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Marriage Equality vote and debate viewed more than 100,000 times online

Update 2:40pm: Last night’s Marriage Equality debate in Parliament was viewed more than 100,000 times online, according to Parliamentary video archive In The House.

Maurice Williamson’s speech alone has 25,000 views on YouTube, while the video of Parliament singing Pokarekare Ana has just over 80,000 (both videos at bottom of article). The rest of the figure is made up of smaller segments and speeches, which each have several hundred viewers.

In The House is maintained by Christchurch-based Tandem Studios, which has been working with the House of Representatives since 2009 to repackage Parliament TV content for the web.

StopPress has asked Parliament TV for its viewing figures from last night. As it’s not a commercial entity it doesn’t keep track of viewership over the air. A spokesperson for Parliament TV says it’s unable to provide the number of viewers it achieved last night on its online livestream.

Original Story: A momentous day yesterday for both sides of the Marriage Eqaulity debate as New Zealand Parliament passed through legislation legalising same sex marriage.

In becoming only the 13th country in the world to do so, New Zealand’s garnering a lot of attention from around the world. Some like Canada who’ve taken the step before us and others like Australia and parts of the US yet (if ever) to do the same. The internet’s little click machine Reddit, showered praise on this little island nation only minutes after it was broadcast on TV– and in doing so no doubt sent a lot of traffic to 3news.co.nz (which hit the front page).

Stuff.co.nz has changed its logo in celebration of last night’s decision. No doubt the sentiment is appreciated by those in the LGBT community, but I can see designers around the country cringing in horror at its ’90s-Geocities-esque appearance.

Right now this video of Parliament breaking into a spontaneous rendition of Pokarekare Ana is circling the interwebs. It’s unclear whether the politicians are singing or if most of the noise is from the public gallery, but it sure makes for heart-warming watching. It’s interesting to see many of the 44 politicians who opposed the bill standing during the song.

Check out the video and feel the fuzzy feelings flow through you. 

And National MP Maurice Williamson is also the apple of the internet’s eye after his brilliant speech. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCDEiaoEP2U

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