The death of Queen Elizabeth II has been expected for years – and foretold by strong rumors on social media. It is fitting for a woman of her global stature and recognition that today’s online conversation is dominated by discussions about the Queen.
For a 96-year-old representing an institution stretching back centuries, the Queen was more tech-savvy than many imagine. Elizabeth defied stereotypes about women her age and – through her counselors – was an avid supporter of technology. She sent her first email when visiting the Royal Signals and Radar Establishment in Malvern, England – in 1976, years before most people had, as part of the early development of ARPANET, the forerunner of today’s global internet.
The Queen’s username? HME2: Her Majesty, Elizabeth II. “All she had to do was press a few buttons,” Peter Kirstein, the man who helped set up the Queen’s email account at the time, told WIRED in 2012.
She wasn’t just an early adopter of email. She put the first version of the Royal Family’s website live in 1997, years before some major British newspapers decided to go online. Ten years later, she launched the family’s YouTube channel with a rare video of the first Christmas televised broadcast in 1957. She also sent out her first tweet in 2014, tapping an iPad and hugging Zoom meetings when her health failed and Covid lockdowns halted many of her personal public engagements.
“I think the Queen has been extremely smart on the internet,” said Sadie Quinlan, a pro-royal YouTuber who posts under the name Yankee Wally. (Quinlan has been criticized for her anti-Meghan Markle commentary videos.) “I think she knows what’s going on, and I know she knows it’s kinda wild, and life goes on more on the internet than in the real life.”
But in recent years, the Queen, whose motto has long been “never complain, never explain” through the royal family, has become something more than an early technology adoption. She has become a meme, enthusiastically deployed by social media users who want to pass on wry comments about their peers. “The internet likes a little old lady to be stubborn,” says Idil Galip, who studies memes at the University of Edinburgh and runs the Meme Studies Research Network. That the Queen was fond of corgis, and at one point owned nine at a time, also helped her be loved by the online masses. “I think her love for animals has also been a big part of why she memefied,” says Galip. “The internet loves corgis too, and so does the queen.”
The endless, listless life of building openings and public events also gave the Queen plenty of opportunities to become a meme. From her excitement at the sight of cows as part of her 90th birthday in 2016 to cutting a simple cake with a ceremonial sword in 2021, she has shown she can play for the masses. “I think a lot of people also like to look behind the facade of royal aloofness and say, ‘Oh, she’s just like us,’” says Galip.
