framing the new king on social media (master thesis media studies)

7/30/2019 Framing the New King on Social Media (Master Thesis media studies)

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FramingtheNewKingonSocialMedia

SerenaWestra

MasterThesis

M.A.NewMedia&DigitalCulture

MediaStudies

UniversityofAmsterdam

Studentnumber:5879175

[email protected]

06-..

Supervisor:BernhardRieder

21June2013

AreSocialMediaUsedasplatformforPoliticalDiscussionandwhatPictureis

PaintedoftheDutchMonarchy,WhenLookingattheInaugurationofKing

Willem-Alexander?


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Abstract:

Thisthesisisstructuredaroundanexitingevent:thisyear,2013,akingwillreignthe

Netherlandsfor the first time in 123years.The storyof this majorpolitical eventon

socialmediaisresearchedfromadigitalmethodsperspective,andcontextualizedwith

theoriesofmediaempowerment,publicspheresandhermeneutics.What isbeingsaid

andbywhom?Andcanthecontentonthesocialmediaplatformsbeseenascritiqueof

themonarchy,orisitmerelyentertainment?Thepreviousinaugurationin1980wasthe

dcor of the most violent protests since peacetime, in contrast, this year hardly any

protestinAmsterdamwasfound.Didtheprotestmoveonline?Tofindanswers,both

Twitter and Facebook are studied. It appears that users are actively participating on

TwitterandFacebookbysendingpostsandtweetswiththeiropinion,creatingpages,

sendingaroundhumorouspicturesoftheking,andusinghashtagstotakepartinthe

onlinediscussion.Althoughalotofthecontentdoesnothaveapoliticalstatement,itis

clearthattheDutcharenotafraidofexpressingtheirthoughtsaboutthemonarchyon

socialmedia.Althoughduringtheinaugurationhardlyanyphysicalprotestwaspresent

in Amsterdam, in contrast to the riots of 1980, social media are actively used as

platforms of expression and making fun of the monarchy. Nevertheless, the general

imageofthekingispositive.HasKingWillem-Alexanderturnedintoacelebrity?

Key words:

Facebook, Twitter, digital methods, representation, hermeneutics, King Willem-

Alexander,Monarchy,Netherlands,protest


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FramingtheNewKingonSocialMedia-SerenaWestra

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Foreword

I had a hard time deciding on a research topic; there are so many things I find

interesting. Nevertheless, when I came up with the topic of the inauguration of King

Willem-Alexander, I immediately got enthusiastic.It looked like a good case study to

combine my interests in new media theories, sociology,and datavisualization. It was

exciting to study an event that is evolving before your eyes. Moreover, it is very

interesting to study my own society and culture, and to have a critical look at daily

practiceswedonotoftenquestion,likesocialmediause.WithmyresearchIhopeto

give new insights in things we as Dutch citizens take for granted, like living in a

monarchic country, having the freedom to protest, and the possibility to use social

media,particularlyFacebookandTwitter,toexpressapoliticalopinion.

Acknowledgment

I would like to thank Bernhard Rieder for all his time, help, guidance, and advise. I

believeIwas veryluckyandhistechnicalandtheoreticalexpertisewasveryhelpfulto

me.Next,IliketothanktheAmsterdamPolicetosharethoughtsaboutthetopic.Itwas

interesting to see their perspective. Thanks to my fellow students of the master

program; they really pulled me through. Last, big thanks to Mart for his everlasting

patience,encouragementandhelp.


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Table of ContentsIntroduction 6

Overview 81. The Dutch Monarchy and Protest 9

1.1TheDutchMonarchy 9

1.2TheInauguration:30April2013 11

1.2.1Program 12

1.3ProtestsandtheInauguration 12

1.3.1Protest:19802013 14

1.3.2LackofInterestinProtest? 15

2. Theoretical Framework 17

2.1Interpretation&Meaning 17

2.2.Interpretivecommunities&Refraction 19

2.3ThreeWaysofReadingaText 20

2.4TheAxisofOnlineDiscussions 21

2.4.1civility&PoliticalConversations 23

2.4.2Incivility&Non-PoliticalConversations 24

2.5Overview 25

3. How is the new king framed by social media? 26

3.1.1.TwitterandFacebookintheNetherlands 263.1.2.StudyingFacebookandTwitter 26

3.1.3CodingComments 28

3.1.4ResearchOVerview 29

3.2TwitterResearch 30

3.2.1TwitterResearchMethods 31

3.2.2Findings 32

3.2.3PopularHasthtagsandTopics 32

3.2.4ContentAnalysis 35

3.2.5PopularResources 37

3.2.6WhoweretakingpartintheonlinediscussionsonTwitter? 38

3.3FacebookResearch 40

3.3.1MethodsandSample 40

3.3.2Findings 41

3.4OverviewofFindings 43

4. Case Study: Het Koningslied 45

4.1IntroductiontoHetKoningslied 45

4.2TwitterResearch 46



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4.2.2Findings 50

4.3FacebookResearch 54


4.3.2Findings 58

4.4OverviewofHetKoningsliedFindings 60

5. Discussion 61

5.1.1CodingtheComments:NegotiatedandInformationalPosition 61

5.1.2Context,HumorandInterpretiveCommunities 63

5.1.3Refraction 64

5.1.4AxisofCivility 65

5.2GeneralStatements 67

5.2.1SocialMediaUse 67

5.2.2AcceptanceoftheDutchKing 67

5.2.3NormalizationandPersonalization 69

5.2.4CelebrityCulture

70

5. Conclusion 72

6.1FutureResearch 74

Appendixes 75

1.TheLyricsofHetKoningslied 76

2.DatasetofTweets 77

3.OverviewofPopularRetweetssentonQueens-day,April30 th2013. 79

4.WordcloudsMadeofRetweets 83

5.ExtraInformationaboutTopUsers 86

6.ComparisonbetweenthreeFacebookPages 88

7.TopRetweetsperhouronFriday,April19th2013 90

8.InsightsinThreeFacebookPages 91

9.FacebookSample 94

10.AdditionalDataset 95

References 95

Literature 95

Television Broadcastings 99

Websites,ApplicationsandTools 100

ListofFigures


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IntroductionItisthebeginningof2013andforamomentallDutcharetalkingaboutthesamething:

Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands just announced that she is going to abdicate on

national holiday Queens-day, April 30th, 2013. This implicates that her son, Prince

Willem-AlexanderoftheNetherlands,willbecomethenewkingoftheNetherlands;the

firstkingin123years.Thelastinaugurationwas33yearsago,andalothaschanged

sincethen.Socialmediahavebecomeanindispensiblepartof ourwesternsocietyand

the way we communicate. Twitter and Facebook give users a chance to represent

themselvesonline,expresstheiropinionandmobilizelike-mindedpeople.Theprevious

inauguration in 1980 was the dcor of the most violent riots of the Netherlands in

peacetime(Priemus2).Whatistheroleofprotestthisyear;didprotestmoveonline?

Are users of Twitter and Facebook using the platforms to comment on the political

event,andwhatpicturearetheycreatingofthemonarchyandthenewking?

Thisthesislooksat the inauguration of KingWillem-Alexanderandthe Dutch

monarchy from a digital methods research perspective. This research perspective, as

developed by Richard Rogers, engages with virtual methods that import standard

methodsfromthesocialsciencesandthehumanities( EndoftheVirtual1).Theterm

onlinegroundednessisintroducedas anefforttoconceptualize researchthatfollows

the medium, captures its dynamics and makes grounded claims about cultural and

societalclaims(4).Hence,Rogersarguesthatgroundingclaimsintheonlinesphereisa

majorshift in the purpose ofInternet research, inthe sense that one isnot somuch

researchingtheInternetanditsusers,asstudyingcultureandsocietywiththeInternet

(Rogers,EndoftheVirtual,20).Likewise,Twitter andFacebookcommentsarestudied

to make claims about society and to find out how people are interpreting the

inauguration.Howdotheymakethestorytheirown?Hence,theresearchquestionis:

aresocialmediausedasplatformforpoliticaldiscussionandwhatpictureispaintedof

theDutchmonarchy,whenlookingattheinaugurationofKingWillem-Alexander? WiththeriseofsocialmediaandintroductionofDigitalMethodsithasbecome

easierthaneverbeforetostudyaDutchinaugurationfromthepeoplesperspective.By

studying comments on social media, many different user opinions can be taken into

accountatthesametime.Moreover,whatisbeingsaidcanbetrackedbytheminute:the

studyofsocialmediaisreal-time.Thedifferencebetweenwrittentextsandcomments

on social media is their unfinished nature; comments are seen as fluid, informal,

impulsive, short-lived, fast and almost oral. Comments are often full of emoticons,

abbreviations, misspellings and slang; looking at comments is almost like looking at


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speech.Comments-e.g.Facebookposts,tweets,hashtagsandsharedmedialikelinks

andpictures-canbeseenasinterpretationsandexpressionsofthepublicopinion.This

understanding of comments becomes increasingly interesting when looking at

thousandsof differentcommentsatthe sametime, calledmass hermeneuticsby Geert

Lovink. He calls for the creation of internet-specific hermeneutics, or mass

hermeneutics,thatproposestounderstandallthetextsontheInternet(60).Lovinksays

comments are an essential part of the network effect, and to ignore or dismiss this

elementistounderstandonlyhalfthestory(58).Hence,thisresearchisan attemptto

applymass-hermeneuticsandagroundedtheoryapproachtounderstandwhatissaid

onTwitterandFacebookaboutthemonarchy.

