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Tag: hashtags

  • Twitter, Fox News To Gauge Real-Time Sentiment At South Carolina Debate

    Monday’s GOP debate is setting up to be an important battle, as it is being held in South Carolina just days before the big primary in the Palmetto State.

    And as Fox News’ Bret Baier hits the candidates with questions, viewers will have a chance to give their feedback regarding just how honestly and openly the hopefuls presented their responses.

    Twitter and Fox News are teaming up to give the debates an added dimension – real time feedback via Twitter reactions. Twitter is asking viewers to use two particular hashtags when tweeting about candidates’ responses: #dodge and #answer.

    For instance, let’s say that you think Rick Santorum tried to talk his way around a question about Afghanistan, you can tweet Santorum’s name along with the #dodge hashtag. Conversely, if you think Ron Paul tackled a question about Medicare head on, you can tweet his name with the #answer hashtag.

    The results of these tweets will be displayed on the Fox News site. This way, users can see real-time meters that judge the national consensus – do a majority of Twitter users feel a candidate made a good attempt to answer a question, or was it a clear example of dodging?

    VP of Fox News digital Jeff Misenti told the NYT that they’re going to use the Twitter data when analyzing the debates. When commentators are breaking it down afterwards, “we’re going to try to pull some of this data into those conversations,” he said.

    This is the second time that Twitter and Fox News have tried this live reaction tracking. Back in December, viewers we asked to use the #dodge and #hashtags to comment on how well the candidates tackled each debate topic. But this debate has even more significance, as the candidate list has narrowed since Iowa, and the real primaries are underway.

    Twitter wants everyone to join the conversation, even when they aren’t tweeting about candidates dodging questions. Users are asked to use the more generic #scdebate hashtag with all their debate-related tweets.

  • Twitter’s Top Topics and Hashtags of 2011

    So far, we’ve looked at the top searches on Bing, Yahoo, AOL and Ask for the year 2011. Twitter has now revealed its list of top topics and hashtags for the year.

    “Among other things, we saw history unfold in the Middle East, mourned the passing of Elizabeth Taylor, celebrated National Whipped Cream Day, and cheered for theDallas Mavericks, Texas Rangers and Wayne Rooney,” the company says on its blog. “We wondered about Charlie Sheen, speculated about the Sony NGP, and raved (or raged) about Rebecca Black. And we tYp3ed LyK tHi5.”

    First things first. The top hashtags of the year were:

    1. #egypt
    2. #tigerblood
    3. #threewordstoliveby
    4. #idontunderstandwhy
    5. #japan
    6. #improudtosay
    7. #superbowl
    8. #jan25

    The top topics were broken down by category:

    TV:

    1. Pretty Little Liars
    2. Two and a Half Men
    3. The Craigslist Killer
    4. Golden Globe Awards
    5. People’s Choice Awards

    Movies:

    1. Thor
    2. The Dark Knight Rises
    3. X-Men: First Class
    4. Fast Five
    5. Green Hornet

    Music:

    1. Rebecca Black and Friday
    2. Nate Dogg
    3. FEMME FATALE
    4. Gerry Rafferty
    5. Gil Scott-Heron

    Actresses:

    1. Elizabeth Taylor
    2. Mila Kunis
    3. Anne Hathaway
    4. Raven Symone
    5. Natalie Portman
    6. Elisabeth Sladen
    7. Jennifer Lopez
    8. Nina Dobrev
    9. Emma Watson
    10. Fernanda Vasconcellos

    Actors:

    1. Charlie Sheen
    2. Macaulay Culkin
    3. Ryan Dunn
    4. Ricky Gervais
    5. Pete Postlethwaite
    6. Tracy Morgan
    7. Jake Gyllenhaal
    8. Ashton Kutcher
    9. Colin Firth
    10. James Franco

    Soccer:

    1. Wayne Rooney
    2. Fernando Torres
    3. Howard Webb
    4. Wembley Stadium
    5. Colo Colo

    Football:

