Following the takeover of Twitter by Elon Musk, hate speech and toxic narratives have been trending in the weeks immediately after the takeover. For the following analysis, we focused on three hateful narratives: antisemitism, anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, and racial/ethnic hate speech. We compared the extent of their presence on a pre-Musk Twitter and a post-Musk Twitter.
Ahead of the US midterms, Twitter analyzed trending toxic political themes. Pre-Musk, focus was countering misinformation and hate. Post-takeover, discourse quality declined, extremists emerged.
In our analysis of over 4 million tweets during an 8-week period (March 1st and April 27th, 2022) across 5 countries— the United States, United Kingdom, India, South Africa, and Nigeria— we studied the sentiments expressed by users on the platform to Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover saga. While reactions to Musk’s initial criticism of the platform were generally more positive, his plan to buy Twitter was met with largely negative emotions.
In our analysis of over 4 million tweets during an 8-week period (March 1st and April 27th, 2022) across 5 countries— the United States, United Kingdom, India, South Africa, and Nigeria— we studied the sentiments expressed by users on the platform to Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover saga. While reactions to Musk’s initial criticism of the platform were generally more positive, his plan to buy Twitter was met with largely negative emotions.
How did Twitter react to the Roe v. Wade announcement from the Supreme Court? What does this mean for abortion rights in America?
Digital Pulse is a platform for measuring and understanding the public’s evolving emotional responses to breaking events. Conceived by Digital Planet as part of the IDEA2030 initiative, Digital Pulse harnesses unstructured data to gauge the reactions of various online communities across the globe to key events. Data gathering and analysis were conducted by Ripple Research, an IDEA 2030 affiliate, under the direction and guidance of the Digital Planet team.
