The CrowdTangle tool is used to accurately measure the audience of social media posts. Launched in 2012, news media have long used it to find out what kinds of content their readers are interested in on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Acquired by Meta (formerly Facebook) in 2016, CrowdTangle has become essential for certain researchers who study the phenomena of online virality. The app plans to say goodbye soon.
CrowdTangle has become the media’s best friend on social media
Meta has stopped following CrowdTangle according to a report shared by Bloomberg this June 23 and plans to remove it completely. Facebook bought this tool in 2016, initially designed to help activists organize their actions on Facebook via a dedicated online space. The co-founders, Brandon Silverman and Matt Garmur, quickly realized that this use of their creation would not bring them any money.
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They took the gamble of hijacking the functionality of measuring interactions on publications to make CrowdTangle an audience analysis service. The news media were quickly won over by such a tool which offers a dashboard giving an overview of the publications performing best on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Many media have started using it to understand which topics generate the most interaction on each social network. Brands and associations also use these tools to manage their communication on social networks.
It was thanks to CrowdTangle that I was able to release several articles.
In particular on the domination of the extreme right on Facebook during the presidential election. https://t.co/4opUBmxIqG
— Raphael Grably (@GrablyR) June 24, 2022
A tool that guaranteed a minimum of transparency
The Verge reports that CrowdTangle is widely used by researchers to study the virality of content on Facebook. Researchers from New York University, in collaboration with the University of Grenoble, were able to determine (pdf) that misinformation content on Facebook has six times more interactions than information from verified sources.
Thanks to CrowdTangle, Kevin Roose, journalist for the New York Times, highlighted the stronger engagement for right-wing media on Facebook. A reality which, according to him, is in contradiction with the official reports of Facebook on this subject.
While CrowdTangle appears to be a popular tool for many people, its upcoming demise could be linked to internal disagreement. There is a “war for data” within the company which concerns the amount of information the company should make public. A disagreement which had led in October 2021 to the departure of the co-founder of the application, Brandon Silverman.
Bloomberg reports that the tool should have disappeared earlier, but that the European Digital Services Act has slowed down the process. Indeed, social networks are scrutinized with interest by European regulators, in particular to guarantee the transparency of recommendation algorithms. CrowdTangle is precisely one of the last tools that made it possible to effectively understand how Facebook works. Meta is reportedly already working on a replacement, but some voices are being raised that it would be accessible only to scientists, leaving journalists on the sidelines.
Let’s be clear. The system proposed to replace CrowdTangle is–so far–terrible. But most importantly, it’s inaccessible to journalists, who are the bulwark for public accountability and democracy. If I can access CT and journalists can’t, we all lose.https://t.co/DcMYWz5Tet
— Dr. Rebekah Tromble (@RebekahKTrumble) June 23, 2022