Girl group Blackpink rivals Greta Thunberg at COP26
Social media has been buzzing with news about COP26 and unsurprisingly a tweet by climate campaigner Greta Thunberg has received the most engagement since the talks began, however number two on the list may surprise many.
The silver went to K-Pop girl group Blackpink who recorded a multilingual message to their 7.5 million Twitter fans, known as Blinks, in which they called climate change “the most important issue of our time".
In the video, the musicians called on global leaders to follow through with their Paris Agreement commitment to limit global heating to 1.5 degrees.
“We can still save our planet. We can still save our future,” they wrote in text accompanying the video.
Tweet from political leader among top ranking posts
With over 82,000 likes, 26,500 shares and 1400 comments the tweet was sandwiched in the rankings between two posts by Ms Thunberg, according to data from media insights company Meltwater.
Ms Thunberg's highest placed tweet heralded her arrival in Glasgow in which she thanked the city for a “very warm welcome”, while her next most popular tweet, a promise to stop swearing, garnered more likes than Blackpink’s, but less shares.
Another tweet by the group before the conference received even more engagement, in which they urged Blinks to “step up and come together for our planet”.
That tweet garnered more than 113,000 likes, 28,000 shares and 1700 comments.
Honourable mentions of other trending tweets go to Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett who celebrated meeting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the conference, and a series of posts lampooning US President Joe Biden for falling asleep at the conference.
Facepalm among top emojis used in relation to COP26
Analysis by Meltwater found most Twitter conversations about COP26 posted since the conference began have been neutral, followed by negative which trumped positive posts by roughly 100,000.
Words associated with negative posts included “fossil fuels”, “climate alarmists”, “cars”, “luxury hotels” and “private jets”, while positive tweets contained phrases such as “ways to strengthen”, “show world leaders” and “powerful message”.
Top emojis associated with the conference were unsurprisingly pictures of the world, but facepalm, downwards pointing finger, and the Scottish, British, Indian and Israeli flags were also frequently used.
The majority of tweets about COP26 have came from the United Kingdom, followed by the United States, India and then Australia, with men responsible for 61 per cent of all posts, compared to women at 38 per cent.
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Hashtags that received the most love were #COP26Glasgow, which was used 145,349 times, followed by #TogetherForOurPlanet at 129,811, but unsurprisingly the post popular tag was #COP26 which has been tweeted 2,410,528 times during the conference.
Australia continues to garner negative international coverage
Sentiment from Australian media about the country and climate change has been overwhelmingly positive when compared to negative.
The same could not be said for international coverage of the fossil fuel embracing nation, with data from Meltwater indicating negativity has continued since the government was attacked over its lack of detail in its net zero by 2050 plan.
On social media, tweets about Australia and climate change generally haven’t been positive at home or abroad.
With most world leaders having left the conference, coverage of the summit is waining, but with more than a week set to go, and more agreements yet to be negotiated, expect plenty more news about COP26.
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