Counting images of The Queen. (WS)
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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This is More or Less on the BBC World Service. This week, we'll be asking whether Facebook is really worth twice as much as all the companies on the Nigerian Stock Exchange, and Ruth Alexander will be trying to count the number of photographs of the Queen. Hello, and welcome to More or Less, exploring the world of numbers in 539 seconds. This week, imagine you meet a genie who makes you an offer.
I can give you every share in Facebook.
And then you meet another who makes you a different offer. I can give you every share in every company on the Nigerian Stock Exchange. You can only choose one of these offers. Which one should it be? But first, Queen Elizabeth II, head of state in 16 nations, including the United Kingdom, is celebrating 60 years on the throne this weekend.
How does the episode introduce the two big questions: Facebook valuation and counting images of the Queen?
And so we've set up a Jubilee-inspired challenge for the ever-Eagle, Ruth Alexander. How many pictures of the Queen have ever been printed everywhere in the world?
Well, another way of posing that question might be, please count a number that's impossible to count. I mean, she's said to be the most photographed person in the world. One of the world's largest photo agencies, Getty Images, has around 250,000 photos of the Queen.
Well, hang on, no, no, that doesn't work, because we don't know how many times those images have been used.
I thought of what might be a better way of trying to work this out. I asked the Guardian newspaper how many times it's featured a picture of the Queen this year, and it's 21, apparently. So I multiplied that by the circulation figures of the world's major daily paid-for newspapers, and then multiplied that by 60 for 60 years, and then, to adjust for the fact that the press in some countries will be less interested in the Queen than others, took 5% of that figure.
And your number is...?
What about all the tea towels? What about the key rings?
I mean, there just must be so many other images of the Queen out there.
Let's assume that in the UK, the number of people who have ever taken a picture of the Queen equates to 20% of the size of the current UK population. So that's about 12 million people.
These are personal photos, snapshots.
Yeah, snaps in the photo album. And let's also assume that the equivalent of 0.1% of the population of the 116 countries she's visited have also taken a picture or bought a commemorative tea towel or mug. Right. So altogether, I reckon that's at least another 5.3 million people. And then there's internet search results, so let's throw in 50,500,000 for that.
Ruth, you're just pulling all of these numbers out of your pocket. I'm not convinced.
Well, look, I do have some other real numbers, right?
How does Ruth Alexander frame the challenge of estimating how many images of Queen Elizabeth II exist?
Proper numbers, with proper research.
Proper numbers, proper research, and they're really big. Money. The Queen's portrait has graced the currencies of 33 countries. In the UK alone, the Royal Mint has struck around 74 billion coins since the Queen first appeared on them.
That's a big number. And what about notes?
Banknotes, yes, about £35 billion in the UK. Now, I've got figures from the mint offices and central banks in other countries too. Canada, Australia, Jersey and the Solomon Islands. So add in another £89,179,325,000 banknotes and coins. I have tried to call the central banks and mint offices of a number of other countries, but they didn't get back to me or they just didn't have the numbers. Some countries became independent quite a long time ago, so the numbers just aren't there. So I've estimated the rest according to what I think are fairly reasonable assumptions. So I've looked at how many years the Queen was head of state in a given country and how big its population is compared to the UK and then used the UK numbers.
So my estimate is... that there have been another 88.5 billion coins and banknotes with the Queen's head on ever made.
I am genuinely impressed now, Ruth. Thank you. But you've forgotten something.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–1:09
2
How does the episode introduce the two big questions: Facebook valuation and counting images of the Queen?
1:09–3:11
3
How does Ruth Alexander frame the challenge of estimating how many images of Queen Elizabeth II exist?
3:11–8:03
4
What early data sources and simple newspaper-based method does Ruth try to estimate Queen images?
8:03–9:51