For months now, this has been a conversation on Twitter: the theory that the @KensingtonRoyal Instagram account was quietly buying bot-followers in small amounts very gradually so that the account would always be the “most followed” royal IG account. It became a thing almost as soon as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex started their @SussexRoyal IG in 2019, and Meghan quickly showed the world how adept she was at that Instagram-inspo/impactful social media life. She was producing unique (and often exclusive) content for the SussexRoyal IG, and the account quickly amassed millions of followers. But no matter how good the Sussex content, the KensingtonRoyal account still managed to stay *just* ahead in follower numbers. Just a random social media happenstance or something more nefarious??
Well, Caity Weaver at the New York Times did a lengthy investigation and it is, in a word, hilarious. She literally interviewed dozens of social media experts and professional social media trackers, all to figure out the likelihood of Kensington Palace quietly buying bot-followers to boost their follower numbers to be just above the Sussexes. The piece is really long and detailed, and if you already have a NYT subscription, you should definitely just read the piece here. First, she gets into the history of how the Sussexes started their IG account and how their content was far superior to the Cambridges’ content even in the beginning (the Sussexes began their IG on April 2nd, 2019).
Though Meghan was by no means a global star before her marriage, she had maintained an active and successful personal Instagram account, its profile buoyed by her regular role on a moderately popular American cable legal drama. That account boasted around 2 million followers before its deletion following her engagement (not far from the approximately 2.27 million followers @KensingtonRoyal had when the engagement was announced). Some data:
From its very first post, Harry and Meghan’s new Sussex account was distinct from @KensingtonRoyal — and seemed unmistakably the work of an Instagram veteran. It established a signature color palette (royal blue) and typography (a hybrid of caps-locked roman and lowercase italics). These kinds of personalized elements were absent from @KensingtonRoyal.
According to data provided by CrowdTangle, a social media analytics tool that, like Instagram, is owned by Facebook, nine of the 10 most-liked posts ever shared by either @KensingtonRoyal or @SussexRoyal showcase some combination of Harry and Meghan (and/or their son). The single outlier is an image of William and Kate’s two eldest children taken on Princess Charlotte’s first day of school in 2019. (It came in eighth.)
Data generated by the media monitoring software Cision, which tracks online media mentions, found that, from the date of the announcement of Harry and Meghan’s engagement in November 2017 to January 2020, Harry and Meghan received vastly more global online attention than did William and Kate. (Recall, too: They crushed them in Google searches.)
(William and/or Kate did receive more online attention than Harry and/or Meghan on a handful of dates, such as: the day Kate wore a green gown to the BAFTA awards ceremony, out of step with the event’s unofficial all-black dress code to express solidarity with victims of sexual misconduct; the period immediately before and after the birth of William and Kate’s third child; and their daughter’s first day of school.)
Thus it is perhaps not surprising that, from the date of the @SussexRoyal debut until Harry and Meghan’s bombshell announcement this past January, @SussexRoyal’s Meghan-and-Harry-centric posts received more total likes than @KensingtonRoyal posts centered on Kate and William. According to CrowdTangle data, the Sussexes came out around 13.5 million likes ahead. Of course, on Instagram, likes are only one measure of engagement. Another is comments. Harry and Meghan won that by an even bigger margin: In the same time frame, their account received more than double the number of comments that @KensingtonRoyal did, despite @KensingtonRoyal laying claim, perpetually, to hundreds of thousands more followers.
Weaver then discusses the “interaction rate” and suggests that the Sussexes have always had the higher interaction rate with their followers, comment numbers and “likes,” nearly double that of Kensington Royal. It took about six weeks for SussexRoyal IF to get 8 million followers. It took KensingtonRoyal more than four years to get to that number. It was the creation of the SussexRoyal IG that seemed to create quite a stir in the KensingtonRoyal IG followers:
Before Harry and Meghan’s account existed, @KensingtonRoyal might gain something like 1,000 followers on an average good (but not astronomically good) day. But between Jan. 1 and March 31 of last year, its following shrank by nearly 10,000 accounts. The creation of @SussexRoyal seemed to reinvigorate it — and then some. On May 12, the day @SussexRoyal posted a photo of Meghan’s hands holding newborn Archie’s cute tiny baby feet, the account of Archie’s aunt and uncle, @KensingtonRoyal, gained more than 42,000 followers. This despite the fact @KensingtonRoyal had posted no content, as well as the fact that the Sussex post was in honor of a holiday few in Britain were observing: U.S. Mother’s Day.
Then comes the analysis of just how KensingtonRoyal could be purchasing bot followers, and how it’s unlikely that they are buying them en masse, by the tens of thousands, for bulk follower numbers on a daily or weekly basis. It’s far more likely they are getting some kind of service which gives them bot followers a thousand one week, 900 the next week, and so on. One social media expert spoke about how public figures and politicians are doing this to manipulate public opinion, and, regarding mass-bot purchase, “most people leveraging fake followers these days — especially at the behest of well-resourced groups or individuals — are being very careful to avoid suspicion, detection and deletion.”
TL; DR version: The Cambridges are petty clout-chasers spending Charles’ money to buy Instagram followers so they’ll still look special and important even though Harry and Meghan are clearly more popular and interesting.
9 of the combined 10 most popular posts ever shared by Will & Kate's Insta or Harry & Meghan's Insta are about Harry and Meghan. Yet, no matter how many followers Harry & Meghan got, for nearly a year, they could never quiiiite seem to reach Will and Kate https://t.co/8kFkSbPExF pic.twitter.com/Ud3Pfca9ic
— Caity Weaver (@caityweaver) February 27, 2020
Photos courtesy of WENN, Avalon Red, Backgrid and NYT Instagram.
This is so funny and sad at the same time!
The same can be said for that brilliant image of W+K up on plastic stools!
Those stools are so petty and so perfect.
Imagine paying for Instagram bots while one of your patronages closes for lack of funds. Yikes.
Also I wonder if the push to ban them from using Sussex royal was in the hopes they would have to start a new insta?
@HowyaLawya – why couldn’t she have killed two birds with one stone and fundraised for the Arts Room on Insta? Too much lateral thinking for her, perhaps?
-Always like reading your posts: both humorous and on the nose
Hoyalawa, maybe this is one of the things the Cambridge’s foundation is spending their money on. The money that Meghan was bringing in. I bet they also use their foundation money to pay Bad Dad for trashing Meghan. How petty and gross. To possibly be spending the money that Meghan and Harry bring to the foundation on things that will hurt Meghan and harry. Maybe it’s The Thing (or one of the Things) that the RF is so desperate to keep under wraps.
