George Washington University Libraries Collect Millions Of Election Tweets
From The Hatchet (GW Student Newspaper):
After the U.S. presidential election on Nov. 8, library staff collected more than 3.6 million tweets from election night and 279 million tweets about or from candidates, parties, conventions and debates throughout the election cycle. The dean of libraries said the collection can help researchers who are studying the 2016 presidential election gain insights on what people said on Twitter throughout the election process and on election night, specifically.
The collection is available on Social Feed Manager, a tool created in 2014 with a $24,000 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Studies, and currently supported by a $130,000 grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, to assist in research through social media outlets. Researchers can access this collection of tweets from the election season by emailing the library’s data email account.
Geneva Henry, the dean of libraries and academic innovation, said in an email that the libraries collect the social media data for “research, archiving and academic purposes” and know that political events are particularly important for researchers in multiple disciplines.
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Direct to GW Social Feed Manager Website
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Filed under: Data Files, Funding, Libraries, News

About Gary Price
Gary Price (gprice@gmail.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area. He earned his MLIS degree from Wayne State University in Detroit. Price has won several awards including the SLA Innovations in Technology Award and Alumnus of the Year from the Wayne St. University Library and Information Science Program. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com.