion themes guiding election coverage nationwide this year? And how has that changed since the Capitol riots on Jan. 6, 2021?

Just searching for the simple term “elections” since Jan. 1, 2022, unsurprisingly returns a massive volume of messages: that single word was mentioned more than 11.61 million times this year alone within the United States. A whopping 88.83% of these discussions are coded with negative sentiment, which is not surprising given the vitriol behind candidates’ ads and news platforms. Naturally, so many mentions does not lead to a very conducive micro-level look at the dialogue, but some of the overarching themes can give insight into what people have been talking about over the run-up to the Nov. 8 elections.

One of the most dominant themes is “fair elections.” Ever since former president Donald Trump lost his re-election bid in the 2020 presidential election, concern has spread across America about the validity of elections and whether or not votes are being properly counted. While investigations have proven that there was no fraud in that election and it was conducted fairly, the ongoing concern has spread from Trump’s supporters to a wider population who are also worried about their vote counting.

The two most-shared Tweets under this topic come from the Biden White House and former president Barack Obama, reaffirming the fairness of that election and others in the U.S., as well as expressing the need for reliable and passionate poll workers. Reports indicated that it is difficult to find poll workers for these upcoming elections because volunteers and employees fear for their safety in such a contentious atmosphere.

Another recurring theme of discussion is gerrymandering, the practice of moving voting district borders to make the most desirable districts for a party or candidate. There was a huge uptick in mentions of gerrymandering and elections in conjunction with each other in June 2022, right around the time Roe v. Wade was overturned and many states’ leaderships proved to not be very representative of their constituents’ opinions on abortion.

Many people talking about gerrymandering discussed how specifically partisan it is and called for an end to the practice – along with several other reforms to make voting more fair and easier for all citizens, in particular with the Freedom to Vote Act. This Act garnered nearly 359K mentions this year with 87.3% of those being negative. However, phrases like “filibuster” and “head in the sand” showed up frequently in conjunction with the Act’s name, indicating that a lot of the negative mentions come from affiliated practices and perceptions of legislators. On the other hand, many of the top posts are from Democratic leaders like Joe Biden, Barack Obama, and Kamala Harris, advocating for the need for the Act in creating a more egalitarian vote.

Overall, the phrase “democracy is in crisis” showed up repeatedly not only under searches for widely controversial practices like filibustering and gerrymandering, but also in larger election coverage as well. One of the more widely disseminated op-eds containing the phrase hearkens back to the problem of intimidation and threats at the polls, particularly by armed and/or organized civilian groups. Recently, in Arizona, a group was served a temporary restraining order after Latinx voters reported being threatened and feeling unsafe while voting. Forbes reports that more than 40% of Americans are worried about intimidation tactics and physical threats at the polls. Some voters are reporting online that they have also been turned away from early voting, or even have been arrested by police after erroneously being told by officials they were eligible and registered to vote.

https://twitter.com/vanessajones/status/1582019171281301505?s=20&t=tIT9d8KhDX6-aCMIUXqMIA

Stay tuned with us here at the Clemson Social Media Listening Center leading up to the Nov. 8 general elections.

Author: Kayleigh Jackson

South Carolina Governor Candidates on Twitter

October 25, 2022

With the midterm elections around the corner in the United States, our team will look at social media sentiment and statistics regarding candidates and their political climates. This blog is focused on the gubernatorial candidates for the state of South Carolina.

Joe Cunningham – Democratic
Tally Parham Casey, running mate for lieutenant governor

@JoeCunninghamSC is the Twitter handle of Democratic candidate Joe Cunningham. He has 71,000 followers and over 4,000 tweets. Using Sprinklr Analytics, his handle was searched, and statistics were collected. With this search, an 80 million reach was recorded with over 7,000 mentions. Within these mentions, over 70% are of negative sentiment, and 28% are positive. With South Carolina being a primarily conservative state, the negative sentiment towards a Republican candidate could be a regular occurrence, especially after the political changes that have occurred this year regarding women’s and minority’s rights. Lastly, as expected, the top themes regarding this search are related to voting and the candidate’s name recognition.

