Hashtag History!

On Friday 24th October, 2014, the British Head of State surprised everyone as she commandeered the official British Monarchy Twitter account.

Queen Elizabeth II was visiting the ‘Information Age’ exhibition at the Science Museum in London, when she sent her first ever tweet whilst officially opening the display.

Tweet

Whilst we are still not graced with the presence of the Queen with her own individual personal account, hopefully it is not the last time we witness her Twitter involvement.

The significance of the event was not due to the content of the tweet, but of the historical implications, which helped cause the Twitter storm that followed.

History

This is not the first time in history that Queen Elizabeth II has become the first monarch to immerse herself in developing technology.

In 1952, Her Majesty the Queen was the first member of the royal family to broadcast her first Christmas message live on the radio.

Five years later, she appeared on a live television broadcast, to discuss “the speed at which things are changing all around us”.

In 1976, Queen Elizabeth II was also the first monarch to send an email, whilst she was visiting the Royal Signals and the Radar Establishment.

Although it was not the most exciting message to be received, it illustrated how the Head of State was keen to get involved in the advancement and development of technology.

It read, “This message to all arpanet users announces the availability on arpanet of the Coral 66 compiler provided by the GEC 4080 computer at the Royal Signals and Radar Establishment, Malvern, England.”