The combination of digital methods, mass hermeneutics, and a

historical/political event like this one is not performedbefore often and theresearchfieldisveryyoung.Thestudyofsocialmediainrelationtopoliticaleventsisrelevant

becauseitissaidtoprovideinsightsintheunfoldingofeventsandtheopinionsofusers

aboutacertaintopic.JournalistNicNewmansaysthatfuelledbythegrowthofpowerful

networkslikeFacebookandTwitter,individualsarenowabletocreate,collaborateand

share their own media often to the bemusement of governments, lawyers and

traditionalnews organizations (10).Users can use social mediaas a public sphere to

form a voice against mainstream media. Hence, Dan Gillmore sees great potential in

socialmedia:

Thelineswillblurbetweenproducersandconsumers;changingtheroleofbothinways

were only beginning to grasp now. The communication network itself will become a

mediumforeveryonesvoice,notjust thefewthatcanaffordtobuymultimillion-dollar

printingpresses,launchsatellitesorwinthegovernmentspermissiontosquatonthe

publicsairwaves.(Gillmorxxiv)

EventhoughFacebookandTwitterhavethepotentialtogiveavoicetothepeopleand

totakegovernmentsdown,thisdoesnotmeanthattheyarebydefinitionusedassuch.Inaddition,itwillbecomeclearthatin thecaseoftheDutchinauguration,ratherthan

givingcritiqueagainsttheDutchmonarchyandusingtheplatformtomobilizeprotest,

many users comment in non-political ways with a lot of humor. Nevertheless, the

generalimageofthekingisapositiveone.


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Overview

Theresearchconsistsofatheoreticalandempiricalsection.Inthefirstchapterseveral

topics are outlined to provide context of the inauguration: the Dutch monarchy, the

program of the ceremony on April 30th, 2013, and the roles of protest during the

inaugurationthisyearandinthepast.Inthesecondchapterthetheoreticalframework

is set by examining interpretation and hermeneutics, and by looking the potential of

socialmediatocreateapublicsphere.Anaxisisoutlinedwithononesidemeaningful

conversations on social media with a civil purpose and on other side incivility and

meaninglessonlineconversations.JodiDeansayswearecaughtinnetworksofendless

clicking on Facebook with no political outcome, can the same be said about the

discussion about the monarchy?A look in the field of hermeneutics and linguistics is

usedtointerpretposts,tweetsandcomments.

Next,inthe empirical sectionTwitterandFacebookareexamined:whatissaid

and what isthe interpretationof the users? Tostart, a period ofeight weeksaround

Queens-day is studied for general findings. Then, in chapter four a case study is

introduced with an in-depth study of the online discussion about Het Koningslied: a

song for the king written for the occasion of the inauguration, see appendix 1. It

becomesclearthatusersofbothplatformsareparticipatingactively.Theyexpresstheir

opinionalot,sharecontentfromnewssitesandtakepartinthediscussionaboutthe

events. Arguably, users feel connected to the royals and have accepted King Willem-

Alexanderevenbeforeheisinaugurated.Nevertheless,theconversationsarenotalways

politicalbynature.

The fifth chapter combines the theoretical framework with the empirical

findings.Itisfoundthatthereareseveralstoriestold:astoryinfavorofthemonarchy,

one oppositional, an informational event based story, and a negotiated story. The

findingsareusedtomakegeneralargumentsaboutDutchsocietyandculture.Didthe

kingturnintoa celebrity?Finallytheconclusionreframes thefindingsand theoretical

frameworkagaintofindthepaintingsocialmediacreatedofthemonarchyandroyals.


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1. The Dutch Monarchy and ProtestTheDutchmonarchyhasalonghistorycoveringmorethantwocenturiesandtheHouse

of Oranje-Naussau still plays an influential part in theDutch politics and culture.ThefollowingchapterwillhavealookattheDutchmonarchyandtheofficialproceduresof

an inauguration. Howdid the public express themselves inthe past and how did the

previous inauguration proceed? Moreover, the history of protest movements in the

Netherlandsis veryinterestingand shaped thecontemporaryDutchsociety(Priemus;

Duivenvoorden). Therefore, these topics form a fundamental context for the study of

onlinediscussionsabouttheinaugurationoftheDutchking.

1.1 The Dutch Monarchy

ThekingdomoftheNetherlandsasweknowittodayisfoundedin1815,afterthedefeat

ofNapoleon,atimeinwhichtheNetherlandswasforashortperiodpartofFrance.Until

1795theNetherlandswasarepublic.ThischangedaftertheFrenchNapoleonproclaims

his brother Lodewijk Napoleon as king of the Netherlands, which lasts for only four

years (1806 1810). The Netherlands gained independence in 1810 and Willem

Frederikwasnamedasthe SovereignPrinceof theUnitedNetherlands.As aman with

greatpower,heproclaimshimselftwoyearslaterasKingoftheNetherlandsandDuke

ofLuxembourg;andtheDutchkingdomwasborn(Koninklijkhuis.nl).1

NoteveryDutchkinghadagoodreputation.KingWillemII,whosucceededKing

Willem I in 1840, had the reputation of being arrogant and conservative, despite his

nickname the Hero of Waterloo (Koningen en Koninginnen). His successor to the

throne,KingWillemIIIwasnamedbytheNewYorkTimesasthegreatestdebaucheeof

the age, because of his extramarital enthusiasms and his militant characteristics

(Hanken-Parker).DutchrepublicansevencalledhimGorillaKing(Hanken-Parker).

Between1879and1887theDutchmonarchywasnotreallypopular;acoupleofinfluentialanti-monarchypamphletswerespreadaroundthecountry,and in1887the

bookAdayinthelifeofKingGorillacausedquiteastir(Horlings).KingWillemIIIwas

thelastkingoftheNetherlandsuntilnow,123yearslater.

ThequeensoftheNetherlandsincreasedthepopularityoftheDutchmonarchy.

When King Willem III passed away in 1890, his wife Queen Emma succeeds to the

throne. She 41 years younger than her late husband and reigns for eight years

1

Moreinformationabouttheroyalfamily:http://www.koninklijkhuis.nl/encyclopedie/geschiedenis/koninkrijk-der-nederlanden/

2SeetheinterviewWillem-AlexanderenMxima,hetnieuwekoningspaaronNOS,17April2013.


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(Koninkrijk der Nederlanden). After that, her daughter Princess Wilhelmina reigns

during wartime and gains much respect. In 1948, after two World Wars, her

granddaughter Princess Juliana succeeds her and reigns in a difficult timewith many

protests and student uprisings; nevertheless the people love her because of her

communityinvolvementandinformalbehavior(H.M.KoninginJuliana).Herdaughter

PrincessBeatrixsucceedsin1980andgainsthereputationofbeingaprotocolfetishist

whenshetriestomoveawayfromtheinformalbehaviorofhermother.

Thisyear, QueenBeatrix son,PrinceWillem-Alexander,willbe thefourth king

of the Netherlands. Prince Willem-Alexander is married to Mxima Zorreguieta and

togethertheyhavethreedaughters,ofwhichPrincessAmaliaisheirtothethrone.He

hasthereputationofbeingabitstupidandhisnicknameisPrincePils,causedbyhis

student behavior (Novum1

). Nevertheless, he is very popular. Research center Ipsosconcludesinasurveyconductedforthesuccessionofthethronein2013thatthepeople

oftheNetherlandsarehappywithQueenBeatrix,thefuturekingandfuturequeen;they

appreciate Queen Beatrixs dedication and trust Prince Willem-Alexander to be a

suitableandgoodsuccessor(Ipsos3).Moreover,69%ofthepeoplesaytheyhavefaith

inKingWillem-Alexander(Ipsos5).Theroyalcoupleismuchlovedandthepeoplehope

they will be less formal and detached than Queen Beatrix and that King Willem-

Alexanderwillmodernizethemonarchy.Whenaskedtotheconductorsofthesurvey

which grade they would give the members of the royal family, the following results

show:

Fig.1:ResultsresearchIpsos.

NotableisthechangeofsentimentafteraninterviewwithPrinceWillem-Alexanderand

Princess Mxima a few days before the succession of the throne on television2: 48%

percentofthepeoplehaveamorepositivefeelingofthefuturekingafterseeinghimon

TV(Ipsos13).Moreover,78%percentoftheDutchareinfavorofthemonarchy,ahigh

2

SeetheinterviewWillem-AlexanderenMxima,hetnieuwekoningspaaronNOS,17April2013.


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number.Insum,it canbesaidthatthegeneralpictureof themonarchyispositiveand

theroyals aremorepopularthan inthetimeofthe previousDutchking.Nevertheless,

thequestionwhethertheroyalsarealsopopularonsocialmediaremainsunanswered;

thethirdchapterwilllookintothis.

1.2 The Inauguration: 30 April 2013

OnJanuary28th,2013QueenBeatrixoftheNetherlandsannouncedthatsheisgoingto

abdicateonApril30th,2013,ontheofficialnationalholidayQueens-day.Itwasavery

emotionalmomentsaysheirtothethronePrinceWillem-Alexanderinaninterviewtwo

weeks before the inauguration date.3

On Tuesday, April 30th, 2013 he will be

inaugurated as King Willem-Alexander and this will make him the fourth king of the

NetherlandsandtheeightregentoftheNetherlandsinhisline.Thelastceremonywasheld33yearsagoin1980,whenQueenBeatrixwasinaugurated.

AccordingtotheDutchlaw,acoronationdoesnotexist;aninaugurationtakes

placeassoonaspossibleaftertheabdicationoftheoldkingorqueen.Thisimplicates

thattheDutchkingorqueenneverwearsacrown,althoughacrownispresentatthe

ceremony.IntheNetherlands,thesuccessionofthethronecanbeassignedvoluntarily;

the previous regent does not have to decease, like in Great Britain. Usually the

abdication and the inauguration take placeat the same morning inthe capital ofthe

Netherlands,Amsterdam,respectivelyintheRoyalPalaceandintheNieuweKerk.The

inaugurationwillhappenduringameetingoftheStates-GeneraloftheNetherlands;a

combinationoftheSenate(EersteKamer)andtheHouseofRepresentatives(Tweede

Kamer). This ceremony originates from the official ceremony of 1814, when King

Willem I was inaugurated in the same church. Although the ceremony is held in a

church,thereisnoreligiousmeaningtothis;theceremonyissolelyconstitutional(Van

Asseldonk).

NotableisthefactthatthenewnameofthekingisnotgoingtobeKingWillem

IV,inlinewithhispredecessors,butwillbeKingWillem-Alexander.Rumorhasitthis

nameischosenbecausehedoesnotwanttobeassociatedwiththenegativeimageof

KingWillemIII,theGorrillaKing(Horlings).However,PrinceWillem-Alexanderargues

hedoesnotwanttobecomeanumber:KingWillemIVwillbelikeBertha38-a typical

Dutch cow name (De Vries). His Argentinian wife Mxima Zorreguieta is going to be

calledQueenMximaandQueenBeatrixwillbecomePrincesBeatrix.