Henry McMaster – Republican – Incumbent
Pamela Evette, running mate for lieutenant governor

@henrymcmaster is the Twitter handle of Republic candidate Henry McMaster, who is the current governor of the state. He has 81,600 followers and over 5,000 tweets. Using Sprinklr Analytics, his handle was searched, and statistics were collected. With this search, 68 million reach was recorded with over 9,000 mentions. Within these mentions, over 77% are of negative sentiment, and 22% are positive. Lastly, the top themes regarding this search are the names of other candidates. We can see the banter between Twitter users regarding political policies, and often, social media content compares the current candidate with competitors in order to foster debate on platforms.

Bruce Reeves – Libertarian
Jessica Ethridge, running mate for lieutenant governor

@Reeves4SC is the Twitter handle of the campaign for Libertarian candidate Bruce Reeves. The account has 35 followers and over 20 tweets. Using Sprinklr Analytics, the handle was searched, and statistics were collected. With this search, a 7 thousand-point reach was recorded with over 30 mentions. Within these mentions, over 90% are of positive sentiment. With a much smaller Twitter presence than his competitors, it is difficult to compare the statistics across the full board. However, after briefing the campaign’s website, they have much more information uploaded there, signaling that Twitter is not their primary means of communication. The top themes regarding this search are related to voting and the businesses and individuals that Bruce Reeves and his running mate are targeting with their campaign.

As the elections inch closer, our team will be analyzing Sprinklr for trends and insights into the midterm elections across both South Carolina and the United States.

Author: Louisa Glazunova

Taylor Swift Releases ‘Midnights’

October 21, 2022

“Dear Reader”, the autumnal weather has arrived here in Clemson and so has Taylor Swift, as she released her 10th studio album, Midnights (at midnight) on October 21st.

The news of Midnights was a surprise for fans as Swift is currently in the middle of re-recording her first 6 albums. The impetus of re-recording these albums was a dispute regarding her masters, ultimately, the rights to them were stripped from her. Swift has released two re-recorded albums thus far (See our blog post on her re-release of RED).

The roll out of Midnights is unique from the last two new albums Swift released, Folklore and Evermore. Both of which she completely surprised fans with as they had little to no promotion. Whereas Midnights was a highly anticipated album for Swifties everywhere. Swift announced the release of this album at the 2022 VMA awards, while accepting one of three awards she won that evening. The promotion of of this album was full of surprises, in typical Taylor fashion. Swift leaned into fan theories, or as swifties would call “easter eggs” through various social media posts to announce this album, the most popular of which being “Midnights Mayhem with Me”. This short Tik Tok series announced the track titles of the songs on Midnights. Swift, the “Mastermind” she is, even had her fans tune into the 3rd quarter of the Cardinals vs Saints game on Prime’s Thursday Night Football for a special announcement – a visual album!

Midnights is an album of songs that Taylor Swift says represent different “sleepless nights” throughout her life. Writing, “I think of Midnights as a complete concept album, with those 13 songs forming a full picture of the intensities of that mystifying, mad hour”.  First, swifties were graced with 13 songs at midnight on October 21st, but as instructed through a promotional social media post earlier this week, they waited up until 3am for a ‘chaotic surprise’ which was an additional 7 songs.

Who is talking about Midnights? We took to Sprinklr to look up conversations surrounding ‘midnights’.  From October 20th to the 21st, ‘midnights’ has been mentioned over 1.2 million times, reaching over 4.8 billion users. These conversations are primarily happening on Twitter and over 50% of users are including photos in their posts. Females in the United States were the dominate participants in these conversations. In addition to fans, the top influencers include YouTube, Spotify, The NFL, and of course, Taylor Swift.

An increase in conversations began happening around 10 pm on October 20th as fans had just received the news about the visual album on Prime’s Thursday Night Football. Then conversation volume nearly doubled at midnight on the 21st as the album hit streaming services.

The album seems to be well received as the conversations are overwhelmingly positive – receiving a 76% positive sentiment score. Both fans and critics took to twitter to share their thoughts regarding the album, saying it is some of Swift’s best work and it has all the favorite parts of her previous albums in one.