Would you like some toast with that Jelly, Bill and Cathy???
It is beyond petty, pathetic, and sad, all at the same time. As well as stupid: did they *really* think NO ONE would EVER put the pieces together??
I’m sure they’ll deny all knowledge and throw Poor Jason under the bus, and he’ll throw some minion of his under the next bus coming.
If Harry & Meghan were forced to shut down SussexRoyal (not just change the handle), it wouldn’t matter. They could start up a new IG account at 10:30am today, and by 3pm they’d have their 8m followers back.
@Amy Too: I believe there was some controversy over the Hub Kitchen cookbook money being “reallocated” to the Foundation by Wm and that it was one of the more divisive issues that eventually brought the relationship between Wm and Harry to an end.
Hmmm….these rumours have been around for some time. Please note how the Fail has declined to give any prominence to this very very curious story. Imagine if the Sussexes had been suspected of such underhand going ons? It would have been splashed as a big headline to incite derision and ridicule. The NYT is a respected institution and so this is a credible story. But what should happen next??
I have just checked the Fail did run this story in a very twisted way, stating that Harry and Meghan win on likes but don’t mention anything about the Cambridges buying votes. Of course the trolls made comments saying that Meghan had been buying votes. I also recall that the Cambridges refused to have their account audited?
Funny that today (Sunday), there is an “allowed” gap of about 200,000 likes (in the Sussexes favor) on their St. Davids Day Insta messages. Wonder why it’s not being manipulated today… I wonder… hmmmm… could it be because they were exposed for BUYING likes??? Hmm… a mystery to be sure… lol
Many of us are saying this for months that most of cambridge followers are Russian bots . Also her fans are pathetic , they even have 1 million followers for Kate middleton fan account to compete with Meghan markle fan account. Their fans and them are pathetic and their are wasting their money on this instead of any meaning work. Even you look at any Kate or William engagement get less likes and Sussex general post. Also when you look deep in their following ita very obvious with account has no photo or follower which is basic bots 101.
Not so much Russian, but from a Commonwealth country with low paid English language speakers, like India.
These bots have flooded blind gossip.
Check out the profiles of those “followers” clearly bots.
Yes, the comments are very vacuous and robotic like compliments.
One of the telling parts not mentioned in the article (which someone much cleverer than me spotted and pointed out) is that the Kensington Royal Twitter account has barely grown in followers, despite their Instagram gaining millions.
This is a great point. It’ll be interesting to see what happens if H&M ever launch a twitter account.
Brilliant observation. And how sneaky to buy fans. I tell you, the Cambridges can’t stand that they are not as popular hence the smear campaign.
That was a great point I saw on twitter about KP’s twitter account. That makes the IG situation even more obvious IMO.
Also telling is that the KensingtonPalace IG account can’t be audited like SussexRoyal IG can due to how it is set up. 🤔🤔
That was also one of the real tells for me too, bonobochick. The Sussexes’ set up a ‘creator’ account which allows a certain degree of stats to be extrapolated, whereas the Cambridge’s account is set up as a ‘personal’ account which allows no access or oversight —- not even by them. According to NYT story this is almost unheard of because no one running the account even can pull stats or monitor for bots, etc. Does any celebitchy techie know if they had to have made that choice from the moment KP began account or —— could it have been set up as a creator account and switched to a personal account around time Sussexes set up a separate account? That would certainly be a huge ‘tell’ in my mind. I just love that this is a well-researched think piece with sourced input by a respected and credible news outlet. The writer was very careful to not state the possible ‘bot buying’ was happening or that someone in Cambridge camp is doing it —- but that picture with the stools is worth a thousand words. Just how small minded and petty would you have to be to do this? You’d think the future future from House Keen could find better use for his time and Duchy money. I mean — he could be devoting all that to one of his many causes, e.g., anti-bullying or mental health!
Well said!!
This is the content we need! Yasss NYT
Really not sure how I feel about the NYT doing an in depth investigation into RF sibling rivalry in an era that needs hard hitting investigative journalism on real matters very badly.
There is plenty of room for different kinds of content and analysis.
This is being played out on the stage of racist, xenophobic Brexit driven by Bannon and Putin. Some analysis shows 20% of negative bot activity about Meghan is out of Russia.
This is so much more than just sibling rivalry.
BettyRose, I get what you are saying, but I disagree. It’s bigger than that. Meghan is an African American woman who married into the British Royal Family. It adds to the racist narrative in the U.S. and in Britain. These gaslighting things happen to people of color all the time in varying contexts and degrees. This is the rich-people royal version. No one here has been murdered, but racism has maimed and murdered and ruined the lives of many people.
Bettyrose, the thing is there is interest. It is The Royal Family. It just confirms the petty jealousy of William.
You can also extrapolate this knowledge to the wide world. Brexit?? Apparently world political decisions are being influenced in unethical and immoral ways. Elections?? It confirms how urgent it is to have excellent news sources for your information.
Bettyrose, the thing is there is interest. It is The Royal Family. It just confirms the petty jealousy of William.
You can also extrapolate this knowledge to the wide world. Brexit?? Apparently world political decisions are being influenced in unethical and immoral ways. Elections?? It confirms how urgent it is to have excellent news sources for your information.
Sorry everyone, it seems I posted the same comment twice and I can’t erase it. Sad face.
I agree. It’s exhausting. The article is exhausting. And if you read through the comments in that NY Times article, people seem to be over it.
Those are all good points. Yeah, I’ve commented myself that Sussexit is weirdly analogous of Brexit and other forms of xenophobia unfolding globally. In the name of holding the NYT to a higher standard, I don’t think public interest alone can be the benchmark, but I’m persuaded this has societal relevance. Thanks CBs!
Bettyrose, to add in? Putin likely hates Harry and his popularity. His high-profile military service in Afghanistan was against Russia’s pro-Taliban interests. Not only is there a Western-facing Afghan team at Invictus? There’s also a Ukrainian team, highlighting Russia’s illegal invasion of another sovereign nation.
Harry marrying a bi-racial foreigner was a wet dream for Putin, an easy way for him to manipulate racists in the UK against someone he wants taken down.
