99% of the “controversy” about Trending Topics that I've seen is of two types:
They think it didn't trend, but it did—they simply missed it when it did;
They don't understand why popular topics don't keep trending. If they did, Trends would be mostly things like “love,” “hate,” “Justin Bieber,” etc. Trending is about more than just simple popularity.
(In other words, most “controversies” are based on misinformation.)
I’ve relied on three sources of information for determining how Trending Topics are calculated/. By combining information from these three sources, I’ve come to certain conclusions. Some conclusions are clearly true; some are only possibly true.
I’ve then taken the conclusions and looked at the information again, to see if it helps gain further insight into the source information.
My three sources for information about Trending topics are:
1. Info from Twitter explaining how trending topics are calculated.
Some of what they say is clear, some of what they say makes certain conclusions likely, and some is unclear.
To Trend or Not to Trend… Key quotes:
1.Sometimes a topic doesn’t break into the Trends list because its popularity isn’t as widespread as people believe.
2.Sometimes, popular terms don’t make the Trends list because the velocity of conversation isn’t increasing quickly enough, relative to the baseline level of conversation happening on an average day.
3.Topics break into the Trends list when the volume of Tweets about that topic at a given moment dramatically increases.
4.Twitter Trends are automatically generated by an algorithm that attempts to identify topics that are being talked about more right now than they were previously.
5.The Trends list captures the hottest emerging topics, not just what’s most popular.
About Trending Topics. Key quotes:
1.The following behaviors and others like them could cause your account to be filtered from search or even suspended…Repeatedly Tweeting the same topic/hashtag without adding value to the conversation in an attempt to get the topic trending/trending higher.
2.The most important thing is to make sure your Tweets are genuine thoughts or impressions and not attempts to insert yourself into a trend. Everyone who clicks on the trending topics should be able to see real people’s ideas and links to further relevant information.
An infographic Twitter recommended about Trending Topics. Key quotes:
1.Twitter Trends favor novelty over popularity.2.The…algorithm only accounts for interesting peaks: sudden increases that mark an emerging trend.
3.Twitter used to rank popularity by volume, but changed the algorithm.
4.…the Bieber effect; becoming part of the constant background noise like love, hate, Christmas [etc.]
2. Investigating how the volume of tweets affects topics that have trended
Because it’s hard to know what localization data Twitter is using, I’ve only paid much attention to observations about volume vs. trending for topics, that:…would clearly be popular primarily in the U.S., e.g. use slang primarily popular in the U.S.
…trend worldwide, so location data is irrelevant.
Conclusion
I have seen topics that trended a second time in the same area, so it is not impossible. Of particular note is that this means there is likely something in addition to volume that is not novelty that can cause a second trend. I think that something is new people tweeting about the topic (in addition to sufficient volume).When the algorithm was first introduced, Justin Bieber fans made an enormous effort to create a volume of tweets higher than anything they had previously achieved when they saw that their usual efforts didn’t cause trending. Despite having a very organized network that was repeatedly successful in creating high tweet volumes of his name before, they were unsuccessful afterwards. It can’t only be “lack of novelty” that caused the topic to trend, since it is possible. It appears to have been “the same people saying the same thing” not being counted highly.
Twitter says, in the same article, “Topics break into the Trends list when the volume of Tweets about that topic at a given moment dramatically increases.” but also says “Sometimes a topic doesn’t break into the Trends list because its popularity isn’t as widespread as people believe.” The first quote indicates that “volume” is required, the second that “widespread” popularity is required. The implication is that “widespread” does not mean the same thing as “volume.” Volume would be a count of tweets, but “widespreadness” would be a count mainly of people, or variations in geographic area with the same trending area. This is admittedly not definitive, but considering in particular point #2 above, this seems to be the case.
Twitter does say that the same person “Repeatedly Tweeting the same topic/hashtag … in an attempt to get the topic trending/trending higher” may be filtered out from counting toward the topic. This indicates there is at least one mechanism for counting volume but eliminating some people.