3

For the complete interview see Willem-Alexander en Mxima, het nieuwe koningspaar. NOS. 17 April 2013.


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1.2.1 Program

First, at 10.00 in the morning of April 30th, Queen Beatrix will abdicate in the royal

palace on Dam Square in Amsterdam, which automatically makes Prince Willem-

AlexandertheKingof theNetherlands.Halfanhourlater,thenewkingandqueenwill

showthemselvestothepublicfromthebalconyofthepalace,andbothPrincessBeatrix

and King Willem-Alexander will give a speech. Around 14.00 the King will go to the

NieuweKerknexttothepalacefortheofficialinaugurationceremony,andafterthatthe

receptionofauthoritiesandmembersoftheStaten-Generalwilltakeplaceinthepalace.

24.000 Guestscan join theinaugurationin thechurch (VanAsseldonk). At18.30there

willbeaboattripwiththeroyalsandsomewell-knownDutchartistsontheIJ-riverand

beforedepartureHetKoningslied(thekingssong)willbesung.At20.30theeventwill

endatHetMuziekgebouwaanhetIJwithsalutesfromallshipsontheIJ-river.Thiswill

betheendoftheofficialceremony,butstreetsofAmsterdamwillbefloodedwithDutch

citizenswearingorangeuntillate.

1.3 Protests and the Inauguration

Historybooksdescribetheprotestsontheinaugurationdayof1980as theworstriots

everknowninpeacetimeintheNetherlands(Priemus2).Squattersusedtheroyalevent

aslaunchpadforproteststhatresultedinmorethantwohundredpolicemanandfour

hundredprotestersandonlookersinjured(Priemus2).Smokebombs,fights,andangry

protesters filled the streets of Amsterdam. People screamed: Geen Woning, Geen

Kroning (no home, no coronation) as result of the housing crisis (Eikelenboom). As

result, this specific Queens-day was re-named National Squatter-Day by the squat

movement.

Theprotestsdidnotcomeoutoftheblue;earlierthatyeartherewasaviolent

confrontation between squatters and the police inAmsterdam, and the riot was only

quelled by the police after using a tank and helicopter. The police had a feeling that

therewassomethingabouttohappenontheinaugurationin1980,however,according

totheDutchlawitismandatorythattheofficialinaugurationtakesplaceinthecapital

sotherewasnowayofmovingtheceremoniestoamorepeacefulcity.LynOwenssays

this eventually resulted in a spectacle on a much larger scale than ever before with

aroundtenthousandpolicemeninvolvedinkeepingthecitysafe(82).Infact,theriots

onQueens-day1980-oftenreferredtoastheKroningsoproer-areseenasahistorical

breakpointinDutchhistory(Duivenvoorden2000;Duivenvoorden2005;Owens2009).

WhereasbeforetheKroningsoproertheAmsterdamcitizenshadtheirsympathieswith

the squatters, the pointless destruction caused by the riots turned them off


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(Duivenvoorden,Eenvoet168).Squattersthemselveshadmixedfeelingsabouttheday

andeventuallythemovementdistancedthemselvesfromtheevent(Owens83).

Not surprisingly, people feared for a troublesome inauguration this year,

particularlybecauseof thepresenthousingcrisisandanxietyfor terroristattacks. The

above-mentionedresearchbyIpsosshowsthatingeneraltheceremoniesonQueens-

dayareconsideredascostingtoomuchmoney(14),andalmosthalfofallpeoplearea

bit worried about the safety of Queens-day in Amsterdam (16). In the run op to the

event republican groups started campaigns against the monarchy likeHetis2013,Het

Nieuw Republikeins Genootschap and Pro Republica. Amsterdam citizens were

encouragedtowearwhite(thecolorofrepublicans)insteadoforange(thecolorofthe

monarchy), and to hang white banners from their window as form of protest

(RepublikeinenVragen).WaterlooSquarewas renamedforone dayasWhiteSquare,and anti-monarchists wereinvited to join the protests; more than a thousand people

were expected to show up (ANP). The police, municipal and the king did not try to

preventprotestdemonstrationsinthecity;theyrathertooksecureprecautionstomake

suretheprotestwouldbecarriedoutsafelyincontrastto33yearsago.Themunicipalof

Amsterdam assigned six places in the city for protests where the opposition of the

monarchycouldexpresstheiropinionlegally,andthepolicekeptsecuretrackofsocial

mediaanddeployedaroundninethousandpoliceagentsduringtheday(Novum2).The

futurekingshowedinaninterviewbeforetheinaugurationnoaversiontoprotestsnor

fearofriots:IamconvincedthattheinaugurationdaywillbebeautifulinAmsterdam,

andofcoursetherewillbeoppositevoices-therehastobe,butthereisnothingwrong

with that.4In other words, both the police and the royals gave their permission for

protests;theNetherlandsisademocraticnation.

As it turned out, the inauguration day proceeded without major incidents or

violentprotests,andthepoliceconcludesthatthehappeningsduringthedayweresafe

andcalm(KoninginnedagFeestelijk).Aroundthesameamountofvisitorsasprevious

yearscametoAmsterdamandthenumberofarrestwaslowerthanbefore,assumingly

causedbythehighamountofpeoplewatchingtheceremonyontelevisionathomeand

thespreadoutoffestivitiesacrossthecity.Onlyoneoutofsixassignedprotestspots

wasusedduringtheinaugurationdayonApril30th2013,andmerelyamaximumofone

hundredpeoplewerepresent(ANP).Incontrasttotheriotsof1980,therewasonlyone

smallprotestincidentonDamSquarewiththepolice,whentwocampaignleadersofthe

Nieuw RepublikeinsGenootschap were arrested, for which the police apologized right

4Willem-Alexander en Mxima, het nieuwe koningspaar. NOS. 17 April 2013.


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after(PolitieZegtSorry).Hence,theassumptioncanbemade that therewerehardly

any protests, riots and violent opposite voices during Queens-day in Amsterdam.

Nevertheless,thelackofphysicalprotestdoesnotexcludeotherformsofprotest.Did

thecritiqueanddiscussionaboutthemonarchymoveonline?

1.3.1 Protest 1980 - 2013

Beforelookingattheexistenceofonlinediscussionandprotest,itisinterestingtofind

out why there was a lack of physical protest on Queens-day 2013. Jaquelien van

Stekelenburg did research about protest in the Netherlands and found that most

protesters are highly educated, socially connected people (1). They use their social

networks to transform individual outrage into collective anger, and personalinjustice

intoshareddissatisfaction(idem).Moreover,shearguesthatthesesocialnetworks,and

especiallyonlinesocialnetworks,areusedasinformationchanneltoinform,evokeand

remindpeopleaboutprotests.Thirtypercentofallprotestssuccessfullyachievethegoal

of their campaign, mainly because it is hard for politicians to ignore demonstration

protests (idem). Although thirty percent might not look a lot, many protesters see

getting in the attention of the media, influencing the public opinion and showing

solidarity also as successful results. Moreover, one main factor that influences the

number of participants in protests is the mobilization and promotion of the

demonstration.Protestdemonstrationis notanactof impulsebutaneventthatistheresult of careful balancing between supply and demand (Stekelenbrug 2, translated).

Thus, not only lack of interest in the protest, but also insufficient promotion and

organizationofa protestcampaigncanbeonereasonforthesmallnumberofprotests

thisyear.

What are the main differences when it comes to protests between 1980and

present time in the Netherlands? There is no easy answer; nevertheless, several

phenomena have influenced the amount of demonstration protests and the forms of

protestingovertheyears.Atransitioninprotestvaluestookplaceintheseventiesinthe

Netherlands. The values shifted from materialistic to post-materialistic values; from

economical and political ends to self-actualization. As research shows, bread-and-

butter issues of the past, such as employment, have remained and have been

supplementedby newconcernssuch aspeace,anti-racismand theenvironment(Alest

andWelgrave462).Ontopofthat,protestintheNetherlandsisnormalizing:abroader

audienceprotestsagainstmorethemes,atrendseeninmoreWest-Europeancountries

(e.g.AelstandWelgrave2001;Dalton1996;Stekelenburg2010).


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We can conclude that the growing number of peaceful protest and the increased

legitimacyaccordedtosuchactionssupporttraditionaltheoriesofthenormalizationof

protestbehavior.(AelstandWelgrave465)

In other words, the normalization of protest and shift to post-materialistic protest

valuesincreasedtheamountofpeacefulprotests.Massive(violent)streetprotestasthe

ones in1980arenot the only wayto protest;other formsof protestare increasingly

used,likeonlineprotestsuchastheKonyCampaign,onlinepetitionsandnewwayslike

Twibboncampaigns:

ATwibbonCampaignisyourveryownmicrositewhereuserscansupportyourcause,

brandororganizationinavarietyofways(Twibbon.com).

Anotherdifference between1980and presenttimeisthe amount ofsquattersandthe

roleofthisgroupinnationalprotests.In1980thesquatmovementconsistedoftwenty

thousandpeopleintheNetherlandsandninethousandinAmsterdamalone(Priemus

2). Nowadays the amount of squatters is decreased to around 1.500 people in

Amsterdam.5Whenlookingatthepeoplethatprotestahistoricaltrendisproceeding.

AelstandWelgravearguethatitisnolongeradisorganizedoutburstofthedissatisfied

lowerclasses,butthedomainofthepoliticallyactive,well-educatedmiddleclass(462).

Moreimportantly,recentlya lotofprotestistakingplaceonline,asseenby numerous

politicalexamplesliketheKonycampaignandArabSpring.Socialmediahaveprovento

besuitableplatformsforprotest.However,thisdoesnotmeantheyarealwaysusedas

such.

1.3.2 Lack of Interest in Protest?

Insum,thephysicalprotestduringtheinaugurationthisyearwassignificantlylessbig

and more peaceful then 1980. Even tough the police and state gave permission for

protest, the well-performed organization, and promotion by different anti-monarchy

groups, hardly anyone showed up. Hence, the assumption is made that the lack of

protest isnot caused bypoor promotion and organization, but bylackof interest for

physicalprotestagainstthemonarchyinAmsterdamonQueens-day.Thisisarguably

influencedbyacombinationofgeneralfactors.Firstofall,inwesterncountriesprotest

5TheVolkskrantreportsthatin2009theamountofsqatterswasestimatedbythesquatmomevementtobe

around1.5002.000.


