The Associated Press, Reuters, and Agence France-Presse all released kill notifications to media outlets over the photo — released by Kensington Palace on Sunday — announcing that they would no longer be distributing the image.
The AP wrote, “it appears that the source has manipulated the image.” AFP cited an “editorial issue,” while Reuters said the photo was withdrawn after a “post-publication review.”
Following its release, social media was abuzz with sleuths questioning whether the photo was photoshopped or AI-generated. Many were focused on the cuff of Princess Charlotte’s pink cardigan, which appears to disappear in the photo.
Other users pointed out that Middleton was not wearing her wedding ring.
“no rings, kids all have their fingers crossed, weird blurring on charlotte’s cuffs, leaves on the trees despite it being early mach - i’m sorry but they’re just asking for us to go full katespiracy at this point,” one user on X wrote.
Okay, I thought the conspiracy theories were kinda silly at first. But now, even though I don’t care about Kate Middleton or any of the royal family, I gotta admit I’m kinda curious now.
There is nothing to the conspiracy theories, she’s had abdominal surgery and wants to keep her health problems private. The UK press are intrusive and horrible, and the social media conspiracy theories are just gossiping.
There are plenty of operations that would need a couple weeks of hospital recovery and about 6 weeks recovery at hone (Easter is only the end of March). People speculating are ignorant about basic medical matters and can’t let someone have their privacy. There is no conspiracy.
How are they so bad at this?!
It’s so bad it’s like they’re trying to inflate the attention on the royal family. I can’t think of what they would gain from this type of attention, though… Other than to keep them relevant in the minds of the public and media, in the cheapest way possible?
I think they were trying to shut down the rumour mill as to why Kate hasn’t been seen in months. Probably figured releasing a “photo” would do the trick. Little did they know there’s a worldwide network of researchers checking photos for just this kind of thing.
Palace staff f’ed up.
I can tell from some of the pixels, and from seeing quite a few shops in my time.
- Worldwide network of researchers
a worldwide network of researchers
It doesn’t take a photoshop expert to notice something off.
The tree in the background has leaves on it, in early march.
What’s happening? I don’t keep up on British conspiracy theories.
From reading the article, she hasn’t been seen since Christmas and there were theories that she was in a coma or something.
Then a photo of her gets finally released, and it appears to be digitally pieced together.
Look at the boys hand on the left too.
I’ve seen Dune 2, this is just him telling the housekeeper to bring more biscuits.
I’m going to be the pedantic person I guess.
The voice isn’t really the same as the force, making people do something. It’s a kind of emotional manipulation. The Bene Gesserit are highly in tune with emotions, and they have learned to examine people and say things in a way that they can’t refuse. Jessica (and Paul to an extent) in the movie just have magic powers it seems, but the others it’s more clear what’s going on. Like when Paul is doing his speech to turn the Fremen into his followers, he’s reading them emotionally and manipulating them. (Paul is also a Mentat in the books, so he’s really good with logic too and that plays a role as well.)
Sorry to be the book person. I hope this was interesting enough to justify ruining the joke.
Little over-energetic kids do weird finger stuff sometimes when trying to hold still. But the older two also, it does look like something kids might do to protest a sham picture that lies about their mum. The lack of a wedding ring also feels significant.
I’m an adult and I still do weird stuff with my fingers. I absolutely cross my fingers like that.
conspiracy theorists gonna conspiracy I guess
My middle finger has never bended in that way, and I thing with the tendons being the way they are, curling your pointer in while crossing your ring would be… impressive…
I suspect that they used AI to edit out something like a toy or whatever, and failed to notice.
In any case, fidgety kids is why you take dozens of shots, whoever released that photo wasn’t paying attention
It is more subtle, but it looks like both of the other two children are crossing fingers as well. The boy in the middle seems to possibly be crossing his middle and ring fingers on his left hand and the girl is definitely crossing the same two fingers on her right hand. And Kate’s blurry hand on the kid’s waist makes little sense when nothing around it is motion blurred, unless, I guess, maybe she was yanking it away at the moment the photo was taken? But it seems like if that was the case the wrinkle/ fold in his shirt right in front of her hand would be moving too and not be as crisp as it is.
Not sure where you found this photo, I clicked a bunch of the links looking for the full photo and gave up. I did notice that only the kid closest to the window actually has a reflection though.
Its in the linked article near the bottom in a twitter embed. https://x.com/bencsmoke/status/1766838218425544804?s=46&t=Za25Alq_B_cAQOySmPLDCg
This is Business Insider’s front page right now including this story on the right (which it is also complaining about on the left). It’s really weird. Who exactly are they trying to appeal to, bankers who read the National Inquirer?
But a really weird one, right?
Like you wouldn’t expect a tabloid to have a bunch of financial news and you wouldn’t expect a financial news source to have a bunch of tabloid stuff.
They’re a big company. They must have market research people. So what is the demographic they’ve found that makes this make sense?
SO weird. You make a very good point… is there some tabloid reader/business person overlap somewhere? Like, a huge one that’s invisible to normal people?
