{"126341":{"#nid":"126341","#data":{"type":"news","title":"How Twitter Broke Its Biggest Story, #WeGotBinLaden","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003ENearly a year after U.S. Special Forces killed Osama bin Laden, the events of May 1, 2011 remain one of the busiest traffic periods in Twitter history. More than 5,000 tweets were sent per second when Twitter became the first source with news of bin Laden\u2019s death. But how did the news break and quickly spread across the Twittersphere?\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EA team of Georgia Tech researchers, together with colleagues at Microsoft Research Asia and University of California-Davis, looked at more than 600,000 tweets for answers. By analyzing tweets sent during a two-hour time frame beginning just minutes before the first rumor, they found that opinion leaders and celebrities played key roles. Their data also shows that the Twitterverse was overwhelmingly convinced the news of bin Laden\u2019s death was true, even before it was confirmed on television.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe study confirms the widely held belief that Keith Urbahn (@keithurbahn), an aide to former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, was indeed the first person to break the news on Twitter. His tweet was sent at 10:24 p.m. Eight minutes later, a CBS producer (@jacksonjk) tweeted her own confirmation. When a reporter with The New York Times (@brianstelter) retweeted both reports, the news began to spread more widely. \u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cRumors spreading on Twitter is one thing,\u201d said Mengdie Hu, a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Interactive Computing who led the study. \u201cDetermining if they are true is another, especially in this era of social media and the rush to break news.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ETo make a determination, Hu and her team used machine-learning methods to examine more than 400,000 English tweets in the sample. If the message mentioned the death as a fact or in very confident terms, it was classified as \u201ccertain.\u201d If any hesitation or rumors were mentioned, the tweet was sorted as \u201cuncertain.\u201d Within minutes of Urbahn\u2019s post, 50 percent of tweets were certain. By the time TV networks broke into programming 21 minutes later, nearly 80 percent were already sure that bin Laden was dead. The number peaked to just over 80 percent after TV made it official.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWe believe Twitter was so quick to trust the rumors because of who sent the first few tweets,\u201d said Hu. \u201cThey came from reputable sources. It\u2019s unlikely that a CBS News producer or New York Times reporter would spread rumors of something so important and risk jeopardizing their reputation. Twitter saw their credentials and quickly believed the news was true.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlso, although nearly everyone on Twitter was talking about the news, a group of 100 \u201celite users\u201d was actually driving the discussion. Nearly 20 percent of all tweets mentioned one of these elite users. Unsurprisingly, media outlets such as CNN, CNN Espanol and the New York Times led the way, especially in the minutes before and after the TV announcement. But within a half hour of the TV reports, celebrities surpassed media mentions and carried the discussion throughout the night. They included comedian Steve Martin and reality stars Kim Kardashian and Paul \u201cDJ Pauly D\u201d DelVecchio of the \u201cJersey Shore.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cThe celebrities weren\u2019t the first people to arrive at the party,\u201d said John Stasko, Hu\u2019s advisor and professor in the School of Interactive Computing. \u201cBut they stayed the longest and brought the most guests.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe findings surprised the researchers, especially because the topic was political and the majority of the celebrities had nothing to do with politics.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EHu and Stasko are using the analysis to develop software that can measure moods and influential people on social media. Marketing companies could use the tools while unveiling new products or searching for celebrity endorsers.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EHu will present the findings in Austin, Texas, at the Association for Computing Machinery\u2019s (ACM) Special Interest Group on Computer Human Interaction (SIGCHI) conference in May.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFor more Georgia Tech papers and research that will be presented at CHI, click \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/chi2012.gatech.edu\/\u0022\u003Ehere\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EBy analyzing 600,000 tweets sent on the night U.S. Special Forces captured Osama bin Laden, researchers studied how Twitter broke the story and spread the news. Their data also shows that the Twitterverse was overwhelmingly convinced the news of bin Laden\u2019s death was true, even before it was confirmed on television.\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"By analyzing 600,000 tweets, researchers determine how Twitter broke and spread the news of Osama bin Laden\u0027s death."}],"uid":"27560","created_gmt":"2012-04-26 11:00:33","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:12:04","author":"Jason Maderer","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2012-04-26T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2012-04-26T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"126351":{"id":"126351","type":"image","title":"John Stasko","body":null,"created":"1449178604","gmt_created":"2015-12-03 21:36:44","changed":"1475894749","gmt_changed":"2016-10-08 02:45:49","alt":"John Stasko","file":{"fid":"194520","name":"stasko.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/stasko_0.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/stasko_0.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":32783,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/stasko_0.jpg?itok=M352yzTJ"}}},"media_ids":["126351"],"related_links":[{"url":"http:\/\/chi2012.gatech.edu\/","title":"Georgia Tech CHI Papers"},{"url":"http:\/\/www.cc.gatech.edu\/","title":"College of Computing"},{"url":"http:\/\/www.ic.gatech.edu\/","title":"School of Interactive Computing"}],"groups":[{"id":"1214","name":"News Room"}],"categories":[{"id":"153","name":"Computer Science\/Information Technology and Security"},{"id":"135","name":"Research"}],"keywords":[{"id":"654","name":"College of Computing"},{"id":"166848","name":"School of Interactive Computing"},{"id":"167543","name":"social media"},{"id":"314","name":"twitter"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EJason Maderer\u003Cbr \/\u003EMedia Relations\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:maderer@gatech.edu\u0022\u003Emaderer@gatech.edu\u003C\/a\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003E404-385-2966\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["jason.maderer@comm.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}