#ImpeachmentBackfire trended this morning in tandem with House Democrats' announcement of articles of impeachment. We dug into the traffic; although most of it doesn't look outright automated, we did encounter some not-so-authentic-looking goings-on. . .
cc: @ZellaQuixote
cc: @ZellaQuixote
@ZellaQuixote #ImpeachmentBackfire has been around for months at low volume, so it's difficult to be sure who kicked it into high gear (possibly @larryelder?) @w_terrence is the most-retweeted account, but traffic took off ~3 hours before his tweet, and most of it wasn't RTs of major accounts.
@ZellaQuixote @larryelder @w_terrence Obscure accounts that spammed the hashtag (generally by retweeting dozens of other accounts' #ImpeachmentBackfire tweets) make up a sizable portion of the trend - just 20 of 20519 accounts (0.1%) tweeted 1436 of the 36799 tweets (4%). Many of these accounts look a bit odd. . .
@ZellaQuixote @larryelder @w_terrence First up, we have @FayeRya45713700, the most prolific producer (well, retweeter) of #ImpeachmentBackfire tweets with a whopping 192 (probably more by now.) This account was created five days ago and appears to exist solely to amplify Christmas and anti-impeachment hashtags.
@ZellaQuixote @larryelder @w_terrence @FayeRya45713700 Our next #ImpeachmentBackfire frequent flier (54 tweets), @HealsAngelic, is 9 days old and was relatively low-volume until today. Based on the account name, profile pic, and use of "KEK" in the profile, it's likely a gamer/4chan user's sockpuppet - or wants to look like one.
@ZellaQuixote @larryelder @w_terrence @FayeRya45713700 @HealsAngelic Hailing from New York, we have @MlsAscp, with 49 #ImpeachmentBackfire tweets. Well, @MlsAscp might be from New York, but is on a rather unorthodox sleep/work schedule if so. Like the previous two, this account is a fairly recent creation - a little shy of a month old.
@ZellaQuixote @larryelder @w_terrence @FayeRya45713700 @HealsAngelic @MlsAscp One more: @BlueSkyNJ. Unlike the other three accounts we looked at, this one has been around for years and didn't just retweet; many of its 94 #ImpeachmentBackfire tweet are bespoke spam consisting of the hashtag repeated 6 to 8 times with other hashtags as decoration.
@ZellaQuixote @larryelder @w_terrence @FayeRya45713700 @HealsAngelic @MlsAscp @BlueSkyNJ Guess we're not gonna get the chance to ask what "bike manipulators" are. We'll muddle through, somehow.