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hasbeennormalizedandashifthastakenplacefrommoderntopost-modernprotest

values. Toturnto the streets isnot longer the only option for protest. Moreover, the

biggestprotestgroupin1980consistedofsquatter.NowadaysthisgroupinAmsterdam

decreasedfrom9.000toaround1.500people(NederlandTelt).Last,thefindingsof

the opinion poll by Ipsos show that in general the Dutch are positive about the

monarchy and succession of the throne, which is in great contrast to some previous

Dutch rulers. Does this positive image of the monarchy and royals and this lack of

interestforprotestalsoapplyfortheonlinesphere?


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2. Theoretical Framework ExamplesliketheArabSpringandtheTwitterRevolutionhavedrawnattentiontothe

potentialofsocialmediaasplatformsofcritiqueandpoliticalempowerment.Although

the political situation in the democratic Netherlands is very different compared to

(formerly)oppressedcountrieslikeTunisiaandIraq,socialmediacanpotentiallyforma

suitableplatformforcriticizingthemonarchy.Hence,socialmediaareoftenseenasa

public sphere, a place for criticism outside state control (Bunz 2013; Newman 2011;

Morezov2011).However,socialmediaarealsousedforotherpurposes,likechatting

withfriends,forcommercialendsandentertainment.Inlinewiththis,JodiDeanargues

users are caught in circuits when using affective networks like Facebook, and as a

consequencethereisnotmuchpoliticaldebategoingon(Dean,BlogTheory).Sheargues

thatwe are captured in pointlesscircuits of endless clicking, liking, commenting, and

befriending:circuitsofdrive.Thereisnomeaningofthis,exceptforaffectandsociality.

Asdescribedinthepreviouschapter,hardlyanyprotestdemonstrationswere

carried out in the streets of Amsterdam on Queens-day this year. Did expressions of

criticism move from the streets to the Internet? First the field of hermeneutics and

interpretation is taken into consideration. What does a text mean and how are

interpretations given? Then, a look at theories and research about social media

empowerment andpublic spheres is usedto seta frameworkfor definingcritique on

socialmediaassuch.An axisis formedwithmeaninglessconversationsandthecircuit

ofdriveononeend,andonotherendpoliticaldiscussionsandsocialmediaaspublic

sphere.

2.1 Interpretation & Meaning

RolandBarthessemioticsisaninterestingtheoryandcangivegreatinsightsintheway

users interpret the monarchy and the new king in their comments on social media.

Barthesstudiedculturalmythsandsymbolicmeaningsandarguesthatcertainculturalgroups have cultural myths, second-order signs, which he

calls connotations (Barthes). These meanings are subjective

anddependentonthelanguagegroupthatcreatesthem.For

example,seefigure2.InthispictureyoucanseeKingWillem-

Alexandercoveredwithtattoosinabathingsuit.Itisnotthe

familiar way he is portrayed; nevertheless, the there is no

doubtthatheisKingWillem-Alexander.Putdifferently,aking

canbeportrayedmanydifferentways,butthereisonlyone

Fig.2.WillemAlexander


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KingWillem-Alexander.Thedifferentwaysofportrayinghimaredefinedinlinguistic

termsatthesignifier.TheconceptofKingWillem-Alexanderisthesignified;itisthe

mental image of the king (Barthes). For certain groups the image holds another

meaning, a second order of signs. This is called connotative meaning and is context-

dependent(Barthes).Onlywhentheinterpreterisfamiliarwithcertaininformationthis

meaning can be given to the image. For example, a certain group of people in the

Netherlands might think tattoos are tacky and they see persons with tattoos as

lowbrow.Hence,these people wouldreadthisimageofKingWillem-Alexanderas:the

king isa tacky, lowbrow person without status. This meaning however iscompletely

conventional:theMaoriusetattoosasanindicationofpowerandstatus(TheHistoryof

Maori). They would probably see King Willem-Alexander inthis picture as a person

withhighstatusandpower.Inotherwords,meaningiscontextandculturebound.Another example is the oranje (orange). For the Dutch, the orange color

symbolizesthemonarchyanditisthenationalcoloroftheNetherlands,hencewearing

orange means being in support of the monarchy and using the hashtag means a

reference to this topic. However, to other people with another (national) knowledge

framework,orangewilljustbeacolor.

Thesameholdsforsignifiersonline;themeaningdependsonthecontext,which

canforexamplebeapage,websiteortweet.Inaddition,GeertLovinkarguesthattoday

wearelivinginacommentcultureinwhichcontentisnolongerjudgedinavacuum,but

automaticallyreadwithinthepolitical,cultural,andmediacontextinwhichitoperates

(Lovink 57). To understand a comment, the context of the message is important. On

socialmediathisimplicatestoreturntoaprevioustopic,knowledgeaboutotherpostby

thesameuser,oraddressingbackgroundinformation.Whatweneed,Lovinksays,isan

introduction of re:search in real-time flows to give us easier access to the relevant

archives,bothinsideandoutsidethecurrentthread(60).

A form of contextualizing is needed, such as references to other contributors or

backgroundarticles that explain more about thedateand place ofthe original entity.

(Lovink60)

In other words, it is not predictable how a text is interpreted; this depends on the

culture and the background of the viewer. Some readers choose not to see it and

perverselysubstitute their own meanings for the meanings that texts obviously bear

(Fish 338). Hence, Barthes argues that a texts unity lies not in its origin but in its

destination (Barthes). So, the essential meaning of a text does not lie at the original

message,butattheinterpretationofit.


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Consideringtheresearchtopic,thisimpliesthatonepictureorcommentontwo

differentFacebookpagesmighthaveacompletelydifferentmeaning.Forexample,when

figure2iscanhavedifferentmeaningsdependentontheuser,pageortweetconnected

to it. Likewise, tweets froma fakeking-account havea different meaning than tweets

fromtheofficialmonarchyTwitterprofile;yetonlybyknowingthecontextofthetweet

andbackgroundoftheTwitteruserthisinformationisgained.Inlinewiththis,Houston,

HansenandNisbettdidresearchabouttheimpactofcommentsontheinterpretationof

anewstextandfoundevidencethatthebroaderonlinecontextinfluencesperceptions

oftheInternet:thecomponentsof onlineinformationdo notfunctioninisolation,but

might be affected by other elements of the online environment (88). Moreover,

informationlogicshavealotof influencein thecontentofa message.GanaeleLanglois

explainsthis:

Thepoliticsofhumancommunicationarenotsimplyaboutwhatisbeingsaid,orputout

there: they have to do increasingly with the informational logics of social media,and

how socialmedia distribute, hierarchize,and attribute meaningfulness to information.

(Langlois54)

In other words, studying the context of comments is significantly important when

looking atthe imagesocial mediausers paintof the king and the monarchy. Itis the

connotative,culturalmeaningthatmakesthecommentinteresting.

2.2 Interpretive communities & Refraction

BernhardRiederconductedastudyoftweetsintheFrenchTwittersphereandfound

that often users comment on issues from the perspective of their own immediate

concerns(TheRefractionChamber 9).Interestinglythough,theseconcernsseemtobe

largelyshared.Inaccordance,StanleyFishsaysweneverinterpretalone:wearepartof

interpretative communities (342). These interpretive communities have a shared

knowledgeandcommonsense,whichallowsconnotation.Likewise,EliPariserargues

usersonsocialmediaarecaughtinnetworksoflikemindedpeople,hecallsthisthefilter

bubble(Pariser).In addition, Riedersays that insteadof merelybeingexposedtolike-

mindedness, users are the driving force behind the production of shared values and

understandings (The Refraction Chamber 12). Users create a sphere with shared

knowledge,informationandtopicsthemselves.


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Interestingly,Riedersaysthatthemostsuccessfultweetsinthe Twittersphere

aremostoftenthosethataddatwitstothetopicandspinitinacertainway,hecalls

thisrefraction(TheRefractionChamber8).

Wewouldliketoproposethemetaphorofrefractionasawaytofurtherthinkaboutthe

space between identical reproduction and total heterogeneity. [] What we mean by

refraction: the issue is commented upon, connected to a differentissueor a specific

detailisunderscored.(Rieder,TheRefractionChamber8)

Thus,refractionistheinterpretationofdifferenteventsandtopicsintermsofalimited

setofgeneralshared concernsandsharedknowledge.Theseshared meaningsmakeit

easier to make an argument or joke, which is especially useful when considering

limitation of merely 140 characters a tweet. A single hashtag can mean a lot when

shared knowledge is addressed. Victor Raskin saysthat manyjokes arebased on this

shared knowledge between the speaker and the hearer(s) of a joke; it would not be

funnyorevencomprehensibleifthespeakerandtheaudiencedidnotshareacertain

shared knowledge or presupposition (327). Raskin says it appears that a certain

repertoireofcognitivestructuresisstoredinourmindsjustasthemeaningofwordsof

thelanguagewespeakareinternalizedbyus,thisisoftenreferredascommonsense

(329).

So,thiscommonsensemakesitpossibletoplayaroundwithatopic,connectit

to other issues, and to make jokes about it. Moreover, common sense allows for a

community interpretation, a connotation. Is humor used and refraction visible when

lookingattheonlinecommentsaboutthemonarchyandinauguration?Moreover,are

there different interpretive communities recognizable and do they use of common

knowledgewhentalkingaboutthemonarchy?

2.3 Three Ways of Reading a Text

Stuart Halls says interpretation can cause different readings of a single text. Hall

distinguishesthreehypotheticalpositionsfromwhichdecodingofatelevisualdiscourse

maybeconstructed:thedominant-hegemonicposition;thenegotiatedposition;andthe

oppositionalposition(Hall).Themomentwhentheeventturnsintoamessageiscalled

encoding, and when it is transformed back it is called decoding. They are determine

momentsforthemessage;bothhaveinfluenceonthemessage,andbothareinfluenced

bythe frameworkof knowledge, relation ofproduction andtechnicalinfrastructureof

thecreatorandreceiver(Hall109).Itisperfectlypossiblethatthesentmessageisnot

thesameasthereceivedone.Hence,HallsaysinlinewithBarthes,thatmeaningsare

notfixedinnaturalperception.Attheconnotativelevelofthesignsituationalideologies


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canalterandchange,andthereforeconnotativecodesarenotequalamongthemselves

(Hall110).Meaningcanchangeduringcommunicativeexchange.Hallexplainsduring

an event, like the inauguration,the event transformed into a message inorder to be

transportedfromthesendertothereceiverbythemedium.Heexplains:

Arawhistoricaleventcannotinthatformbetransmittedby,says,atelevisionnewscast.