Social media manipulation is happening everywhere so it’s a timely story in that regard. It also shows the pettiness and insecurity of the future future heirs that they are even bothering to do this.
It’s right in Caity Weaver’s wheelhouse though as she writes celebrity based stories. So it’s not like political journalists, etc are being diverted. (And they are indeed at the vanguard of covering some really vital stories in a way cable news doesn’t come close). And she’s a humorist as well which contributes to the overall snark and shade.
And the fact that this story is in a publication like the NYT and not some rag also has to burn.
Besides, this story practically could’ve been done in a day given how obvious it is. It’s kind of hilarious (in an ‘omg that sos pathetic’ Kind of way) reading through the whole article.
Bots are a REAL part of how 2016 was “won” (read stolen) in the US and will be a big part of what happens this fall in 2020. Zuckerberg knows this and why he has avoided telling the truth in multiple trips to the Hill. He is also allowing knowingly false political ads on FB.
So yeah, paying for bots? That is part of the national picture of how social media popularity is staged (and IMO how the K-family is still milking their pseudo-fame).
The royals are just the angle to hook people, at its heart this is a well researched piece about social media analytics and data manipulation when our society is ever increasingly powered by the value of people’s online data. People have launched careers off of Instagram engagement metrics, and people with social media clout have tremendous power to shape our culture’s discourse on any number of issues. Data is the currency that’s fueling modern capitalism, it’s literally what makes companies like google and Facebook so powerful (especially in the largely unregulated world of hybrid tech/media behemoths). So yeah, any way of getting people to think about these issues is important even if uses the seemingly trivial antics of a royal rivalry to make them digestible.
@BettyRose, Let’s not be dramatic. The NYT still have wedding announcements, writes restaurant reviews, and crossword puzzles as well. It’s not like the people covering Corona Virus and the primaries are putting that on hold to cover the British Royal family. It’s a fairly large newspaper that employs lots of staff and freelance writers, LOL. But seriously, why are the royals engaging in something so shady and manipulative, just to get followers Instagram? That’s just incredibly shallow and insecure. The whole British media slant toward Meghan reeks of dystopian propaganda, it’s like something more akin to how people are discredited in totalitarian societies, not a so-called democracy with a so-called free and unbiased ( ha!) press.
I think Betty Rose that there is a parallel story here that is even more important than what this may or may not reveal about the Cambridges. And that would be the story of how very easy it is for anyone, from anywhere to manipulate social media. The writer touches on this when she mentions Trump in the article. Looking at stats and quotes from researchers, she shows how perception can be altered. One of the ongoing issues in the US is still the question of just how far Russia (or another country) involved itself in our last presidential election The author brings up excellent information of how many of the social media platforms have now shut down any ability for outside monitoring of this manipulation by making it impossible to drill down for stats. Personally, I found this well researched article confirmed my personal worry that a small number of very powerful, extremely wealthy persons or groups can manipulate and (obviously) do manipulate the rest of us to think a certain way. I thought the story definitely was appropriate for space in the NYT.
One word: PATHETIC!
I’ll just take a bow and say I told you so.
Thanks for the last paragraph, Kaiser!
I absolutely believe they’re buying bots cause that follow to like ratio makes no sense to me.
Do you think Cain & Unable Keen may be buying bots to post negative comments in the comment sections of the Daily Fail?
Does anyone know how much a bot costs? Inquiring Minds Want to Know!!!
I think that’s more likely to be coming from the Daily Fail themselves.
Afternoon, Bay… I’ve read somewhere that the Wail actually has a pool of commentators hired specifically to change or warp the narrative below the line. There may, of course, also be Russian trolls on the case (after all, now Vlad is Supreme Ruler For Ever and Ever and doesn’t have any wars to interest himself with at present, he can pay more attention to his favourite meddling-in-other-countries’-business hobby). It certainly is strange – beyond the Meghan hating misogynoir baiters and other failed humans who pile in on every ‘story’ – that the top comments come invariably from a handful of usernames and identities. I’m just surprised that they haven’t cottoned on to inflating FFKween’s numbers to exaggerate her popularity
I thought this was researched and put out about a year ago that analysis was able to narrow the overwhelmingly insane number of negative comments output on the DM to about 20 IP addresses. I remember reading the article.
10-15 pounds for a basket (of 1,000 bots). Troll farms are more expnsive, but a professional troll gets paid very little for every post so every sockpuppet account makes hunderds of posts a day on many platforms (thus the Daily Fail batch of only 20 profiles dominating the commentariat), and some AI are already developed enough to replace them. Some are already commenting here on Celebitchy.
The best tell that some posters are paid PR tolls is when they never get erased, regardless of offensive contente or how many times they get reported. Social media platforms know those unorganic and coordinated profiles are “untouchable” and just let them be.
Thanks for the detailed response Anon, as your comment makes the way this is done so much clearer.
Anon: thank you very much to answer my eternal doubt. I’ve noticed that on DM, Express and others, there are some comments bordering the crime and they are never erased or denounced. There were some I saw I wouldn’t reproduce here even if I was paid to.
The same when Archie was born. On DM and Express the comments were surreal, bordering the psychopathy. This time to, I saw some impossible to reproduce. And nothing happened.
The Fail just bans people who point out the truth about the despicable way they treat the Sussexes, so they are then just left with right wing Brexit loving racists. So many people who used to stick up for the Sussexes and point out the lies and fake stories are no longer seen in the comments, they have either been banned or withdrew in disgust.
They are SO lame.
I just had a look at KP Instagram and a lot of their followers are empty accounts so I can believe this.
You can’t go by that though. I have an Insta Acct. set up to follow my nephews’ sports events, and some celebs, but I don’t post myself (no interest in doing so). So my account would be considered “empty”, and yet, I’m not a bot. Now…my Twitter account… lol. that’s a whole ‘nother kettle of fish (almost all politics!)
I wish Meghan would restart The Tig. I really enjoyed that site.
I’m the same. I have never posted anything on my Insta account because I don’t have any interesting pics t share, but I follow a lot of folks and I’m obviously not a bot.
I’m more of a Twitter gal.
another empty account here! I signed up for instagram just to enter a contest last year. now I use it to follow accounts — I’m not interested in posting stuff myself.
Same here – opened an account to follow Health & Fitness professionals but have zero posts myself. I use it as a tool not a place to post photos.
You guys don’t count. Yes you have an account with no posts, but then you don’t go commenting on other pages either, as you say, it’s just to view. What the poster Above is referring to is those with zero to very few posts who are actively spewing negative stuff on the page.
