Royal wedding prompts frenzy on Facebook

Since many people can no longer make a cup of tea without telling the world about it on Facebook, it was hardly surprising the royal wedding dominated status updates today.

As the first major event of the social media age was played out, users of the site poured their excitement about it straight on to the web pages.

During the ceremony, there were 268,777 mentions of the wedding on the social network in the UK, equal to 74 every second.

And by the time the newlyweds emerged for the procession to Buckingham Palace, the number of mentions by users around the country had hit 1,199,196, Facebook said.

Less predictable, perhaps, was the fact that during the ceremony, Prince Harry was talked about more than his brother by UK users.

But it was not only the British online community caught up in the frenzy.

Some 10,600 allusions to Kate's dress were recorded among UK users during the ceremony, with 4,583 comments on Sir Elton John singing along.

Royal wedding fever also swept the United States, and the total number of mentions of the term "royal wedding" on the site across both countries reached almost 2.5 million in the 24 hours leading up to the couple leaving Westminster Abbey.

Other royal wedding-related terms that featured prominently in Facebook status updates today included "God Save the Queen", "Union Jack" and "British monarchy".