Eventscanonlybesignifiedwithintheaural-visualformsofthetelevisualdiscourse.In

themomentwhenahistoricaleventpassesunderthesignofadiscourse,itissubjectto

allthecomplexformalrulesbywhichlanguagessignifies.Toputitparadoxically,the

eventmustbecomeastorybeforeitcanbecomeacommunicativeevent.(Hall108)

Inotherwords,whenthistheoryisappliedtotheresearchofsocialmediathequestion

turnsinto:howistheinaugurationeventturnedintoanonlinestory?Togetinsightsin

the different readings of theinaugurationstory, a coding system is used. This system

willbeelaboratedoninthenextchapter.

2.4 The Axis of Online Discussions

In the previous part it was found that the context of a message is important for

interpretation.Context isseeninthisresearchasFacebookpages, tweets,networksof

tweets,orthehashtaglanguage.Thequestionatstakeishowtodefinethesecontextsas

democratic,humorous,entertaining,meaninglessorpolitical?

Researcherslike journalistNic Newman argue that TwitterandFacebookhave

thingsincommonwiththenotionofapublicsphere,theyhavethepowertocreatea

spacewhereauthoritiescanbekeptwithinbounds(55).The publicsphere,asdefined

byJrgenHabermas,isaplacewherethepubliccantalkfreelyandcriticizethestate

outside state control (Habermas). This sphere is needed for a democracy to function

well,asGerardHauserargues,sincedemocraticgovernancerestsonthecapacityofand

opportunity forcitizensto engagein enlighteneddebatewiththe purposeof educated

judgment(83).FormanypeoplesocialmediaplatformslikeTwitterandFacebookhave

becomethenewmeetingplace.Forexample,MercedesBunzarguesthatifyouwantto

bepartofthenewdigitalpublic,youneedtobeonFacebook(139).Socialmediahave

become places to create and spread news with a global reach and start discussions

aboutabigvarietyoftopics.Thespeedwithwhichindividualcitizenscancreateand

move information can help to bring down governments and humble mighty

corporations(Newman55).

Atthesametime,therearenegativevoicesthatdonotseethepotentialofonline

mediatoformapublicsphere.Forexample,Papacharassipointsoutthatmanyonline

discussions far from guarantee a revived public sphere since the technology is not


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universally accessible and the ones that are available frequently induce fragmented,

nonsensical, and enraged discussion (Democracy Online 260). Moreover, a lot of

conversations that take place on social media are not even political discussions or

democraticconversationatall.Houston,HansenandNisbettsharethisideaandsaythat

in best cases, user participation can result in an online conversation about the news,

while in worst case it might result in cacophonous shouting matches among online

readers(80).Nevertheless,BernardStieglerstressestheimportanceoftheexistenceof

onlinediscussionsandsocialmediaaspublicspherethequestionthecurrentsociety:

Itisnecessarytodevelopcommunitiesoftheoreticalandpracticalknowledgeonandin

the networks, to establish spaces of critique, and for this, to invent a much needed

politicaltechnology(Stiegler29).

Hesaysweneedtocreatepoliced,meaningpoliticizedcommunitiesoffriendsinsocial

networksandthesenetworksshouldbecivicinthesensethattheytakeacriticalstance

regardingtheconditionoftheirindividuation(29).In otherwords,itis importantthat

usersof social mediause the social network toquestion the current condition ofthe

Netherlandsandforcritique.Butaresocialmediaactuallyusedassuchinthecaseofthe

inaugurationofKingWillem-Alexander?

Inaddition,forthestudyofonlineconversationsabouttheDutchmonarchyan

axis isdevelopedto getinsightsinthe natureof thediscussions:aretheypoliticaland

using social media as a public sphere; or are they uncivil and just used for self-

promotion, meaningless conversationsand humor?Theaxisisdividedintotwosides:

civilityandpoliticalTalk,andincivilityandnon-politicaltalk,seefigure3.

Fig.3.AxisofPoliticaltalkandcivility.

Civility&Political

talk:

PublicSphere

Democratic

conversation

Problemsolvingmodel

Incivility&Non-

politicaltalk:

Entertainment

Incivility

CircuitofDrive

Self-promotion

Sociablemodel


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2.4.1 Civility & Political Conversations

The distinction between civility and incivility is based on Papacharassis definition of

civilityinonlinediscussionsascivilbehaviorswhichenhancedemocraticconversation

and his shared assumption that ifonlinemedia have the potential totruly revive the

public sphere, it should promote civility (260). Michael Schudson studied democratic

conversationsandnamesthefollowingcharacteristics:

Conversations that serve democracy are distinguished not by egalitarianism but by

norm-governedness andpublic-ness,not byspontaneity butby civility,and notby its

priorityorsuperioritytoprintandbroadcastmediabutbyitsnecessarydependenceon

them.(Schudson297)

InSchudsonsviewademocratictalkmustbepublic,uncomfortable,partlydependedon

the prior existence ofa public world (e.g.print),and above all with clearnormsand

rules (306). These rules are designed to encourage pertinent speaking, attentive

listening, appropriate simplifications, and widely apportioned speaking rights.

AccordingtoSchudson,insituationsweretalkisboundtobeuncomfortableitismore

likely that formal or informalrules of engagementappear; these are thesituations in

which fully democratic conversations take place (306). Besides, participants have to

showawillingnesstolistenseriouslytoa rangeof views,andwillingto giveonesown

ideas,arguesWiliamGalston(227).Thiswillingnessisinfluencedbythecontextofthe

conversation.

Interestingly, Schudsonsaysthatoftentwomodelsof conversationsaremixed,

whichleadstoconfusionaboutthecharacteristicsofdemocraticconversations.Thetwo

models are the sociable model of conversation and the problem-solving model of

conversation(299).Thefirsttypeofconversationsdonotcomposeanargument;itsees

the conversation as an end-in-itself, an aesthetic pleasure. The latter pictures

conversation as a model of good government (300). So simply saying something or

havingaconversation,likethefirstmodel,isnotenoughforademocraticconversation.

Social media researcher Ganaele Langlois agrees and says that more often then not,

raisingawarenessaboutanissuejuststagnatesatthe levelof never-endingdiscussion

(54).

Inorderforanykindofhumancommunicationtobemeaningful,ithastobenoticedby

others, and than lead to some kind of political action, or social change, or shift in

awareness.(Langlois54)

So, political change onsocial mediaappearswhena discussion leads toan organized

actionoroutcome.Inotherwords,themaindifferencebetweenaregularconversation

andademocraticconversationisthatthedemocraticconversationleadstoaconclusion.


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Thefocusisnotsomuchabouttheconversation;itistheresultthatcounts.Inorderfor

aconversationtoleadtoaresult,aconversationwithacleargoalorstatementhastobe

started,peopleneedtobewilingtolistenandtogivestructuredarguments,andbesides,

anumberofnormsandrulesapply.CantheseconversationsbefoundonTwitterand

FacebookwhenlookingatthedebateabouttheinaugurationofKingWillem-Alexander?

2.4.2 Incivility & Non-Political Conversations

Despite the potential and need for democratic and civil online conversations,a lot of

onlineconversationsarenotcivilorpoliticalatall(Papacharissi2002,2004;Anderson

etall2003).AshleyAndersonetallsaythattheInternetdoeshavethepotentialtofoster

discussions and deliberation among far-reaching audiences in space, however, such

discussions are not always rational: [They] can take an uncivil route, with offensive

commentsorrepliesimpendingthedemocraticidealofhealthy,heateddiscussion(2).

Papacharassi defines incivility as offensive discussions that impede the

democraticidealofdeliberation(267).Hesaysthesekindsofmessagesposeathreatto

democracyandthwartthedevelopmentofapublic (280).Inlinewiththis,Andersonet

allarguethatwhileincivilityontheInternetmayreproduceanddiverseviewpoints,the

heated, volatileexpressions canalso fall short of the democratic ideal of rationaland

reasoneddeliberation(4).

Besides, some discussions are not democratic conversation by nature because

they are focused on entertainment and social aspects. These conversations are also

listedonthissideoftheaxis,ascanbeseeninfigure3.AmericannewmediacriticJodi

Dean argues that on social media platforms users do not engage in political debates

because they are too busy with getting attention (Blog Theory 39). Users engage in

networksofaffect:theycreateaprofile,startaddingcontenttotheplatformandshare

thiswithfriends.Inaddition,friendscommentandreacttothecontentandcreatemore

information, which other friends can comment on, and so on. She argues we are

capturedinthisprocess:thecircuitsofdrive(BlogTheory).Thesubjectgetsstuckdoing

thesamethingoverandoveragainbecausethisdoingproducesenjoyment.Post.Post.

Post.Click.Click.Click(Dean,BlogTheory40).

Asaresult,shesaysweareinthecompetitionforattentiontoooftenhowdo

wegetourmessageacross?(Dean,TheLimits).Thiscanresultinashiftinfocusfrom

doing to appearing, or put differently, a shift moving away from larger questions of

building a political apparatus with duration toward thinking in terms of getting

attentioninthemediacycle(Dean, TheLimits).Inlinewiththis,GeertLovinksaysthat


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actingon socialmediasitesis amassive self-branding exercise (13). Someusersonly

engageinonlineconversationstogetattention.

Likewise, author Eli Pariser has a similar statement when he speaks of the

individualuniversesofinformationthatarecreatedforeachofusbypersonalizedfilters

(Pariser).He arguesthatasmoreandmorepeoplediscovernewsandcontentthrough

personalizedfeedslikeFacebook,thethingsthatreallymatterfalloutofthepicture.In

theDarwinianenvironmentof thehyper-relevantnewsfeed,contentaboutissues like

homelessnessorclimatechangecannotcompetewithgoofyviralvideos,celebritynews,

and kittens (Pariser). In other words, the public sphere falls out of view due to the

pursuit of attention, the big stream of entertainment online and time consuming

networksofaffect.