@Anna I agree actually. Most empty accounts are fake. You can usually tell by the profile photos which are stolen from someone else’s social media as they like to pick attractive people in “thirsty” poses. Sorry, I have an IG account and see this all the time.
The Cambridge stans, always are going to justify whatever they do, empty accounts? Ohh my account is empty because….ohhh mine too! Also, so many new names talking against the Sussexes, seems like the DM commenters are landing on this site!
Actually, I recognize two of the four of those names as long term posters here- one of them back to 2009 or so. This is the point some of us are trying to make about accusations- please be careful/diplomatic when it’s this vague. I know it can be irritating to post something and have people jump up to contradict you, but some people are just sticklers for accuracy and not trolls.
I do agree that sockpuppets are trying to infiltrate here.
House Cambridge are petty people with no emotional insight at all, do they not realize the good they could do in the world? Short sighted fools.
They are totally buying bots. Its just not a coincidence that they always stay JUST ahead of sussexroyal for followers, even when there are significant events that should have increased H&M’s followers to beat KP, even if temporarily – the birth of Archie, for example.
Also, back to the struggle survey – they have 11 million followers on IG but only 200k people took the survey? That means that less than a quarter of their IG followers took the survey….I know that a lot of the followers aren’t going to follow every link (my mom for example follows them and I know she wouldn’t have taken that survey), but less than a quarter? to me that says a LOT about the interaction rate and who is actually following them on IG.
I overall enjoyed the shade in the article – she definitely made it clear that the KP Instagram is pretty boring compared to the Sussexes, lol.
and the bit about the top 10 IG images on either KensingtonRoyal OR SussexRoyal almost all being about Harry and Meghan? that includes Prince Louis being born, his first birthday, Christmas pics, etc. That one pic of George and Charlotte cracked the top 10, but barely. That right there tells you why the Cambridges were so ticked when the Sussexes started their own IG.
Absolutely.
Not to get really picky, but it helps your point. 200k survey takers (assuming they’re excluding the people who took it multiple times from that total) is less than 2% of their 11.2m Instagram followers.
The really telling part as you mention was that for so long the gap was always almost exactly the same. KP stayed 500k ahead the entire time. Even if they were both gaining at similar rates (unlikely with the Sussexes having a newer account and more engaging posts and bigger life events and more media attention in the mix, but let’s suppose), with the couples having big events at different times it wouldn’t ALWAYS be the same gap. One would gain, then another. That wasn’t the case here.
Someone is being very small and petty and jealous here…
omg I am laughing SO HARD at myself right. I need more coffee. I was mentally doing the math for a million. HAHAHAHAHA.
(but you’re right, that just makes my point stronger.)
I’m dying.
It does look like they are buying a percentage of whatever total the Sussex’s gain and I wonder if they will end up buying responses to the Struggle Survey that has quite frankly struggled. If there is a sudden increase is respondent figures well…..
🦆🦆🦆 If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is a duck. 🦆🦆🦆
200,000 isn’t even ‘less than a quarter’ of 11 million, it is less than two percent!
EDIT: Belli beat me to it 😉
My coffee hasn’t kicked in yet!! lol (although to be fair, it is still less than a quarter, just…….way less.)
Actually, 200,000 out of 11,000,000 is only 1.8% of followers!
Sorry didn’t read far enough!
Yeah and I’d put a large bet down that the 200,000 figure Quoted (as embarrassing as that must be to Katie Keen), is raw and that duplicates and other filters have not yet extrapolated the true number of responders. I’ll bet it was more like 100,000 – 150,000.
People!! I had only had one cup of coffee! Go easy on me!
JA Lowcountry Lady, I’d put ‘real, unique, within the UK’ responses to Struggle Survey far, far below 100,000.
No better than a contestant on the Bachelor.
*DEAD* LOLOLOLOLOL
The 2 photos at the end of this article really highlight the differences between the 2 couples, especially as a couple.
The difference in warmth and engagement between each of the two couples is beyond stark. Even W&K’s “physical” touches in public are so stiff and awkward. And to be honest, can *anyone* remember Will *ever* looking at (or even speaking about) Kate with anything *near* the level of affection/pride that Harry and Meg do of each other?
I know different people act differently (duh!), and everyone has their own level of “comfort” with PDA, but I literally can think of only ONE instance where W&K had a “moment” like that: the Olympics, where they jumped up and Kate threw her arms around his neck, and Will (loosely) held her back around the waist/hips.
I’m not surprise some bots are following @Kensingtonroyal. It doesn’t make sense for them to have more followers than Harry & Meghan, especially after Sussexit.
House Cambridge are just so pathetic and desperate to be the more popular couple – they really are threatened by the Sussex’s and it just further proves that William has been the driving force behind a lot of the drama around their leaving esp them not being allowed to use ‘royal’ to make money.
I wonder if they will issue a press release refuting this – you know when they issues statements about Katie Keen’s use of wiglets and botox.
Also – the graphic about who follows one account but not the other – Ariana Grande, for example, follows Sussex Royal but not Kensington Royal. She has 176 million followers on IG. Out of the people who follow KR but not SR – the biggest name in terms of followers was Millie bobby brown.
the celebrities clearly are drawn to the Sussexes and people can say that its not about being a celebrity, but it totally is.
That will stick in William’s craw as I recall an interview where he complained that h e struggled to find celebrities to work with him – this was just before the Lady Gaga partnership (I think). Both Cambridges love themselves celebrities.
He truly has that Windsor pettiness in spades.
They’ve been chasing celebrities since their first overseas tour after marriage. The quickie Hollywood visit tacked on to a Canadian tour. The made up BAFTA event in L.A., the desperate attempt to get Angelina Jolie there, etc.
I remember they got criticized by the trip to Hollywood after the Canadian tour.
HAHAHAHA. I hope they try and deny it. Can’t wait for British media to pick this story up.
The British media wont cos they always remember they are professionals and report on stories with facts n prove when it comes to the keens.
Ha ha, good one! 🤣 You know they never let facts get in the way of the deed of the day,LOL! They’d be afraid to even go near a story like this.