The conversations surrounding Midnights have only begun as swifities received the official music video for “Anti-Hero” on Friday morning, which will be followed by more to complete the Midnights visual album. We will keep monitoring conversations, but for now we will be streaming Midnights from the Social Media Listening Center.

Author: Michelle Brazeau

Fans Remember Robbie Coltrane After Actor’s Passing

October 19, 2022

Renowned Scottish actor Robbie Coltrane passed away last Friday at the age of 72. Coltrane was perhaps best known to the younger audiences for his portrayal of lovable half-giant and Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry gamekeeper Rubeus Hagrid in the Harry Potter movie series.

Coltrane began acting with roles in the theatre in the late ’70s and transitioned to broadcast productions in the 1980s, starring alongside other British greats, including Hugh Laurie, Stephen Fry, and future Harry Potter co-star Emma Thompson. The late Queen Elizabeth II appointed him as an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2006 for his “services to drama.” Throughout his career, Coltrane also earned many other awards, including several for “Best Actor” in his shows.

He was even voted as the No. 6 “Most Recognizable Scot” in a United Kingdom poll in 2006, following the Loch Ness Monster, Robert Burns, Sean Connery, Robert the Bruce, and William Wallace.

Coltrane had suffered from osteoarthritis later in his life, and reports shared that he had used a wheelchair for several years leading up to his death due to the extreme pain he was suffering through.

Many fans and entertainment entities expressed sadness and condolences upon hearing of his death, including many of his Harry Potter cast-mates. From Oct. 11 through Oct. 19, Coltrane’s name was mentioned 1.17 million times worldwide, with a major spike of nearly 922K mentions on Oct. 14, the day the news broke that he had passed away.

Former co-stars turned to social media to share tributes to the late actor, including Tom Felton (Draco Malfoy in Harry Potter)…

Bonnie Wright (Ginny Weasley in Harry Potter)…

and Hugh Laurie (his co-star in several productions, including the sketch show “Alfresco” and BBC sitcom “Blackadder”).

Though a Scottish actor, Coltrane touched the hearts of millions worldwide, and support poured in globally. Following the United States and United Kingdom, the top countries with mentions of Coltrane’s name were Brazil, Spain, and Thailand, with many of the most popular Tweets posted in Thai.

Many evoked popular motifs from the Harry Potter series as they mourned, including the scene of students raising their wand in tribute to character Albus Dumbledore’s death. Visitors to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal’s Islands of Adventure theme park in Orlando, FL, even re-enacted the tribute themselves:

Others mourned Coltrane as the latest of the Harry Potter movies’ cast to leave us. Acting giants such as Alan Rickman (Severus Snape), Richard Griffiths (Vernon Dursley), Helen McCrory (Narcissa Malfoy), John Hurt (Mr. Ollivander), Richard Harris (the original Albus Dumbledore), and Verne Troyer (Griphook the goblin) have all passed away since the movies first hit the big screen.

Though we will all miss Coltrane’s contributions to acting and charming personality, we can feel cheered by his legacy to this generation and future ones. An interview from the Harry Potter reunion special resurfaced in which Coltrane reflects on what Hagrid meant to so many people: “In 50 years’ time, I’ll not be here, sadly… but Hagrid will.”

Author: Kayleigh Jackson

Iranian Women Fight for Freedom

October 17, 2022

In early September, a female Iranian citizen was beaten to death by the police force for allegedly violating the strict female dress code that is in place for the women of Iran. There were videos released by authorities, and the citizens of Iran, particularly the female population, expressed extreme distress. Her name is Asra Panahi, and she has become the face of this movement.

In solidarity, many women have begun protesting against the strict dress code, amongst other laws that restrict the rights and freedoms of women in Iran. There have been several isolated incidents over the years, but the mass protests of women standing together have caused an uproar in the country.

