An Ongoing Streaming Sample Twitter Collection and Analysis Toolkit

SPRING 2016 RESEARCH INCUBATION AWARDEES 

PI: Jacob Groshek (Emerging Media Studies, COM)
Collaborators: Manuel Egele (Electrical & Computer Engineering, ENG)

This project seeks to develop alternative and robust collection, storage, and analysis capabilities to perform research based on communications sent via Twitter. Twitter is one of the most popular and frequently used online social networks (OSNs), and the vast majority of user-generated content is public by default. The analysis of these communications can provide scholars with novel insights into how the use of Twitter as a pivotal OSN can influence sociopolitical movements (e.g. Ferguson, #occupy, and the Arab Spring), or how individuals may misuse OSNs for ill-intentioned purposes (e.g. rumor mongering or stock market drops after false news alerts). However, to undertake such research endeavors requires a data collection and analysis tool that is far superior to Twitter’s search function, which is limited in time and in the amount of data that can be returned (i.e. aggressive rate limiting).

This work is funded by a Hariri Research Award made in June, 2016.