Elizabeth II was also the queen of the media and the internet
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During her very long reign, Elizabeth II made every effort to preserve the most traditional essence of the Crown, underlining the importance of its customs and trying in different ways to to bring the British people closer to an institution that is now obsolete for many; on the other side of her she embraced progress as few monarchs have known or been able to do before her. Since its coronation in 1953, the first (and so far only) in UK history to be filmed and broadcast around the world with an estimated 277 million viewers, television has for example been a crucial medium for dissemination of the images of royalty and their public commitments.
Aware that the figure of the queen should be something modern and close to her subjects, instead of a distant relic relegated to old palaces, coins and stamps, Elizabeth - and before that, she imagines, her advisers and in a more convinced way, her husband Philip - had sensed that television should enter Buckingham Palace and tell the most varied aspects of royal commitments and court life, in a kind of ante litteram reality show. A striking example of this evolution is certainly the so-called Royal Christmas Message: inaugurated by grandfather George V in 1932 through the BBC World Service, it went on television in 1957 at the express wish of the queen: "I sincerely hope that this new medium will render the Christmas message more personal and direct. that never touches your personal lives. But now at least for a few minutes I welcome you in the peace of my home ”. In 2012 she also inaugurated the 3D shooting.
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That of seeming a welcoming and familiar character, somehow "normal", with whom to have a direct relationship despite blue blood and diamond jewels was one of the main missions of her kingdom for Elizabeth. If the consort, Prince Philip, was passionate about mechanics, cars and space rockets, the queen has always been attentive to the evolution of the means of communication as a way of keeping up with her subjects rather than for personal passion.
In March 1976, when the ARPANET system (the computer network that would become the internet) arrived at the Royal Signals and Radar Establishment in Malvern, England, she was the first to usher in that connection and curiously became the first head of Been to have ever sent an email. And since things change very quickly especially in the digital world, Elisabetta sent her first tweet in 2014 and in 2019 she published her post on Instagram.
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“Today, while visiting the Science Museum, I found it interesting to discover a letter from the Royal Archives, written in 1843 by my great-great-great-grandfather Prince Albert. Charles Babbage, considered the first computer pioneer in the world, had designed the Difference Engine, of which Prince Albert had seen a prototype in 1843 ", wrote in that social message:" Today I had the pleasure of learning about the initiatives of programming for children and it seems appropriate to me to publish this post on Instagram today ”. Between the lines of this episode in itself funny you can read a little the figure of Elizabethan technological involvement: the fact that it could create a bridge between the past and the future, that it was a new way of telling the monarchy, with its cumbersome past. and his often forgotten stories, to new generations who communicate in an increasingly fragmented and fast way.
After all, the media and technological evolution has been a kind of double-edged sword for the monarchy: the growing overwhelming power of tabloids and television has resulted in a continuous public exposure of the most private facts of royalty, from dramas of Diana to the most recent scandal of Prince Andrew, while also on social networks the populist and anti-monarchical sentiment of recent years has developed. But if the image of Elizabeth II, even for us who are not directly her subjects, is so powerful and pervasive, it is also thanks to the multiple media representations that have told her over the decades, not least The Crown: it was due wait for an (American) streaming platform like Netflix to enjoy a dispassionate and unfiltered story that, despite all the contradictions of the Crown, has revived the fascination for a woman who has merged power, passion and dignity like few other historical figures. And let's not talk about the funny memes, gifs and videos that have made her an immortal transgenerational pop icon.
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A brilliant reader of her time, Queen Elizabeth II embraced technology with a spirit of usefulness and comfort: curious and stubborn as all more or less official portraits have always told her, she let herself be explained and tried to experience everything. One of the fondest memories we may have of her during the pandemic is a connection of her via Zoom of her with her daughter Anna of her on one of the many charitable occasions she never gave up on. He was also aware of the limits that all this intermediation could bring to our lives, however: "Despite the advances, the old problems of human communication are always with us: we have the means to send and receive messages, travel far in the world, exchange experts, but we can still hardly find the messages to send, ignore those we don't like and listen without understanding ", he pronounced in an important speech in 1983:" Perhaps even more serious is the risk that the domination of technology will blind us to basic needs of people: electronics cannot create complicity, computers do not generate compassion, satellites do not transmit tolerance. ”Maybe she was wrong and maybe not, Queen Elizabeth, her message certainly arrived loud and clear, even in digital format .
