Diana had it easy...

Everyone naturally is comparing Kate Middleton to Diana, Princess of Wales.

The titles are similar, Kate is marrying Diana's son, and like Diana, Kate seems to be a very attractive, sexy, level-headed young lady who is marrying into the Royal Family and accepts everything (including baggage) that comes with this union.

However, there is one element that it is difficult to make comparison with, and that is the scrutiny that Kate will be under...for the rest of her life.

Numerous media and articles have discussed how "Kate will not be another Diana", the media will not hound her as much, and she will be allowed a degree of privacy. And yes, to a certain extent maybe that will be true. After the kicking the media got for contributing to Diana's death (pursuing her down the tunnel in Paris, paparazzi on mopeds etc minutes before the crash)...maybe "some" (not all) of the media will give Kate a break. Who knows, time will tell.

However, compare and contrast Diana's Royal Wedding back in 1981 with the Royal Wedding taking place in a few weeks. Yes, granted, some 750 million people watched the wedding on television broadcast around the world, and we are sure that Wills and Kate's Wedding will attract an equally vast number of viewers, some figures have indicated over 2 billion viewers globally.

But look at the ways in which Diana was pubicly scrutinised and you'll see the difference.

In 1981 in the UK there were just 3 terrestrial television channels. No Channel 4 or 5, no satellite or cable. Just 3 channels for Diana to be discussed and scrutinsed. Today there are literally thousands of televison stattions transmitted by cable, satellite, web and streamed live to mobile phones. Add in radio stations (in 1981 a handful of BBC and commercial stations) and you have hundreds more digital and web-based radio stations discussing Kate and the wedding. Result: Exponentially more television coverage for Kate than in 1981.

In 1981 there were roughly the same number of printed newspapers as today, but there were a fraction of the number of magazines, particularly celebrity magazines like Hello, OK!, Heat etc...all of which have died and gone to heaven for a Royal Wedding. Diana didn't have to watch out in case a photo of her cellulite was featured on the cover of Heat magazine...Kate will.

1981 was before the age of news delivery via the internet, smart-phones, text message...it was TV, Radio and Newspaper, c'est tout. Kate lives in a world where news (about her) can be disseminated rapidly via thousands, tens of thousands of different news channels, websites, RSS feeds....within minutes of the news event happening.

Diana was scrutinised by the media, and in turn the public read/watched the media and talked at home about her. They discussed the Royal Wedding, the birth of Wills and Harry, the divorce...but the Diana effect was (until her death at least) a one-way street. The public could not respond.

In the age of Web 2.0...with user-driven content...with social media, Facebook, Twitter and Blogs...the public can react instantly, and publically, to news about Kate. It is now very much two-way. If Kate says or does something interesting...or controversial...or sexy....stage one will be the media putting it "out there" as discussed above. In return, there will be a tidal wave of comments, Tweets, status updates and blog postings coming back at the media...and back at Kate. Look at how many Google News Items there are about "Kate Middleton" on any given day, then multiply that out by the number of Twitter accounts taking the Google feed, and the number of bloggers writing their own slant on it...and you can begin to understand that Diana...actually...had it easy.

Diana was scrutinised and hounded by the media, on behalf of the world.

Kate, in today's modern age, can be watched, scrutinsed, discussed and dissected DIRECTLY by the global public...and she can see (if she wants to) exactly what the global public think of her and her family.

We hope she's up to it...good luck Kate.