Conspirador Norteño Profile picture
Data Scientist/Musician/Participant in the General Confusion @trutherbotprop Resist autocracy and research/counter disinformation. I serve the realm.

Oct 4, 2019, 11 tweets

If you've been reading the analysis threads @ZellaQuixote and I post, you've probably seen the tweet schedule plots we include. Here's a simple web application you can use to make those plots yourself for accounts of your own choosing.
makeadverbsgreatagain.org/allegedly

@ZellaQuixote The plots include 6-7 weeks of history ending with the most recent tweet, limited to the most recent 3200 tweets. If 3200 tweets don't go back the full 6-7 weeks, part of the plot will be blank. The circles are color-coded based on the app used to post the tweets.

@ZellaQuixote Update: a shaded "no data available" box will now be shown if the tweets available via the API (generally the most recent ~3200) do not go back a full 6 weeks. The goal is to prevent folks from mistaking the time range prior to the available tweets for a gap in activity.

@ZellaQuixote The percentage of tweets posted with each app or service has been added to the legend. Additionally, the overall percentage of tweets posted via automation apps/services is shown, along with a red check mark if over 90% (the threshold we've been using for "bot").

@ZellaQuixote Update: we added a test for 24/7 activity to makeadverbsgreatagain.org/allegedly. The score is the percentage of the displayed time range where the account tweets at least 24 hours straight with no gaps of 2 hours or longer. Accounts with scores of 50+% are flagged as automated (red check).

@ZellaQuixote Second update: a "Color Scheme" selector has been added. Two options:

Tweet source: tweets are colored by app/service used (this is the original behavior)
Tweet type: tweets are colored based on one of five categories (standalone tweet, retweet, quote tweet, reply, or thread)

@ZellaQuixote As we evolve this tool further, it's worth considering how to adjust the visualization parameters to make it harder for bad actors to use it to spread disinformation. These plots don't actually show suspicious activity, but the default options are being used to spin it that way.

@ZellaQuixote We've modified the site to automatically determine the appropriate scale for best visualizing the tweet volume of the account being analyzed (you can still manually select a different option if desired). Many thanks to @BeegorBucleor for inspiring this enhancement.

@ZellaQuixote @BeegorBucleor Update the fourth (we think?): we've added detection of repeated tweets to the site. A repetitiveness (is that a word?) score has been added to the legend, and a table of the tweets the account has most frequently repeated within their last 3200 is shown beneath the plot.

@ZellaQuixote @BeegorBucleor The repetition detection only applies to text content of tweets - links, images, video, etc are omitted, as are retweets. The repetitiveness score is calculated as follows:

@ZellaQuixote @BeegorBucleor Due to poor planning, we somehow failed to include @SeanSpammity in the example screenshots of the new "repeated tweets" feature. This has now been rectified.

Share this Scrolly Tale with your friends.

A Scrolly Tale is a new way to read Twitter threads with a more visually immersive experience.
Discover more beautiful Scrolly Tales like this.

Keep scrolling