2.5 Overview

Althoughthecommentsstudiedinthisresearchareallconnectedtoapoliticalevent,a

lookintodifferenttheoriesmadeitclearthatthisdoesnotimplythatallcommentshave

a political nature and are used for democratic conversations. How comments are

interpreted depends on the culture and interpretive communities of the reader and

context of the platform, like a Facebook pages or Twitter hashtags. Moreover,

interpretive communities and shared knowledge allow for playful dealing with

comments:it allows forhumor and refraction to appear. Moreover,a message canbereceived in another way than intended, as explained by Stuart Hall. Last, an axis is

formed to explain the difference between civility and democratic conversations, and

incivility and non-political conversation. These theoretical approaches form the

reference frame of the study of Facebook and Twitter, as will become clear in next

chapter.


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3. Methods: How is the King Framed by SocialMedia?3.1.1 Twitter and Facebook in the Netherlands

Already weeksbeforeQueens-day, Facebook andTwitterwere packed withmessages

abouttheinauguration,thenewking,andtheabdicationofQueenBeatrix.Astudyof

TwitterandFacebookprovidesinterestinginsightsintheopinionofthepublicandthe

storythatistoldontheseplatforms.BothplatformsareusedalotintheNetherlands:at

thismomentabout3,3millionpeople(25%percentofthetotalpopulation)useTwitter

and7.9millionpeople(60%ofthetotalpopulation)useFacebook(Oosterveer).Halfof

allDutchTwitterusersvisittheplatformonadailybasisandfivemillionDutchvisit

Facebookonadailybasis(Oosterveer).Hence,itcanbesaidthattheinhabitantsofthe

NetherlandsuseTwitterandFacebookasanintegratedpartoftheirlifeandessential

wayofgatheringinformation.

FormanypeopleFacebookandTwittercomplementeachotherintheirnature.

In addition, many Dutch have a profile on both platforms:85% of the Dutch Twitter

usersalsohaveaprofileonFacebook(Oosterveer).Afterastudyofbothplatformsand

the relation between the sharing of BBC content, Nic Newman found that Twitter is

wherethenewsis,butthemajorityoftheaudienceisspendingitstimewithFacebook(14).Facebookuserstendtobeinterestedinmajornewsstoriesoreventthatarefunny

orunusual,incontrast,Twitteruserstendtobemoreseriousmindedandinterestedin

differentanglesonarunningnewsstory(Newman24).Thesetwodifferentangelsmake

itinteresting for the study to look atboth platforms.YouTube and LinkedInare also

usedoftenbytheDutch,e.g.0.4millionDutchpeopleuseLinkedInonadailybasis,and

0.9millionpeopleuseYouTubeonadailybasis(Oosterveer).However,forthepurpose

ofthisstudyitisnotconsideredasrelevanttotakethesetwoplatformsintoaccount.

TheprofessionalnetworkingelementofLinkedIndoesnotsuittheresearchandsince

videosdonotplayacentralroleinthisstudy,thestudyofvideoplatformYouTubeisnot

takenintoconsiderationforthisresearcheither.

3.1.2 Studying Facebook and Twitter

How can Twitter and Facebook be studied? On the online micro blogging platform

Twitter,usershavetheirownprofilesandcansharetheirstatus,links,photosorother

content,aslongasitfitsthemaximumsizeof140characters.Theseformsofexpression

onTwitterarecalledtweets.Byusinghashtags,userscanorganizeandtagthecontent,


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so discussion about specific topics can be found. Concentrating on retweets, i.e. the

sharingofatweet,allowsforanaccountoftheunfoldingofevents.Tweetsandretweets

are by default public to anyone to see. Private messages can be used for private

conversationsandarenotvisibleforothers.Inaddition,thisstudywilllookatpublicly

available tweets ina period ofeight weeksaround the day ofthe inauguration: from

March20thuntilMay14th2013.

Facebook has a more closed nature compared to Twitter. Depending on the

individual privacy settings, a profile can be accessible only by the user him/herself,

friends,friendsoffriends,oreveryoneontheweb.In2007NicoleEllisonsaidthatSNSs

like Facebook are primarily organized around people, not interests (13). They define

social networking sites as web-based services that allow individuals to construct a

public or semi-public profile within a bounded system, articulate a list of other userswithwhomtheyshareaconnection,andviewandtraversetheirlistofconnectionsand

thosemadebyotherswithinthesystem(3).However,thereseemstobeashiftfrom

theindividualprofiletosharedinterestsandbrandsonFacebook.Onthenetworking

site, groups, pages and the newsfeed are becoming increasingly popular and more

centralfeaturesofthetool(Ghimire).

Facebookcreatedpagestoallowbusinesses,organizationsandbrandsto share

theirstoriesandconnectwithpeople(PageBasics).Insteadonfocusingonpersons,

pagesarefocusedinterests,asFacebookexplainsontheirwebsite:

Pages look similar to personal timelines, but they offer unique tools for connecting

peopletoatopicyoucareabout,likeabusiness,brand,organizationorcelebrity.(Page

Basics)

Hence,thisstudydoesnotlookintoasampleofindividualuserprofilesbutatasample

ofrelevantpages.Withthisabiggeraudiencecanbestudiedthanbylookingatusers

alone,whichresultsinamorerepresentativestudy.

TheresearchconductedisbasedontheDigitalMethodsResearchInitiative.6The

broadertheoreticalgoalofdigitalmethods,asarguedbyfounderRichardRogers,isto

rethink the relationship between the Web and the ground (End of the Virtual 8). He

introduces the term online groundedness as an effort to conceptualize research that

followsthe medium,captures itsdynamics,andmakesgroundedclaimsaboutcultural

and social change. Rogers calls for a method that follows the medium to reorient

6Formoreinformationabouttheinitiativeseehttps://wiki.digitalmethods.net/Dmi/DmiAbout.


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Internetresearch toconsider the Internetas a source ofdata, method and technique

(EndoftheVirtual13).

So, bystudying Facebookand Twitter aneffort ismadeto make claims about

peoplesopinionontheinaugurationonApril30 th. Rogers researches social networks

from a post-democratic approach, which marks a shift from looking at demographics

withabio-politicallyperspectivetoaninfo-politicallyperspective;i.e.fromtraditional

demographys like race, age and income characteristics to characteristics like tastes,

interests, favorites, groups and installed apps (Post-demographic Machines 24). In

addition,thisresearchfocusesontaste,opinionandinterestsratherthanonpersonal

datalikeageororigin.

3.1.3 Coding Comments

GeertLovinksaysoncethedebateisraging,wedonotquiteknowhowtosummarize

thepeoples interpretation(59).So,for theunderstandingof thedifferentstoriestold

byusers onsocial mediaand toresearch a big dataset, a codingsystem isused. This

categorization consists of four positions based on Stuart Halls different readings as

mentioned in the previous chapter. The scheme is reframed from a grounded theory

orientedcontentanalysis,whichmeansthatthethreecategoriesarereframedaccording

tothe data itself and a fourth position isadded tomeetthefindings: the neutral and

informationalcategory.Duringtheempiricalstudyitbecameclearthattherearealotof

commentsconcerningnewsfacts,thefestiveor theweather.Thesekindsof comments

donotfitinadominant,oppositionalornegotiatedview;thereforethenewcategoryis

created.

Position Kindofcomments

Dominant-hegemonic PositiveabouttheDutchMonarchyortheroyalfamily

Negotiated Approaches the monarchy and/or one of the royals in a

playful,humoristicorcasualway

Oppositional Oppositional or critical against the monarchy or the royal

family

Neutral/Informational Noclearopinion,descriptive,eventbasedorfactual

Fig.4:Fourdifferenttypesofpositionsofusers.

ThedominantpositionconsistsofmessagesinfavoroftheDutchmonarchyorpositive

aboutthe royals.Incontrast,theoppositionalpositionisa collectionof negativeabout

themonarchy.Forexample,postsbyhetis2013areusuallyoppositional,sincetheyform

a republican stance and are generally negative about the monarchy. Figure 5 is an

exampleofanimageindisfavorofKingWillem-Alexander.Atranslationofthetextsays


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I do not want Willem; get rid of the orange scum and the image shows a figure

throwinganorangecrowninthetrashbin.Bothimageandtextareoppositionalofthe

Willem-Alexander.

Fig.5IkWillemNiet!

Nevertheless,itisnotalwaysclearwhatismeantwithatextorimage.Thenegotiated

viewisnotoppositionalorpositive;itissomewhereinbetween.Thetopicisaddressed

inaplayfulway,oftenwithhumorandconnectionstootherissues.As explainedinthe

secondchapter,sharedknowledgeorcommonsensetomakesenseandtomakeajoke.

To fit the research, the negotiated position includes several kinds of comments, see

figure6.

Negotiatedposition Kindofcomments

HumorousandPlayful Jokesaboutthemonarchyand/orroyals

Use the event for their

ownends

Themonarchyand/orroyalsareusedinadifferentwayfor

commercialcampaigns,advertisingand/orselfpromotion

Connecting to other

issue

The subject is connected to other (seemingly unrelated)

topics

Entertaining/Celebrity Looksattheglamoroussideoftheevent,theparty,thedress

ofMximaandthewaytheroyalslook

Fig.6.Negotiatedposition.

3.1.4 Research Overview

The study of online comments is divided into two parts. The first part consists of a

generalstudyofcontentabouttheinaugurationandKingWillem-AlexanderonTwitter

inthetimespanofeightweeks:fromMarch20 thuntilMay14th2013.Thesecondpartis

aFacebookstudythatlooksatthreedifferentpages.Togethertheyformageneralview

onsocial mediause inrelationto the inauguration events.In the next chapter a case

studyrelatedtothetopicisexploredtogiveinsightsinonespecifictopicintheonline

discussionabouttheinauguration:officialsongfortheking-i.e.HetKoningslied.For

thisatimespanoffourdaysisused:betweenApril19thandApril22nd2013.Again,both

FacebookandTwitterarestudied.Eachchapterendswithasummaryoffindings,which

willbefurtherelaboratedoninthediscussionchapter.