This is a major event in the country’s history and surrounding areas with similar restrictions against women’s rights. However, social media platforms are not seeing much discussion over the prominent issue. After analyzing #AsraPanahi over the last month, following her brutal death, Sprinklr Analytics found a 55 million reach count with a 19 thousand mention count. With the significance of this event and the protests that have followed, it is surprising that the numbers are so low.

However, over 98% of the mentions have been recorded as negative sentiments. Out of the trending topics analyzed by our team this month, this was the first topic with such high negativity surrounding it.

Prominent social justice warrior, Britney Spears has tweeted about the issue, and as an opinion leader on social media platforms, her followers’ retweet and support her voice.

These protests will continue to rise as the citizens of the community fight for their civil rights movement. Hopefully, the awareness of the issue will be spread and increased on social media in order to gain funding and educational awareness as to what is happening in the revolution of women’s rights in Iran. Below is a tweet from Swedish athletes supporting the cause.

Author: Louisa Glazunova

Dame Angela Lansbury Passes at 96

October 14, 2022

On October 11th, 2022, Dame Angela Lansbury passed away at 96 years old. Lansbury left quite a legacy behind and her impact of the entertainment industry will live on through her films. Angela Lansbury starred in many films, such as ‘Murder, She Wrote,’ as well as being the iconic voice of ‘Mrs. Potts’ in ‘Beauty and The Beast.’ Lansbury was a talented musical theater actress in addition to her work in films. She played leading roles in shows like ‘Sweeney Todd’ and ‘Gypsy.’ Her work was highly recognized, winning her five Tony Awards. Four of these Tony awards were for her roles in musicals and her fifth was for a featured role in a play in 2009.

Not only was her work incredibly popular in the United States, she remained loyal to and gained recognition in her home country. Born in the United Kingdom, Lansbury was just as important to the country as it was to her. In 2014, Queen Elizabeth II bestowed Lansbury ‘Dame Commander of the British Empire’.  This is a high honor given to one who have had a strong impact in their field of work.

Who is talking about Angela Lansbury? We took to Sprinklr to search “Angela Lansbury” to find out. Her name has been mentioned 468k times from October 11th to October 14th. These mentions have reached over 6.9 billion users. Those engaging in discussing surrounding Lansbury were primarily females in the United States or United Kingdom. The most popular platform to discuss Lansbury was using Twitter, and 44% of users shared pictures along with their posts; many of these were photos of Lansbury in her most famous productions.

Top influencers in the conversation were news outlets such as BBC News and The New York Times, but also some other organization such as Disney Animation and even NASA, who posted this beautiful tribute to Lansbury:

Regardless of if it was organizations she worked for or fans of her work, users took to social media to share their fond memories of Lansbury. Many repeated stories they heard about the kind heart Lansbury had both for her co-workers and those were impacted by the AIDS epidemic.

https://twitter.com/sharpegirl/status/1579961837348880390?s=20&t=ilooHZDk7Fb3AcTK00qk0Q

https://twitter.com/rebeccamakkai/status/1579931097932365824

Overall, sentiments regarding her were positive. Individuals shared their favorite roles she played and expressed their sadness at her lost. Below is a word cloud of popular emojis associated with this search. As you can see, many users included emojis relevant to her most popular roles., i.e. roses for ‘Beauty and the Beast’, and a broom for ‘Bedknobs and Broomsticks.’

It is no doubt that the world is mourning the loss of Angela Lansbury. However, they are also celebrating the incredible legacy she left behind and keeping it alive through sharing their favorite performances online. As always, the Social Media Listening Center will continue to monitor these conversations.

Finally, we’d like to end this article with the following tweet from Playbill which sums up the legacy Dame Angela Lansbury wished to leave on this world.

Author: Michelle Brazeau

Fire on Rapa Nui Irreparably Damages Moai Statues

October 13, 2022

The iconic Moai statues on Easter Island, traditionally known as Rapa Nui, have been left “totally charred” following a fire on the remote Pacific island. The fire blazed through more than 250 acres of the UNESCO World Heritage site and “irreparably” damaged many of the giant, ancient statues.

