Let’s ditch quantitative data for social media (for now)

There Used To Be A Time (TM) where discussions on social media, especially on Twitter, were indicative of relevance — at least of relevance within certain communities: If things trended on Twitter, there was a plausible chance that the topic discussed had some salience in that very Twitter-specific mix of audiences comprised of media and tech and politics people. Today, that is very different. Looking at how algorithms have taken over content recommendation and distribution, and the rise of the clipping economy that plays these algorithms like a fiddle, what is “trending” on social platforms (X, Instagram, Tiktok, Facebook) is no indication of actual relevance or popularity anymore. In fact, I would go even further: This type of algorithmic manipulation is so pervasive and total that I would argue we should dismiss quantitative analysis in that space completely (for now at least, until we understand better how to adjust our measurements and analysis to the new reality). So this goes…