Westeros Sentinel - A Visual Analytics Dashboard for HBO's Fantasy TV Series "Game of Thrones" New Web Intelligence Platform Tracks the Online Dialog Surrounding the Start of the Fifth Season (Vienna, 9 April 2015). Unpredictable characters, political intrigues and complex social relations are key ingredients behind the success of HBO's TV fantasy series Game of Thrones. The result is an active exchange on social media platforms, with heated discussions and spirited debates among the fans of the series. With Westeros Sentinel, webLyzard provides a visual dashboard to explore the online dialog. Released ahead of the series' fifth season, the system is named after the fictional continent Westeros, which is home to the capital and plays a central part in the storyline. "Westeros Sentinel uses the webLyzard Web intelligence platform to better understand viewer engagement by analyzing streams of user-generated content", explained Prof. Arno Scharl, Managing Director of webLyzard technology. "We have chosen the popular television series Game of Thrones as a showcase, because it has established a reputation for lively and animated discussions via social media platforms". The system aggregates the user comments from these platforms in real time, and combines them with the latest news articles. It then determines the sentiment of comments about fictional characters automatically, and provides an interactive dashboard with trend charts and visual analytics components. The platform addresses changes in the media landscape, and the significant impact of social media on the viewing experience. Television programming professionals no longer measure the success of a show such as Game of Thrones merely by the size of the audience, but rather by engagement. Social media allow audiences, critics, actors, producers, and marketers alike to share experiences, discuss important events, express views and provide interpretations. Westeros Sentinel captures this social engagement around Game of Thrones and provides a much deeper insight into evolving viewer perceptions and opinions. Advanced text mining tools provide an unprecedented level of transparency about emerging trends. They reveal how new plot elements trigger and shape discussions, for example, or how real-world events such as an actor's public appearance at an award ceremony affect viewer sentiment. Links and Images Westeros Sentinel Portal http://got.weblyzard.com Press Resources and Image Material http://www.weblyzard.com/game-of-thrones About webLyzard technology (April 2015) webLyzard technology provides advanced Web intelligence and visual analytics services. It helps to better understand the perceptions of stakeholders who engage in online communication - customers, journalists, policy makers, etc. The dashboard provides access to important indicators for campaign management and public outreach. It enables decision makers to identify relevance and sentiment of online content, measure brand reputation, and apply the industry’s most advanced communication success metric. Contact Prof. Dr. Arno Scharl webLyzard technology Puechlgasse 2/44, 1190 Vienna, Austria (Tel) +43-1-2760821 (E-Mail) scharl@weblyzard.com (Web) www.weblyzard.com (Twitter) @webLyzard