While some sources initially reported the cause as a volcano fire, Rapa Nui’s mayor, Pedro Edmunds Paoa, believes it was intentional, telling newscasters that all fires on the island are caused by humans. If it was indeed arson, the perpetrator permanently damaged statues that were nearly a thousand years old – the first being carved around 1100 C.E.

According to Paoa, the fire probably sped up the rocks’ natural degradation and erosion process, already precarious due to their age and the porous nature of the volcanic rock they’re made from. Archaeologists and scientists have documented more than 800 moai around the island but suspect there could be several hundred more yet undiscovered. Debate over the statues’ purpose(s) remains ongoing, as some theorize they represented past chiefs while others suspect the Polynesians used them to mark sources of fresh water on the island.

The park and island are now closed to visitors, another blow to Rapa Nui’s heavily tourist-based economy. Due to COVID-19, tourism had been restricted over the past few years and the island had only recently re-opened at the start of August.

Now, Paoa maintains that the only way to protect the site from vandals is to have permanent guards around the moai and Rano Raraku volcanic crater, the latter being the site of the most fire damage. He also insinuated that the absenteeism of Chile’s government and their apathy toward Rapa Nui, the world’s most remote inhabited island, allowed for the alleged arson.

Over the last week, social media mentions of the island spiked aggressively on Oct. 9, shortly after global news sources like Reuters broke the news. People online expressed heartbreak over the fire and its damage, while also rightfully pointing out there was much less news coverage than there was for a similar fire-based disaster, at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris in 2019.

And they had a point. 42.9K of the total 44.5K mentions of “Easter Island” and “Rapa Nui” in a one-week timespan stemmed from Twitter, with minimal conversations and traffic coming from traditional news sources or news sites. In comparison, Notre Dame was mentioned 12.76 million times in a similar one-week timespan surrounding its fire. While certainly not to lessen the significance of the damage incurred at Notre Dame, this clear disparity in news coverage demonstrates that the world’s eyes still avoid the global south.

According to a Twitter user whose location is marked as Chile, the Chilean media did not even share this news immediately.

Translation: “1. Why did they not put this on the news in Chile? 2. It’s called Rapa Nui.”

The Copernicus, the EU Space Programme’s Earth Observation facet, shared a picture of the fire damage and burn scar from space. Hopefully the island’s environment and economy are able to recover quickly, and Paoa and his investigators can apprehend the culprits.

Author: Kayleigh Jackson

10/10 Growth of #WorldMentalHealthDay

October 10, 2022

10/10 marks the annual date for the internationally recognized day for mental health awareness. Over the past decade, mental health awareness has become more and more prominent a subject and is frequently a trending topic. However, this year,

In 2021, within a 24-hour period, Sprinklr recorded a 6.38 billion reach with over 419 thousand mentions. Out of these mentions on social media platforms, over 60% were recorded as positive! This is exciting to see the growth of the subject as individuals become more aware and mindful of their community members who struggle with mental health. Interestingly, the United Kingdom had more mentions within the country compared to the United States of America, overpowering by over 20 thousand mentions.

In 2022, within a 24-hour period, Sprinklr recorded 4.5 billion reach with over 500 thousand mentions. Out of this year’s mentions, over 80% were recorded as positive, a 20% increase from the previous year. Again, the United Kingdom had more mentions within the country compared to the United States of America, overpowering by over 20 thousand mentions. India was only a few thousand behind the USA, which was a steep increase from 2021.

For both years, trending subtopics were #selfcare and #mentalhealthsupport, and #mentalhealthmatters. Although the reach was not as great, the increase in mentions and positive sentiment is an important factor for the growth in the awareness and education of mental health.

Selena Gomez and Katy Perry were analyzed as the top influencers in #worldmentalhealth day this year. Selena Gomez announced her movie that revolves around mental health and celebrity status while Katy Perry retweeted the tweet, exploding the reach of the already famous celebrity.

It is fantastic to see influencers reaching out and promoting awareness of mental health via social media! The trending topic will continue to grow in support and understanding and the world will showcase this via social media platforms each year!

If you need any mental health support, please reach out to the BEWELL program offered by Clemson University; you are not alone!
Author: Louisa Glazunova