Love is in the air this week. Love for queen, country, music, football, love of self, neighbour and love for a comedy movie icon, whose life was well spent, Google Trends reveals.
Mr Taiwo Kola-Ogunlade, the search engine’s Communications and Public Affairs Manager for Anglophone West Africa, said in a statement in Lagos on Wednesday that searches by Google users in the week ending Aug. 31 dwelt mostly on love.
Kola-Ogunlade said that Queen Elizabeth and Donald Trump dominated timelimes, blogs and news sites in Google’s search trends, which started on Aug. 24.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Google Trends is a service launched in May 2006 that allows one to see how popular, search terms and their demography have been over time on Google.
“Ronaldo loves Real Madrid, Drake loves Rihanna and we all love Queen Elizabeth as seen from reactions to a hoax claiming the British Monarch and Queen of England is dead,’’ Kola-Ogunlade said.
The Google manager said the Canadian rapper, singer, songwriter, producer and actor, Aubrey Graham, known as Drake on Broadway, in romantic mode as he presented an award to Rihanna got attention.
He said that Robyn Fenty a.k.a Rihanna, as a recipient of the Michael Jackson Vanguard Award for 2016, got Drake on his knees in his well-fitted Tux while presenting the award.
“The award is the highlight of an event that acknowledges the breadth of an artist’s visual accomplishments.
“With phrases like ‘captivating from day one’ and ‘someone I have been in love with since I was 22,’ Drake going down on one knee in that tux may not have been totally out of place.’’
According to him, the viral hoax of the death of the British Monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, after suffering a chest infection and a bad cough is also noted on the web.
The communication manager said that the 90-year-old, who incidentally was also in the news for a personal donation to victims of the Italy earthquake, had a number of people share their condolences online.
He said that interestingly, the deception sparked conversations about who was next in line on the throne as well as one that proved how popular stories about the royal family were with readers.
In the world of sports, Christiano Ronaldo’s love for Real Madrid and football made him to earnestly work out, building on his fitness, for a return to action was well read in the week, Kola-Ogunlade said.
He noted that Ronaldo had been out of action since suffering a knee injury while representing his home nation, Portugal, in the final of Euro 2016 which they won against host, France.
“Ronaldo won the Best Player in Europe award 2015/16 ahead of Antoine Griezmann and Gareth Bale and attributed this to the ‘best club in the world,’ Real Madrid.
“Apparently all this hard work is not for the ladies as he spelt out his determination to maintain himself at the ‘Best Player’ levels while sticking to Madrid, the club he likes the most,’’ the Google manager said.
He said that people’s attention was also got by the highly unique U.S. election of the century, with Republican Party Presidential candidate Donald Trump calling his Democratic Party opposition Hillary Clinton a bigot.
Trump’s statement, Kola-Ogunlade said, was not the norm in terms of controversy.
He said it had, however, sparked critical thoughts on the applicability of the word on his rival as some video reports of the facial reactions of some of his supporters suggested.
There were varied reactive comments including reverse attacks, mixed signals and confusion, the Google manager said for Trump because he had faced previous, serious criticism for racism himself and uttered inflammatory statements.
Searches on the death of iconic actor and comedian, Gene Wilder, aged 83, most memorable for classics in the 1970s and 80s also got people’s attention, Kola-Ogunlade added.
“There has been personal and heartfelt tribute from a host of celebrities such as Mel Brooks, Billy Crystal, Steve Martin, Sir Roger Moore, Russell Crowe and from a number of comedians via social media.
“Wilder was reported to have died due to complications from Alzheimer’s disease with which he has struggled for years.
“Wilder had classics such as blazing saddles, young Frankenstein, See No Evil Hear No Evil, Willy Wonka and the chocolate factory,’’ the Google Trends revealed.
Kola-Ogunlade said that Teyana Taylor, a singer and actress, would probably remain in memory for a while for taking the shine in Kanye West’s recently premiered and peculiar ‘Fade’ video.
The search, he said, revealed Taylor as a very recent mum and engaged to Iman Shumpert, a Point Guard for NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers but was now with Kanye’s Good label. (NAN)