Can you imagine what their statement would be like if they did try to deny it? It would basically have to be something like “well the reason we have such low engagement compared to other instagrams accounts is because people are hate following us to keep an eye on us. Or, um, all of our fans are 80 year old women who don’t know how to like and comment. And all of the younger fans that do know how to like are women like Kate who are afraid of voicing their opinion because they’ve been raised in super conservative homes where women are seen and not heard and everyone fears and respects the BRF to the point where they literally bow their heads and avert their eyes even when looking at our Instagram pictures. They’d be way too scared of breaking archaic protocol by actually interacting with us in any way!”
Hahaha! Sounds plausible they are doing that to keep that unhealthy competition going on. Anyhow the only account I follow is the SussexRoyal account.
yeah me too! unfollowed all other british royal accounts around Sussexit and the mean shenanigans.
Me too. In fact as soon as sussexroyal was launched I unfollowed kensingtonroyal.
Soooooo… what are they paying for these “followers”?
I could use a part time job. LOL.
You would think that being the future future King and Queen Consort would be enough for /some/ people but nooooooooooooo
They’ve got to buy followers so the sixth in line and his wife who are never seeing the throne don’t have more followers
This is the most hilariously pathetic thing ever.
If you can, read the whole article. Caity Weaver is fantastic.
Caity Weaver really is amazing at this. She’s the one who found James Comey’s secret twitter account.
And she’s a hilarious writer.
The Shakespeare references were magnificent.
That was Ashley Feinberg, both of whom once worked at Gawker (RIP). They are like two sides of the same delightfully nutty internet & pop culture coin.
Caity Weaver is delightful! Her twitter cracks me up daily.
Very forensic analysis- the royal rota could never lol.
I will never understand this grievance of who is more popular in this time for the monarchy where the top job is guaranteed& nobody is going to try overthrow! Marriage/compatibility issues aside, Diana being more popular than Charles might have hurt his ego but that popularity would have served his reign.
Same as when officials were said to be looking at how to harness the Sussexes’ global appeal from the Times Shipman article. Rising tide lifts all ships. Oh well.
I agree with you. Somehow, the Windsors seem to conflate hierarchy with popularity. And they’re not the same thing. Just because you’re higher in the hierarchy (*Charles, William*) doesn’t mean you’re automatically going to be the most popular. It’s not rocket science.
I don’t know why their so obsessed with this. Also, popular is a bit of a red herring. According to those YouGov polls, while Harry is the 2nd most popular Royal, Meghan polls below both Kate and Will. However, in terms of cultural relevance, newsworthiness and excitement, the Sussexes are way ahead. Even the haters who write about them get more traffic than when they’re batting for the Cambridge’s.The thing is, the people who like the Cambridge’s will never like Meghan and Harry, it’s just a different audience, but they will engage more with the Sussexes social media, than Sussex stabs ever will with the Cambridge’s . The whole popularity may shift once the Queen passes, but William doesn’t have the patience or maturity to see that, and is not doing himself any favors smearing his brother and his sister-in-law. The Sussexes, feeling the pressure and vitriol from the beginning, and all the scrutiny and criticism, don’t care about this, and need to think about their lives and how to give it a purpose as they get on in years, so they won’t end up a wreck like Andrew or Princess Margaret. William wants popularity and adoration, without accountability or responsibility.
When your entire identity is based upon the idea that you are more important than your siblings and above everyone, it really sticks in your craw when people shrug and say so what we like the other one better.
Something the article touched on glancingly but didn’t take further was the connection to Cambridge Analytica. Buying bots and fake followers was used in the Brexit campaign online in social media and who used to work on the Brexit campaign and is now press secretary for KP ..
that’s right Christian Jones.
He would have all the contacts to get this done but the main reason why this is getting noticed is because the people who follow Harry and Meghan tend to be younger and more savvy with how social media works than the older group that were micro-targeted to support Brexit.
Oooh! Thanks for the insight #tea
That was the precise reason why he was hired: to lead the online mob.
After this article, he should be fired. But he won’t be. House of Double Pettty will keep him around just in case…
Next Weaver needs to do an analysis of the Russian origin for anti-Meghan bot activity.
Exactly – and Cambridge Analytica has a direct tie to Facebook. Which returns back to Zuck allowing fake news on FB which he refuses to remove and has said as much to Congress.
Cain and Unabel strike again. Pathetic!
Add incompetence, short-sightedness, low EQ to all in the BRF, and without comprehension they are being caught and called out daily. Antics of the dysfunctional parade. 🙂
I’m so glad William and KP are being called out for their jealousy. That was a fantastic article.
I love it was the nyt that did this. A respected newspaper.
Next, Cambridges get exposed for buying bots to cyber attack and bully the Sussexes and write racism comments and attacks directed at Meghan. You first read it from here.
Question. Do you think the nasty comments written on the Sussex Instagram are from bots as well? I know there are actual psycho haters leaving comments, but could there be paid bots as well?
I absolutely do, Guest 2.0 —- I’ve read comments saying Sussex account monitor should delete them etc., but I wonder if leaving them just run unfiltered helps their security track the super crazies.
Definitely. JMO but security is monitoring these (hence why they are left) to bolster their case against these whackos and tabs.
I believe that’s already happen. A lot of the nasty and racist comments seem to come from bot accounts. They follow no one and have zero posts. They all leave similar comments.
These two might be the most insipid couple ever BUT they unwillingly provided one of the funniest royal story ever. This is beyond pathetic, extraordinarily petty but also SO hilarious. OMG. These two.
Oh dear! Little Willy and wife are not feeling confident and secure, are they? Should have worked harder and been nicer to your brother/sister-in-law I guess!
Oh but wait “not that they’re jealous, they’re just not like that!”
The most interesting thing about that post is the comments. Every single time SussexRoyal posts something, there are instantly thousands of abusive and hateful comments, and this is held up as “proof” that Megan is widely disliked.
The comments section to that post, there are only a tiny handful of hateful comments. There are some (which makes sense since clearly there are some real human beings who either stan the Cambridges, or are Harry tinhats, and accordingly hate Meghan) but not many.
If Meghan is so widely disliked, and Will and Kate so beloved, then surely their army of devoted fans would be made aware of this article and be commenting equally furiously?
I’ve been in online fandoms and I know how they work. One tiny negative or even neutral comment in the most obscure local paper, and the Fan Army descends. You see this with Beyonce, with Lady Gaga, Madonna, anyone with a fanbase.
