Louis Twitter Analysis: 2012
Last week, I posted my 2011 analysis of Louis' Twitter account. That one was fun and fluffy and full of adorable boyfriends living in what I like to call "their bulletproof weeks" (see my URL).
NOTE: I've actually updated that analysis after the lovely genderblinditem sent me a bunch of tweets pre-June 2011 that informed some deeper analysis. So check it out. :)
2012 was not so fun to go through. The stark reality of being hastily shoved back into the closet for all intents and purposes cannot be ignored when you look at the graphs I've created.
Thanks again to lapelosa for humoring my excitable numbers flails in her askbox. :)
We ended 2011 with @Louis_Tomlinson beginning to tweet about Eleanor in earnest in November 2012. This came on the heels of increased and consistent tweets to and about Harry in October.
General Observations:
In 2012, Louis tweeted to/about Harry 5 times, less than 1% of his total tweets. Compare that to 2011 where it was 86 times and 10% of his total tweets
The May tweets to Harry were during the DVD watch party (a management-sanctioned event) and were not overly personal. Cute to be sure, but not significant and that should be considered when looking at this graph.
Eleanor:
Eleanor got a Twitter account on January 28, 2012. The first 2 months of the year, Louis tweeted about her (not directly to her) 4 times total.
IMPORTANT: Louis first tweeted directly at Eleanor March 17, 2012. HE TWEETED HER “Miss you! x” MERE HOURS AFTER HARRY SAID HIM & LOUIS WERE DATING. Now, this seems too quick for a social media counteraction, in my opinion. My new theory is this: This tweet came smack in the middle of
The Kiss 95.7 Interview with in-interview love bite (1st)
Z100 Interview—see my analysis here (10th)
New York signing with “Where do you want to sit?” “Next to You” (12th)
The Pallisades Mall interview (13th)
The New York City Date day (soccer in park, lunch, shopping, show, dinner) (15th)
Vevo livechat with “Why doesn’t Harry kiss Lou?” (16th)
The New Jersey signing with “Are you and Harry dating?” (17th
TWEET (17th)
Dallas with the first “denial” (24th)
So it seems pretty obvious to me that they were reprimanded BEFORE this tweet, sometime earlier in the week. They saw the way things were going and sat them down and said cool it. Louis was pissy in the New Jersey signing video and I think Harry might have just been too annoyed to care what he said in response to the girl’s question and voila.
In April, the Eleanor tweets spiked while Harry tweets were non-existent. This is significant as this is the month the tickets for the Up All Night American Tour went on sale.
Louis didn't tweet to/about Eleanor at all in June, perhaps a final stand against management.
In July, tweets spiked again.
The funniest thing about this graph to me is the obvious ramp up during the months leading up to Haylor, Take Me Home release & MSG.
Harry:
Louis did not tweet Harry for his birthday in 2012. He tweeted every other guy in the band, Josh Devine (the drummer), Perrie, Lou Teasdale, Jimmy Carr, Eleanor and 15 random fans but not Harry.
Louis tweeted "his curls or his smell ;) x" on March 3, 2012 in response to a fan's question about what his favorite thing about Harry was and didn't tweet him again until May 31, 2012.
After May 31, 2012, Louis didn't tweet about or to Harry until he thanked him, Liam and Niall for coming to the charity football match in October.
Putting this together, I asked myself what other variable I was missing and it struck me: Jay. People (myself included) get annoyed when Jay tweets Eleanor because it always feels like the least organic thing on the planet, y/y? So I went through her Twitter and this is hilariously obvious graph is the result:
Right off the bat, her spike in January 2012 to/about Harry and then the rapid slide into non-existence takes effect in May.
Please note the hilarious way in which the Jay and Eleanor trend lines seem to mirror each other. I'm not saying that Jay's account is entirely management-controlled. In fact, I really don't think that's the case. But I do very firmly believe (based on this graph) that she gets fed the things she tweets about/to Eleanor to coincide with Eleanor's Twitter usage. Looking at this graph...it almost appears as if Jay is carrying the bulk of the load in terms of bearding starting in (surprise) July. So while we all get annoyed with Jay, it really doesn't appear her relationship with Eleanor is organic (based on Twitter usage). In short, this does not appear to be a loving relationship between two people (Eleanor & Louis), but rather a carefully orchestrated publicity-fuelled social media campaign.
Remember how Louis tweeted Eleanor for the first time March 17th? Well guess who tweeted her the first time on March 23rd! Seriously, I can't make this stuff up. The day before the first "denial."
She first tweeted about Eleanor January 5, 2012. She also first tweeted Yorkshire Tea the day before to tell them Louis loved it and was out. SERIOUSLY I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP.
Jay's last direct tweet at Harry was for his birthday on February 1st.
Perhaps the most telling and just plain sad statistic was this: in 2011, Louis tweeted about products/artists in a promotional manner 30 times (3% of his total tweets). In 2012, that number rose to 121 times and 20% of his total tweets. The numbers and trend line also follow his tweets to/about Eleanor exactly. I'll talk more about that in my comparative analysis soon.
So this isn't earth-shattering information. This is stuff we all talk about and have felt either from real-time observations or gut instinct. But to have it laid out like this has been eye-opening for me to say the least.
My comparative analysis (coming tomorrow) will shed some light on just how manipulated this entire scheme is and maybe even make some predictions based on it.