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3.2 Twitter Research

DuetothefluidandtemporalcharacterofTwitter,doingresearchaboutthecontenton

Twitterisnotaneasytask.Twitterdoesnotprovidefreeinsightsinitsdataset,anditis

almost impossible to lookat every tweet that was posted about theinaugurationand

King Willem-Alexander, since the related tweets have to be found and harvested

manually. This harvesting can be made easy with the use of keywords related to a

certainsubjector event;thisis calledtopicalnetworkanalysis. Accordingto Bernhard

Riederthisisthemostcommonmethodusedby humanistsand socialscientists,and a

topic sample is usually constructed by querying Twitters Search API for certain

keywordsorhashtags(TheRefractionChamber3).

TimHighfieldsaysthiskindofanalysisprovidesresearcherswiththecapability

tocomparepatternsandcitationsacrossdifferent eventsovertime(210).Thisis veryuseful whendealing with a large dataset like theonce created forthis research:over

500.000tweetswereharvestedintheperiodofMarch20 th2013May14th2013.By

identifying topical networks, Tim Highfield says that researchers are enabled to

determinewhy and when connections were made, and it gives great insights in the

contextforthediscussionofparticulartopics(205).Moreover,Highfieldarguestopical

networkanalysesaresuitableforstudyingonlinediscussionsincethemethodcanshow

differentinterpretationsofthesametext.

By focusing on temporary groups within a larger population of users or sites, topical

networksprovidetheopportunitytoevaluatehowpublicdebatetakesplaceonline,such

aswithintheblogosphereorsocialmedia.(Highfield214)

Inthepreviouschapteritwasarguedthatthecontextofthereaderplaysanimportant

role in the interpretation of a text, therefore, context of the discussion needs to be

studied.Thus,itcanbesaidthatatopicalnetworkmethodisasuitableresearchmethod

forthisresearch.Thefollowingkeywordsareused:

Dutchkeyword Englishtranslation

Abdicatie Abdication

Kroning Coronation

Troonswisseling TransferringoftheThrone

Koning King

Monarchie Monarchy

Koninginnedag Queens-day; nationalDutch holidayon April30 anddayofinauguration


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Koningsdag Kings-day,newnationalholidaystartingnextyear

Wimlex

Well-usedabbreviationofWillem-Alexander

Willem-Alexander NameofthenewKing

Inhuldiging Inauguration

Fig.7.Keywordsandtranslation.

These keywords are selected after a study of frequently used words about the

inaugurationonTwitterandtheDutchnewsbetween1017March2013.Alltermsare

inDutchbecausethisstudylooksatthenarrativeconstructedbyDutchusers.Hence,it

isassumedthatmostDutchuserswilltweetinDutchabouttheinaugurationsinceitisa

national Dutch event. More importantly, using only Dutch terms will significantly

narrowthedatasetdowntomorerelevanttweetsabouttheinauguration.Forexample,

usingthekeywordmonarchieinsteadofmonarchywillprevent(toacertaindegree)the

harvesting of tweets about e.g. the British monarchy. To give more insight in the

selectionofkeywords,thefollowingwordsarenotselected,althoughtheyholdastrong

relationtotheinauguration: oranje(orange;verygeneralword), Oranje-Nassau(Dutch

royals last name; not often mentioned on Twitter that way), prins (prince; often

mentioned in other contextsthan as title of Prince Willem-Alexander),troon (throne;

hastoomanyotherunrelatedappearancesonTwitterinthelongrun),and republiek(republic;notoftenusedinrelationtotheinaugurationevent).

3.2.1 Twitter Research Methods

this analysis will look at the dataset in different ways to find out what was said on

Twitter about the inauguration and King Willem-Alexander in the timespan of eight

weeks.TheTwitterAnalyticstooloftheDigitalMethodsInitiativeoftheUniversityof

AmsterdamisusedforthestudyofTwitter.SinceMarch20th2013adatasetiscreated

oftweetswiththedescribedkeywords.Thedatasetconsistof584.008tweetsbetween

March 20, 2013 and May 14, 2013 a period of eight weeks. On Queens-day alone

213.228tweetsarecollected.EventhoughtheinaugurationdaywasonApril30th,the

datacollectionstartedalreadyinMarch.Thisdecisionwasmadebecauseatthestartof

the research it was unclear what was about to happen. Fortunately, this resulted in

collectingtweetsaboutHetKoningslied,thesongfortheking,whichwastrendingtopic

betweenApril19thandApril22nd.Thenextchapterwillfocusonthiscasestudy.

Whenlookingatthedatasetofthefullperiod,seefigures43and44inappendix

2,it isclear that most tweets consideringthe topicare sent onQueens-day. This day


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213.228tweetsarecollected;ingreatcontrasttothesecondhighestpeakonApril26 th,

2013when17.193tweetsarecollected.Intheperiodofeightweeks,30.9percentofall

tweetscontainedlinksandtherewere267.772distinctusers.Onanaverage,eachuser

poster2.2postsabouttheinauguration.

The study of Twitter is divided into three parts. First, popular topics and

hashtagsare studied toget insight in the nature ofthe online discussion. The coding

schemeoffigure4isusedtofindwhichpositionisthebiggest.Second,toexplainthe

popularity of these hashtags and topics a content analysis of six important days is

performed.Last,participantsoftheonlinediscussionareexaminedtoseeifthereisa

bigvarietyinuserstakingpartofthediscussion.

3.2.2 Findings

Some problems were faced during the research and several factors influence the

accuracy of the dataset in a negative way. As Highfield argues, the keyword-oriented

methodofidentifyingtopicalnetworksdoesnotnecessarilylocateallrelevantmaterial

(214). It is perfectly possible that a rather large amount of tweets about the

inauguration is not taken into consideration for this research because they lack a

mentioningtothekeywords.However,Idonotthinkthisisproblematicforthefindings.

ForthisresearchIbelieveasmall,accuratedatasetwithonlyacertainDutchkeywords

ismoreusefulthanalargeinaccuratedatasetincludingirrelevanttweets.Moreover,thedatasetdoesnotnecessarilycoverarepresentativesampleofthegeneralopinion,orof

everyTwitteruser.Nevertheless,Twitterresearchmakesitpossibletoresearchavery

largedataset,inthiscaseover250.000distinctusers.

AnotherproblemwastheselectionofkeywordssixweeksbeforeQueens-day.At

thatmoment,#troondidnotlookasasuitablekeyword.OnTwitterthewordwasused

inmanytweetsunrelatedtotheinauguration.However,DutchnewsagencyNOSchoose

to use #troon as the officialhashtag and encouraged the audienceto use this during

broadcastings.#Troonwasusedalot:111.716timesonQueens-dayincontrasttofor

example #troonswisseling, which was used 6.395 times (Dit was Koninginnedag).

Nevertheless, I do not believe it is problematic for this research since the other

keywordsarecollectingabigdatasetanyway.Theyformarobustdatasetofrelevant

tweets.

2.2.3 Popular Hashtags and Topics

Inthetotaltimespanofeightweeks,themostpopularhashtagsareasfollowing:


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Fig.8TopTags.

Even though troon is not a keyword, it is the most popular hashtag. This can be

explainedbytheuseofthehashtagbyNOSnewsagency.Withthissimpletagpeople

couldgivetheiropinionabouttheinauguration,whichwasusedinthelivebroadcasting

show.Allothertophashtags,exceptfortroonandoranje,arekeywordsusedforthe

creation of the dataset, which explains there popularity. The second most popular

hashtagis Koninginnedag:theday oftheinauguration anda popularnationalholiday

intheNetherlands.Alllistedhashtagsrefertotheupcomingevents,andnorefractionis

visible.Inotherwords:thetophashtagsshowatendencytoneutral,eventbasedand

thefestiveonQueens-dayfocusedwords.

Inlinewiththis,troonandkoninginnedagarealsothemostpopulartagson

Queens-dayalone.Figure9showsamoredetailedviewofthehashtagsthatareused

this day. Itis a co-word graph made with the Co-Hashtag Analysistool ofthe Digital

MethodsResearchInitiative:

[It]producesanundirectedgraphbasedonco-wordanalysisofhashtags.Iftwohashtags

appearin the same tweet, they are linked.The more often they appear together, the

strongerthelink.(TwitterAnalytics)

Inthisgraph,onlythehashtagsthatappearatleast140timesduringthedayareshown

and keywords are left out toshow subtopics. Ascan beseen, hashtag #troon isused

mostoftenincombinationwithqday(Queens-day),Beatrix,Maxima,Willemalexander

andoranje.Notableisthefactthatmosthashtagsaredescriptive,referringtotheroyal

family and/or the events during the day. The only qualifying wordsin this graph are

05000

10000150002000025000300003500040000

45000

TopHashtags

NumberofTweets


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love,trots(proud)andparty.Allofthesewordsarepositive;therearenonegativeor

anti-monarchykeywordstobefound.Notableisthehighamountofnewsrelatedwords:

nieuws, news, PenW (TV-show Pauw en Witteman), and NOS. In other words, most

usersuseneutralanddescriptivehashtags.

Fig.9.Gephivisualizationofco-wordsintweetssendonQueens-day.

ThisfindingissupportedwhenlookingatanhourlyconstructionofretweetsonQueens-

day.ThisismadewiththeIdenticalTweetFrequencytool,whichprovidesarealtime

overviewofthemostpopulartweetsduringQueens-day.Themostsharedtweetsare

collected and put in chronological order per hour, thereby inversing the order of

Twitter,seeappendix3.Thecodingsystemoffourpositions(dominant,oppositional,

negotiating, event/news based) is applied and complemented with categories

containingcommercialandrefractiontweets,seefigure10.Twocategoriesareadded

sincenotalltweetscouldbelabeledwiththesefourcategories:commercial;tweetsthat

promoteacertainitemandarenotengaginginthedebate,andrefraction;othertopics

thatareseeminglyunrelatedtotheinaugurationtopic,e.g.sports.


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Fig.10.PiechartofkindsofretweetsonQueens-day

Again, it becomes clearthat tweets aboutthe news and from news platforms play an

importantpartinthecontentonTwitter.Thenegotiatedcategoryisthesecondlargest

groupoftweets.Onecouldlabelsixoutofeightoftheseashumorous,seeappendix3.