Yet Kate’s fan-army are staying silent? Where are they? Why is the NYT Insta not full of thousands of comments defending Kate and talking about how awful Meghan is, the way they do on the royal accounts? It’s a high profile news story in a major international paper; there’s no way anyone with even a passing interest in the BRF isn’t aware of it. Yet… crickets. Why are almost all of the thousands of people on the Sussex account ignoring this post? The only rational explanation is that they are bots, and not actual human beings. Any bot can be programmed to mass-spam one particular account with abuse. But a bot isn’t sophisticated enough to be able to search other Instagram accounts for mentions of Meghan, discern which account is high profile, differentiate between positive and negative mentions of Meghan, and target accordingly.
The haters take always a little time to appear, they always come a but later and then pile up the likes for the awful comments. They are still giving them attention, and their hypocrisy is blatant, when they are complaining on things the other royals do, as private flying, 🤣 or visiting family. Many of them haters Have certain pattern that is blatant to see and identify, while many of them appear to be puppet accounts
You make such good points here!
WaPo makes you register with an account based upon your subscription. I would imagine NYT does the same thing. Harder for bots to get to work – vs. go look at the Yahoo home page and the “news” page which is nothing but tabloid garbage with swarms of fake posts.
There was actually a Blind Gossip item on this several months ago (yes, I confess, I used to go on there frequently if I were bored, or ill – too ill to even read ‘Twilight’ which is, ahem, my benchmark for a really serious flu) reporting that ‘one’ of the royals was keeping a beady eye on the numbers each and every day and was in competition with other royals. Of course the BG arsehats immediately piled in on Meghan like sumo wrestlers (main reason I don’t read BG now is their hatefulness towards our lovely Meg, long may she obscure Penis-With-Teeth and Wiglet-and-Buttons-Unit). Cathy is known to be highly competitive, though, even though her efforts tend to be half-arsed and feeble (let us never forget the copied-from-an-APA-textbook ‘survey’). It’s SO NICE to have one’s suspicions confirmed: a bit of instant karma.
-If I come across as more than ordinarily barking and madhatterish today, it’s because I had my flu shot yesterday and my temp has gone up to 101…
F-ck normal, Mad hatters are the best sort, any day of the week!😘👍💕
Blind Gossip has an anti-Meghan source. I hate to say “agenda” because that would be them posting gossip about her constantly, which isn’t what they do – they just use gossip that is always a either a BP/KP source or UK tabloid source, and is ALWAYS linked to a UK tab source (particularly the Daily Mail) when it’s “solved”. And it’s the UK tabs that have the anti-Meghan agenda, particularly the Daily Mail.
Blind Gossip used to be pretty accurate when it came to celebrity news, and maybe they still are. But they do a LOT of shady things (for the past few years) when it comes to gossip now, including deleting stories that make people look bad. Particularly those who have connections to the Daily Mail. (I’ll stop there).
I popped over to see if they’d updated that story about a royal trying to keep up on social media with the NYT’s story linked as a source and nope, not there. Tells you all you need to know about BG these days. For real, they had a “gossip” post that tried to justify protecting Andrew but not protecting Meghan. That told me all I needed to know about who BG’s sources were and their agenda wrt Meghan.
BG used to be fairly accurate and interesting till a few years ago. Maybe it was sold? Now it’s just a propaganda arm for certain people. Paid stories galore. And ultra right wing followers (unusual in celeb gossip). I posted a comment on a Meg post and it was deleted. The only post comments that agree with their agenda. All the solves are straight out of the Fail.
@Calibration I’d heard that some Russian company bought Blind Gossip but I can’t confirm it, unlike Crazy Days and Nights which WAS purchased by a Russian company (but was never as accurate as Blind Gossip used to be).
And yeah, that deleting comments thing is something that has been going on for over two years now, I know that for a fact. And I have receipts wrt whole posts (even some that were solved) being deleted to clean up someone’s image within that same time frame.
The anti Meghan source on Blind Gossip is very likely a Palace courtier. This way it would be hard to trace because blogs don’t operate the same way journalists do with their sources.
William basically wants to be harry and the Sussex’s. He buys bots and has people thinking it’s meghans account that’s buying them. He pretty much wants to reverse roles. Everything William ‘is’ and ‘does’, he puts out that it’s harry, everything that harry ‘is’ and ‘does’ William want people to think is him. He would love it if people called him charming and charismatic like they do harry. Remember how harry was’emotional’ And William was ‘logical’, given that William constantly throws tantrums and you only need to look at the Sussex’s website to see how clearly they thought out their next moves. William basically wants the be the Sussex and he wants the Sussex to be him and his dreary dull wife.
Yoooo!!! Hahahahahah I’m dying at all of this. My cousins and I always say “You think you petty?! I can outpetty your petty and get paid for it!!” This article is a literal embodiment of this statement. The author did the research, broke it down and showed out! Wow!
Bwahaha!! This is so sad and pathetic.
Love this. I’ve been following the numbers on Insta (just bc I’m petty and can’t stand Will) and have never understood how Kensington managed to stay just ahead of Sussex when there’s obviously no real competition between the two. Pathetic.
Hahahaha! It was a thorough article. And distinctly not pro- or anti-Cambridge. Line up the statistics, and the story tells itself. House Keen is better at wanting real followers than at actually acquiring them.
This is so pathetic. And what’s makes it funny is that they aren’t smart enough to also BUY ENGAGEMENT. LMFAO. Like you take the time to buy bot followers but aren’t springing a little extra for fake comments?? Which is the thing that throws off their overall analytics and makes it easy to tell that they are buying followers. They cant even do THIS well. Lol.
Buying followers is a popular tactic with SM influencers and small businesses who are trying to build up a SM presence. So I think that this ‘strategy’ of buying Insta followers to compete with the Sussex’s has come from Kate via Mummy, who am sure has done it for PP and potentially James (who seems to be doing a lot on SM lately, esp promoting his sisters struggling struggle survey).
Im a blogger so I am well versed in people buying followers to build their social media presence. My point is that if you’re not buying ENGAGEMENT the algorithm can spot fake followers a mile away. Which is why if you’re going to take the time to buy bot followers you should also spend the extra cash for engagement on your posts. KP did a half a$$ed job on even this – which is easy to do.
Watch the likes going up now after this article because someone pointed out their mistake.
I am no pro, but at some point I was checking their numbers and the counter was Rolling up At a fast speed in the KP account, while the Sussexes was much, much slower. No new posts at the time.
I found that funny, but I thought that it was Maybe not a real time thing.
