***Spoiler Alert*** The third season of Amazing Race Canada finally has a winner--and the final episode didn’t disappoint, featuring a dramatic two-way race to the end that saw brothers Jesse & Gino Montani beat out pro wrestling partners Nick Foti & Matt...
#BytheNumbers: Harper leads race in Twitter mentions, but hits wall on sentiment
We’ve now reached the midpoint of the second month of election campaigning, and at this point all major Canadian party leaders are at the top of their respective social media games. Amongst all Twitter content either mentioning a federal party or its leader from...
Heavy lifting with Phil Ho
When you wake up in the morning, does the thought of media monitoring look like a 50-pound dumbbell sitting in the corner of your office? If so, you’re not alone. I happen to be a morning person: I’m at the gym lifting weights for two hours starting at 5 am each day...
#elxn14: Economy and jobs take precedence in federal election tweets
It was bound to happen, eventually: The economy has now taken centre stage in Canadian election-related Twitter chatter. The incumbent Conservative government has been pushing its economic record and reputation, while opposition parties have criticized the government...
#TIFF15: Bell, Royal Bank, Visa this year’s top-mentioned sponsors (so far)
It’s finally here, the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival. The movies, the stars, the parties, the after-parties, more stars...it’s a date circled on the calendars of movie buffs for months. And as the excitement builds and bursts forth, Twitter devotedly...
Big data: Leveraging data blending
Data analytics firm Alteryx this week released a survey from Harvard Business Review Analytic Services on how companies are leveraging data blending to uncover business insights, even as Big Data sources continue to grow at an unprecedented rate. The survey, which...
Twitter, Meet the US Open
Though it doesn’t have the ad power of the Super Bowl, and doesn’t attract the gamblers among us as much as March Madness, don’t cry for the US Open; it gets its fair share of attention. Starting Monday, August 31st in Flushing Meadows, New York, the fourth major on...
Federal election: Harper gets pilloried on Twitter
Canadians are headed back to the polls on Monday, October 19, following the dropping of the writ on August 2 by Prime Minister Stephen Harper (commencing the longest election campaign period in Canadian history). All four major party leaders are now in full-on...
Amazing Race Canada, Season 3 Ep. 7: Math with Air Canada & Reminiscing with James Duthie
In episode 7, the Amazing Race Canada left the outdoor playground of Sudbury, Ontario and travelled to the city of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. As mentioned in last week’s blog posting, the citizens of Sudbury mobilized during the previous airing of the Amazing Race...
Amazing Race Canada, Season 3 Ep. 3: Buenos Aires — Home of futbol, the tango, and… Mentos?
Spoiler Alert On this week’s episode of Amazing Race Canada, contestants flew from Santiago, Chile to Buenos Aires, Argentina. The show saw a 10.5-per-cent increase in social media activity compared to last week’s episode. In last week’s post, we speculated the...
McDonald’s announces all-day breakfast; Twitter nods in approval
McDonald’s isn’t doing so well. The fast-food colossus has been acutely suffering for two years, having posted slumping numbers for six consecutive quarters. The giant is ailing. It’s sick. It’s casting around wildly for ways to stop the bleeding. And it thinks it may...
I “SPY” a great movie: Twitter love is no secret, matches other intelligence
Every summer is chock full of blockbuster movies, and perhaps the best one this year is flying a bit under a public radar dominated by action hits like Jurassic World and Ant-Man. But since its release last month, the comedy SPY has been cleaning up on Twitter based...