Moreover, there are no negative retweets about the monarchy or royals in this list,

althoughthereisoneretweetnegativeaboutthebehavioroftheDutchonthisparticular

day.

Inotherwords,whenlookingatpopularhashtagsandretweetsoftheperiodof

eightweeksandQueens-dayalone,itbecomesclearthatmosttweetsareinformational

andnewsbased.ManyofthemconcernthepartiesandeventsonQueens-dayandare

positive.Therearehardlyanypoliticaltweetsfound.

3.2.4 Content Analysis

Howdidthishappen?WhatexactlydiduserstalkaboutonTwitter?TheIdenticalTweet

Frequency tool of the Digital Methods Research Initiative is used to identify six days

withthemosttweets,seefigures46-51inappendix4.Asmallincreaseoftweetsinthe

runuptotheeventisvisibleandthesixpopulardaysare:March26,April5,April17,

April19,April26andQueens-dayonApril30.

Tofindoutwhatcausedtheseincreasesintweets,popularcontentisanalyzed

withtheIdenticalTweetFrequencytoolthatlistsidenticaltweetsas retweets.Next,for

eachdayallretweetsarecollectedandtransformedintoaword-cloudwithWordl,see

appendix4.Themostusedwordsaredisplayedasthebiggestwordsandkeywordsare

removed from the cloud (abdicatie, Kroning, Troonswisseling, Koning, Monarchie,Koninginnedag,koningsdag,wimlex,willem-alexander, inhuldiging) because they are in

Positive

8% Negative

0%

Event/News

42%Negotiated

33%

refraction

13%

commercial

4%


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there anyway. Henceforth, from the six word-clouds the most popular words are

extracted,seefigure51inappendix4.

Notable is the popularity of the words liefde (love), discotheek (club), sukkel

(loser).Thishasmostcertaintytodo withapopularsongcalledSukkelvoordeliefde,

koningindediscotheekbytheOpposites.Sincekoning isoneofthekeywordsforthe

researchbutalsopartofthetitle,manytweetswereunintendedcollectedthathaveno

relationwiththeinauguration,butonlywiththesong.Hence,thesewordsareleftoutin

thefindings.

Remarkablyisthewordonze(our)thatappearsinalmostallword-clouds(five

outofsix).Thesignificantuseof ourcanbeseenas awayofexpressingthefeelingof

connectedness.Whenlookingintothedatasettodiscoverwhenourisused,itappears

thatitisoftenareferraltotheking:

IkbenopzoeknaarmannendieWillemAlexanderhetennetalsonzeaanstaandekoning.

Wiekentern?RT=dank!7

WillemIVstaatnaastBertha38indewei'bestequotetotnutoevanonzekoning.8

In addition, every time our appears in the dataset of retweets of the six days, the

associated word is labeled with use of four categories: royals (Beatrix, Willem-

Alexander, Mxima), Dutch monarchy, Queens-day and other which consists of

associationsunrelatedtothefirstthreecategories.Ascanbe seeninthefigure11, the

firstcategoryisthebiggest.

7Translation:IamlookingformenwiththenameWillemAlexanderjustlikeourforthcomingking.Who

knowssomeone?RT=thanks !2013-03-2610h,8,RT@marionvanes:IkbenopzoeknaarmannendieWillem

Alexanderhetennetalsonzeaanstaandekoning.Wiekentern?RT=dank!

82013-04-1719h,4,RT@lammert:'WillemIVstaatnaastBertha38indewei'bestequotetotnutoevan

onzekoning.


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Fig.11.Whatdoesonzerefertointheretweetsample?

Thefrequentuseofourinrelationtothekingcanbeinterpretedasawayofshowing

acceptanceandconnectedness.Itmayimplythatthepeoplehavealreadyacceptedhim

asking,eventhoughheisnotinauguratedyet.Heisnottheking,butourkingaccording

totheDutch.

Moreover,inthethirdcolumnoffigure52isrelatedeventsandnewsitemsare

summed to explore the suggested correlation between tweets and news. This

informationisconductedafteramanualstudyoftheDutchnewsonthatparticularday.

A correlation is indeed found when comparing the popular words of the retweets to

relatedevents.Wordslike vandaag,aprilanduurpointtothedescriptiveandreal-time

functionofTwitter. There arealsoa lotof referralsto mainstream media,newspapers

andjournalist:MaxWesterman,PauwenWitteman,deVolkskrant,andWimDaniels,and

linkstonewssiteslikeNu.nlandvolkskrant.nl.So,manyuserswriteaboutthenewsand

refertoothermediawhentalkingabouttheinaugurationandDutchmonarchy.

3.2.5 Popular Resources

ThisleadstothequestionwhatistheroleofnewsmediainthediscussiononTwitter?

Forthis,theURLFrequencytoolbytheDMRIisused,whichcomposesalistofalllinks

mentionedonTwitterat leastone hundredtimes.Next,theLinkRippertoolisusedto

capturealloutgoinglinksfromthislist.Avisualizationismadefromthisdataset,see

figure12,whichclearlyshowsthelinksthataresharedthemostonTwitter:fifteenlinks

arehighlighted.Thereddotsarelinksthathavereceivedthemostreferences.Thesmall

orangedotsarelinksthatarelesspopular.Thenodesindicatereferringofonewebsitetoanother.

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

26

March

5April 17April 19April 26April

Whatdoes'onze'refertointhe

retweetssample?

other/unrelated

Queens-day

Monarchy

King/RoyalCouple


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Fig.12.Gephivisualizationofmostpopularlinks.

Itappearsthatthereisanetworkoflooselyconnectedclusters.Mostofthesepopular

links have its own network; each red dot is surrounded by a group of orange dots.

Sometimestworeddotsappearinthesamecluster,adetailedlook showsthatbothof

thesewebsitehavethesamedomainname.Whenlookingatthedomainnameofthetop

fifteen popular resources, every single one is originating from a news site. Some are

foreign, like the British Guardian or Detik News fromIndonesia. Hence, the clustered

networkcanbeexplainedbythedifferentnationalitiesofthenewssites.Inotherwords,

thereisastrongconnectionbetweenthenewsandcontentonTwitter.Moreover,not

onlynationalnewssitesappear,thetopicisalsomentionedonpopularforeignnews

sites.

3.2.6 Who were taking part in the online discussions on Twitter?

Last,key-playersonTwitterarefoundbyusingtheDMRISocialGraphtoolbymentions.

Thistoolgivesinsightinthekindofusersthataretakingpartinonlinediscussion:

[The tool] produces a directed graph based on interactions between users. If a user

mentions another one, a directed link is created. The more often a user mentions

another,thestrongerthelink.The"count"valuecontainsthenumberoftweetsforeach

user inthe specifiedperiod. Use: analyze patterns in communication, find "hubs" and

"communities",categorizeuseraccounts. (Twitter Analytics)


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Unfortunately, having over 260.000 distinct users in the timeframe of eight weeks, it

was impossible for the visualization program Gephito deal with all the data atonce.

ThereforethetimeframeisadjustedandrangesfromApril17 thtoApril30th,2013.Only

userswiththirtyormorementionsaredisplayedinthegraphtomakethevisualization

clearer,seefigure13.Thesizeofthenodesdependsonthedegreerange,whichmeans

both the mentions a user receives and sends are taken into account. The bigger the

node,themorementionsauserreceivedandsent.

Thereare267distinctcommunitiesidentifiedinthenetworkofTwitterusers.A

communityis a groupof Twitterusers that uses the same hashtagsand/or mentions

eachother many times. Inother words, therewere a lot ofconversationsgoing onin

individualcommunities.Infigure15eachofthetoptencommunitiesareidentifiedwith

adifferentcolorandtheorangecommunityisthecommunitywiththe mostmentions.Thetopthreemostmentionedusersarepartofthiscommunity.

Fig.13.Social-graphGephivisualizationofkeyusersbetweenApril17April30,2013.

Acloselookatthesocialgraphofthetopmentioneduserscanbefoundinappendix5.

Notableisthebigamountofnewsagencies:fiveoutof twentyofthemostactiveusers

arenewsagencies.Moreover,threeoutofeightuserslistedhavetheirrepublicanview

intheiraboutsection,theyareclearlyanti-monarchy.Oftheotherfiveusersitisnot

cleariftheyareanti-orpro-monarchy.Twooutoftwentyarefake,humoristicaccounts.

Interestingly, the republican users are in the same networks as the official

tweetsaboutthemonarchy,somenewssitesandthefakeaccountsoftheroyals.There


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are a couple of Twitter users that identified themselves with a republican stance or

humorous aboutthe monarchy pointof view, however, no explicitusers account pro

monarchyarefound.Inotherwords,alsowhenlookingatkeyplayersitbecomesclear

thatnewsagencieshaveanimportantrole.Moreover,republicanusersarepartofthe

topuserslikesomehumorousaccounts,althoughrepublicancontent isnotpartof the

popularcontentoftweets.Assuminglytheserepublicanusersareonlyactiveinacertain

community.

3.3 Facebook Research

Duetotheclosednature,thestudyofFacebookisnotaneasytask.Facebookisdivided

intodifferentpages,groupsandprofileanda lotofconversations about themonarchy

and royals probably take place on private and hidden places. Hence, not a topicalresearchisconductedlikein theTwitterresearch,buta sample ofrelevantand public

pages is selected. The Facebook research consists of two parts. First, the biggest

Facebook page concerning the inauguration is researched; secondly this page is

comparedtoananti-monarchypageandapro-monarchypage.Thekindofpagesand

thelevelofparticipationarestudied,whichgivesinsightsintheinterpretivecommunity

ofacertainpage.Doeseachpagereassembleacertaininterpretivecommunity,when

basedaroundadominant,oppositionalornegotiatingpage?

3.3.1 Method and Sample

ThemostpopularpageisZonderBaardGeenKoning(withoutabeardnoking),which

had around 90.000during the period of research. This was the result of a search on

Facebook to all pagesabout Willem-Alexander, themonarchy, and related events, see

appendix9.Allotherpagesfound,exceptforpagesconcerningHetKoningsliedthatwill

be examined in the next

framing the new king on social media (master thesis media studies)

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