The haters have also change their wording lately. It is easy to see, they are trying to Bypass the bullying deletion. I got a big fake hater account deleted from IG, yay for reporting!
For sure Meghan and Harry are more popular, more interesting, and more newsworthy
Does anyone else think it’s a mistake for William and Kate’s IG to be named Kensington Royal? It should have the word Cambridge! Part of the reason the Sussexroyal account was so successful from the start, it used their name and it’s easy to know it’s theirs. If I didn’t read royal gossip I would have never known Kensington Royal was the Cambridge’s official account
Charles’ account goes by Clarence House And his abuse happy brother has it as hrh duke of york or something.
I think it has Kensington because they probably plan to remain based at Kensington palace when Charles becomes king. They didn’t want anything with Cambridge because that wont be what they go by in the future.
This is sad. You got to buy people to like you. First VF now this and busted by the US media. The RR minions are useless.
BillBot and WaityBot buying bot followers. They are so petty and wasteful.
Gee, I wonder why the daily Fail did not investigate and discover this sooner and posted it for their followers 🤔
If Ma Middleton has anything to do with this Insta-Inflation idea then watch for her to get thrown under the bus pretty soon. Wills gets incandescent pretty quickly, I expect.
So yesterday we had the very perceptive Vanity Fair article on Meghan and today the NYT’s sharp analysis that leans pro-Sussex. Is American media starting to pick a side?
Now I’m off to Instagram to unfollow Kensington Royal. How I wish unfollowing them would become a thing today in response to this article.
I did unfollow them when the leaks became blatant, I did not care much for their anodine pics anyway.
Theres also a documentary coming out about the treatment of Meghan and the racism in the royal family – it looks pretty good, even though Katie Nicholl is featured. It’s on Vice I think in March.
ETA so to say – some people are definitely starting to look at Sussexit more critically and its not a good look for the royals.
Ma may have to make room for Kate under the bus too. Heirs are untouchable, wives are expendable. Wasn’t there an article implying that Christian Jones was Kate’s hire?
@Harper, I think American media smells a good story with teeth, that the British media can’t or are too afraid to touch. The first person to interview Meghan, even if all she’s talking about is hiking in Canada and her next projects, will get a ratings bonanza and a house in the Hamptons out of it.
@L4frimaire agree. American media isn’t so much about picking a “side” as it is about good stories that can be sensational and give a ratings boost and traffic. However, no one wants to be sued, and so the American press will NEVER directly accuse someone of something unless they have concrete proof. It’s why the NYT article does not directly accuse the Cambridges or KP of buying bots, but just points you to the logical conclusion.
So yeah, given the Blue Check engagement on twitter wrt this NYT story, I think the US press knows there is something going on wrt Sussexit, and they will keep digging for more proof of things. I think the Buzzfeed article comparing the coverage of Kate vs the coverage of Meghan alerted the American press in this direction, and now others are starting to look at other things wrt all of this.
Remember how it was reported that ABC killed an Andrew and Epstein story because they wanted to keep having access to William and Kate? I don’t think that threat is going to work on many other outlets and newspapers. Especially because Harry and Meghan are the much bigger “get” now.
I read this article last night as it showed up on my Twitter feed thanks to someone I follow on Twitter who liked the reporter’s tweet. The entire premise of the article is hilarious but Caity Weaver truly did a deep dive into the analytics of both IG accounts and talked to a lot of social media experts and analysts. She never explicitly says it but I think we’re all in agreement @KensingtonPalace is buying bots to boost their follower count and it makes Kate and William look ridiculous. I bet you they never expected someone to actually catch on to their stupid scheme lol but the stools from the graphic really make it clear just how petty William can be.
I found this very interesting. If you took away the names involved, it definitely looks suspicious. I liked how she crunched numbers and also talked about the political implications, in that public figures, paid for by the taxpayers, are manipulating data. This applies to figures like Bolsanaro and Modi, as well as royals involved in family drama. There is definitely a lack of transparency and accountability on KPs part, but they do so much shady stuff anyway. That said, she doesn’t mention that, unfortunately, a lot of comments on the SussexRoyal site are really negative and hateful. I hope they at least archive these as part of something bigger, because why do they leave these up or even turn on the comments. It was funny also the side by side comparison of each sites biggest followers. The Sussexes get Ariana Grande, Kris Jenner, Priyanka Chopra, Chrissy Teigen, and Ryan Reynolds. The Cambridges have people I’ve never heard of, except for Millie Bobby Brown, whose work I’ve never watched. I just don’t understand why KP cares about Instagram, seems beneath them as the future futures. As was pointed out in NY Times comments ( very salty those), William will be king, so what does Harry being popular matter? Another interesting thing pointed out in the article is that Sussexes is classified as a creator account, which allows some visibility on metrics. However, KP is classified as a personal account, which for a public figures is considered “ bizarre” and restrict access to data. However, once the Sussexes launch their new website and social, will be interesting to see what happens, what content, and the income potential. Anyway, the author leaves it open to the readers interpretation but the implication is bigger than who gets more clicks. Remember Mark Zuckerberg owns Instagram and he’s in the crosshairs right now for all the BS on Facebook. Interesting how after this article drops, the story about their security funding goes up as well to redirect the hounds.
I would wonder if the Cambridges are buying bots to drive up their follower numbers, could they also be using bots to leave racist messages on the Sussex social media platforms. When the Sussexes were sharing Kensington Palace with the Cambridges, it was noticed the hateful, racist comments about Meghan were left up for days, but any nasty comments towards Kate were struck down ASAP. It would be a revelation if it was discovered if Kensington Palace was behind the racist comments for Meghan.
I wouldn’t put it past the Cambridge team to do that. Some of the comments on SR are so vicious and seem borderline threatening. Like a lot of fans, I like their posts, leave a positive comment and move on.
When big Willie realizes everyone is onto him I’d fully expect another fresh bout of incandescent rage and ramped up smearing.
That’s the only thing incandescent about him, and even that is probably more of a foot stamping, whine fest. He seems like the type that smashes plates, then orders the servants to clean up the mess. Tom and Daisy personified.
Oh yes! The tantrums …I prefect the a House of Peru will have Tierras flying as the toddler has a meltdown.
Read this article last night. The comments on the NYT site are hilarious. All along the lines of “Well so what, William will be king and Catherine will be queen!!!!!” King and Queen of Petty, or I guess House of Petty.
