Sunday, June 27, 2010

#diasemglobo and how big media was able to manipulate Twitter Trending Topics?

Diasemglobo was supposed to be just that: a day without GloboTV, Brazil’s foremost media conglomerate.  Like many Brazilians, I was unhappy with Globo’s treatment of the Brazilian soccer coach, Dunga, and decided that changing the channel the day that Brazil played Portugal in the World Cup was a clear way to make my point.  What actually happened was much more interesting: social media pitted against a media giant.

In three days, the account had thousands of followers. The hashtag #diasemglobo was appearing in the Trending Topics nationally which eventually spread, being featured in the worldwide twitter topics. It suddenly disappeared. Although there were efforts to unseat the topic in Twitter, people had already begun to act. Brazilians produced and printed posters, convinced restaurants to change the channel, had a conversation with family and friends, took the day to read books. Millions of people discussed whether or not they would participate and their reasons why. It was a peaceful dialog.

Rede Globo is the same TV channel that was featured on BBC’s 1992 documentary “Beyond Citizen Kane” which discusses the group's influence, power, and political connections. This documentary was and still is censored in Brazil. Internet is making possible for Brazilians to know more about it today.

I suspect that many Worldwide Trending Topics were manipulated these last days as well, such as “Ana Maria Braga”, in an effort to censor #diasemglobo on Twitter.

After the game, Globo announced TV ratings in an effort to convince the public that the movement was a failure. The problem was, they used ratings numbers issued by the IBOPE institute based on an archaic measuring system called Peoplemeter. To gauge human behavior, randomly selected users need to “log” their presence using an extra remote control every time they want to watch TV. Oh, and don’t forget to press the button every time someone leaves the room as well. If you also consider that the sample size is 750 measurements for São Paulo, the most populous city proper in the Western World, this hardly passes any test of statistical significance.

Diasemglobo wasn’t against Globo TV. It was a tentative step away from the grip of mass media and its history of control and manipulation of the Brazilian populace. I hope it serves as inspiration for bigger causes, causes that move people away from the TV and towards a better Brazil. Twitter gave us the voice we needed. #diasemglobo is a chess game, they announced victory after the first move
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25.06.2010 | The first #diasemglobo in history.

Kind regards,
@diasemglobo