SocialTV Goes to Washington – Analysis of the 2012 State of the Union

January 25, 2012

This week on “#SocialTV goes to Washington” we’re finally seeing some reprieve from the nearly non-stop Republican debates and caucuses with some TV action from the Dems and Obama with this year’s State of the Union. They went big this year on social integrations with not only an official hashtag (#SOTU), but with some additional live tweeting from the official White House account, conversation-starter hashtags like (#40Dollars) and some more generic predefined “theme hashtags” (e.g. #education, #energy, etc.). While there weren’t any world records broken for the number of tweets-per-second, this ability to share and participate in a real-time global discussion is an amazing feat considering that our education system is still teaching kids the impact of broadcast media via the first televised debate between JFK and Nixon.

The ability to participate in events like these creates situations that allow viewers to project their natural behaviors into the social space. Behaviors such as negatively analyzing the appearance and actions of the individuals that appear (like when tweeters called Speaker of the House, John Boehner a member of the Jersey Shore because of his orange-looking tan), or admitting to being positively affected by emotional performances (like when Obama hugged Gabby Gilford), and debating the validity of the announced accomplishments (like pulling the troops out of Iraq). The concentrated format in which these conversations stem from (basically an hour long speech) also influences the ways in which these behaviors are expressed in social because each topic only lasts marginally longer than they are being talked about on screen as viewers attempt to keep up in real-time with the speech. Thus the top topics discovered tend to be ones that viewers had the highest emotional attachment to, or the longest on-screen exposure.

Overall Obama’s performance was well received by viewers [+28% positive and -10% negative sentiment], but for those interested in what our real-time analytical tools and top discovery engine identified as the top themes of this year’s State of the Union collected from conversations all across social (blogs, forums, Twitter, etc.) then make sure to check out the following chart and detailed data below:

• 2.7% – John Boehner (All the conversation related to Boehner was very negative [-25%], it ranged from discussing how bored he looked to how he appeared to have gotten a fake tan and subsequently belonged on Jersey Shore)
• 2.1% – Osama Bin Laden (While some people were hoping that Obama had more accomplishments in 2011 to talk about, they still felt very proud that Osama had been dealt with)
• 2.1% – Steve jobs (After Obama acknowledged Steve Jobs for his innovation the conversation moved around between how much people agreed with that sentiment to how attractive looking Steve Jobs’s widow was [+14% sentiment]. Others though felt like Obama was just name dropping [-6% sentiment].)
• 1.9% – Iraq (This topic was a very sore point with viewers, because while many were happy that there were no more troops in Iraq [+16%], others were still unhappy about the war and felt like we should have maintained a presence there [-11%])
• 1.3% – General Motors (The sentiment around this topic was very mixed [+11%, -9%], and this was mostly because many felt like it was a giant advertisement for GM)
• 1.1% – Hillary Clinton (The majority of viewers felt positively towards Clinton’s appearance and role, but a few did comment towards her appearance being a little haggard-looking [+11%, -5%])
• .86% – Eric Cantor (Similar to Boehner, conversation related to Cantor was about unhappy he looked to be listening to Obama [-14%], Mitch McConnell was another person that viewers felt negatively towards for similar reasons [-7%])
• .85% – Gabby Gilford (Sentiment  around Gilford and Obama giving her a hug was very positive [+22%], and a number of viewers noted how it made them tear up a little)
• .64% – “Spilled Milk” Joke (The majority of viewers considered this joke to be a success [+31%, -7%])

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