I saw those comments and thought, well if that’s the case, why do they care about Instagram numbers? Why even worry about being “ popular” if, as the future unelected head of state, you’ll be on throne, even if you do nothing but play golf or polo for the next 10 years. Why do they care so much? One thing in all of this Sussexit coverage, even with all the crazy headlines, no one is really that genuinely interested in William, even to his mouthpieces like Dan Wooten, he’s just there. They’ve gone from incandescent with rage, to they’ll have to work more the poor schulbs, to the poor Will scheduling conflicts pity party, and still no one is that interested in him. Kate has her fans, but William? Meh.
This reminds me of Trump photoshopping pictures of his inauguration to make it look like there were more people. It’s absolutely pathetic.
Oh my word, this article is delicious! I think the RF is ready for the “racism” articles, and they have their patented answers, but this? This is a brilliant way to shade them and show how truly FAKE they are. Baller move, I love it.
Ooooooh, so Meghan is fake and she’s just about money and jewels? ORLY? At least Meghan doesn’t have to BUY followers and . . .fans! Suck it!
I’m all for the American/any non-UK press to stick it to the Cambridges while looking totally above board. “Hey it’s just an article on statistics, what the problem?” Because defining that problem will out the complainer as a member of House of Petty. Yummy!
Imagine if they had put all this effort into their work, you’d see how high their numbers would be by now. The payback is just glorious now.
Look who’s buying followers!!!😂
I believe this because the likes on KP Instagram posts are so low…
I’ve said on these very pages for months that it’s not just about sibling rivalry, jealousy and racism.
It’s also largely due to fights over money and budgets, Bill acting as though the foundation was/is “his” to do with as he pleases.
Also, I knew Camp Cambridge was in the habit of embiggening their numbers. It’s just delicious irony that the New York Times called them out on their shady bullshit – on 1A, top of the fold.
I think the picture of them on plastic stools should be their next Christmas card, lol!
@Kaiser You missed the part where she questions why they changed their account to private?!(before it was business)
People used to be able to analyse their followers but the new mode doesnt allow that anymore. Its intresting that KP has a social media team but choose to not have analytical information available for business accounts
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahaahahah hahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahaha
oh myyyyy this is so on brand for the Cambridges
Oh my….Bless their hearts …..hahahahaha
This woman is always pulling faces.
My inner petty b*tch is delighted with this article. How pathetic and sad is Camp Cambridge?
Oh Lord. I just can’t do this site anymore the levels of delusion… And the obsession with embiggening the Sussexes…
A well-researched, fact-filled NYT article about how W&K are buying followers is delusion. Sure, Jan.
You’re welcome to return to your mess of Kate stans on tumblr.
We like the Sussexes, but the ones responsible of embiggening them are those obsessed with disliking them. They say they are unimportant, Irrelevant and yet cannot stop posting about them, or in their own site, creating web pages about them and Wasting time creating anonymous accounts to attack them, creating more traffic in their behalf.
Sux to be you.
@Ennie I love the “sux to be you.” Thanks for the laugh. Been on hold forever and little gems get me through.
Puhlease no one is forcing you onto this site. But this wasn’t a Celebitchy researched article it quotes the NYT. Probably not delusional :). We like the Sussexes but the crew trying to destroying them are responsible for the drama elevating them.
It really burns you that the NYT exposed the pettiness of your heroes doesn’t it? Say all you want but it’s there for all to see in a world renowned newspaper with tons of research and evidence to confirm what has only been hinted at prior to now.
These gaslighting tactic of trying to deny the obvious reeks of desperation and frankly quite similar to what that grifter family does in DC. Really what is the difference between will and Kate and Jared and Ivanka? None of them have ever earned anything on their own and do very little of value while being praised to the skies by a sycophantic media.
There is only one couple getting the media to embiggen their meagre work and that’s the Cambridges. The NYT just put their pettiness on blast and they look pathetic.
@Puhlease,
Pa-lease. You are staying mad, aren’t you? LOL!
The anti-Meghan crowd staying pressed every day.
Puhlease, there are plenty of other places on the net where you can go and drag the Sussexes to your heart’s desire. Don’t get salty just because this site isn’t a 24-7 Sussex bashfest.
Don’t let the door hit ya where the good Lord split ya. Ciao!
And I will remind Puhlease if I see her post again, of her words that she was leaving. Every. Time.
I love how this was a very factual and detailed way of basically saying the Cambridge’s have been buying bots for likes and followers cos they are mad jealous and petty that the Sussex’s have natural popularity and interest.
This is so embarrassing and funny.
We knew it tho
This piece is sad because like I suspected Harry and Megan will be the subject of American media from now on. If there is sibling rivalry I’m sure it’s fourfold to blame. William will be King no need to envy Harry. The Media has already ruined a family with biasness and ignorance yet again.
The same media William gave more access to
I didn’t know that the Cambridge camp can employ such underhanded tactics to undermine the Sussex family. It’s not taken too long for them to be caught by the US NYT investigative journalists. Funny and sad.
I would love to see the documentary about Meghan. It says that it will tackle the truth behind what really drove Meghan to opt out of U.K. Hope it could be aired in one of our cable channels here in Asia. Looking forward to seeing the Sussex family together for their final exit from the U.K. Nice to see PHarry’s successful event yesterday with Bon Jovi at Abbey Road for the Invictus Games.
@MARIVIC
What documentary?? Can you share the link?
It’s a documentary by Vice TV. Though I don’t know how balanced it will be cause it will use the Royal reporters.
https://deadline.com/2020/02/meghan-markle-escaping_the-crown-documetary-kicks-off-vice-versa-series-1202869355/
I’m going to watch it with a hefty grain of salt.
@Awkward Symphony. The documentary is entitled ‘Meghan: Escaping the Crown.’ According to the trailer, the docu focuses on the reasons behind the Duchess’s exit from the royal family. It will be released on 10 March by Vice Media.
This bot thing is ridiculous but I am disturbed for the lack of deep coverage about the coronavirus potential exposure at George and Charlotte’s school. The four kids who went to Italy are being tested an I hope they are ok; if they are not how are the BRF and the BM deal with it? George and William, two future kings, may be exposed and the Cambridges are still doing engagements including the trip to Ireland this week. If W & K want to be seen as important and leaders they should stand down from this trip and other engagements until the results come back from the students. It would raise the level of respect events with critics but now they only look like they care about image.