    1. Dallas
    2. Green & Yellow
    3. Superbowl MMXI
    4. Jim Harbaugh
    5. Pittsburgh Steelers

    NBA:

    1. Rashard Lewis
    2. Ray Allen
    3. Derrick Rose
    4. Jason Terry
    5. Dallas Mavericks

    Baseball:

    1. Texas Rangers
    2. Bert Blyleven
    3. Roberto Alomar
    4. Vernon Wells
    5. Justin Verlander

    Food and drink:

    1. McLobster
    2. Fried Kool-Aid
    3. Starbucks Trenta
    4. Devassa Beer
    5. Guinness
    6. BBQ
    7. Mac & Cheese

    World News

    1. Mubarak’s resignation
    2. Raid on Osama bin Laden
    3. Japanese earthquake and Fukushima nuclear disaster
    4. Shooting of Gabrielle Giffords
    5. Gaddafi’s death
    6. Swine Flu outbreak
    7. WoW Gold Guide

    Cities and countries:

    1. Cairo
    2. Egypt
    3. Japan
    4. Libya
    5. Tokyo
    6. Dallas
    7. Vancouver
    8. Hawaii
    9. Joplin
    10. Austin

    Tech:

    1. Mac App Store
    2. Sony NGP
    3. Guitar Hero
    4. Mozilla Firefox
    5. Duke Nukem Forever
    6. iPad
    7. iPhone
    8. Nintendo 3DS
    9. Mortal Kombat
    10. iPod

    Mac App Store? Number one? Interesting. Though no more interesting than Macaulay Culkin as number 2 on the actors list I suppose. Glad to see there have been plenty of people tweeting about mac and cheese though.

    Any surprises for you? Anything you’re surprised not to see on the list?

    Here’s who joined Twitter this year.

  • Lindsay Lohan To Get Naked For Playboy, Spawns Fun Twitter Hashtag

    Lindsay Lohan To Get Naked For Playboy, Spawns Fun Twitter Hashtag

    The Lindsay Lohan situation takes another interesting turn, this time away from the courthouse and into the penthouse, if you will.

    TMZ is reporting that Lohan is in the process of shooting photos for Playboy magazine, the culmination of a deal that has been in the works for quite a while. What’s the going rate for some Lohan nudes these days? Apparently, $1 million.

    According to the sources, Lohan was originally offered $750K, but turned down that paltry sum. One million was apparently enough, as they say shooting began last weekend.

    If you remember correctly, Lohan was dealing with some legal issues this past weekend as well.

    Of course, the Playboy spread wouldn’t be the first time that the world gets a glimpse at the celebrity in the nude. A few years ago, Lohan did a spread of semi-nude photos for New York magazine. The series of photographs was taken to mimic “The Last Sitting,” an impromptu 1962 photo shoot with Marilyn Monroe. The same photographer that shot Monroe, Bert Stern, also shot Lohan.

    Maybe it’s the fact that they’ve seen it before, or maybe it has something to do with Lohan’s recent antics and behavior, but an interesting Twitter hashtag has taken off today. Here’s the best of #PeopleIdRatherSeeInPlayboyThanLindsayLohan –

    Harriet Tubman #PeopleIdRatherSeeInPlayboyThanLindsayLohan 3 minutes ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    Michael Jackson (now) #PeopleIdRatherSeeInPlayboyThanLindsayLohan 21 minutes ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    Upon further review, it looks like the hashtag is the work of @EricStangel (executive producer and head writer of The Late Show with David Letterman) and brother Justin_Stangel (also a head writer).

  • Google+ Gets Real-Time Search, Improved Hashtag Support

    It seems like just yesterday when we were talking about how Topsy was doing Google+ search better than Google, as the company announced realtime (and other) Google+ search results. As a matter of fact, it was yesterday.

    Now, Google has announced real-time search for Google+. How about that?

    “Now when you search in Google+, you’ll see a message about new posts the instant they’re available,” SVP, Engineering Vic Gundotra says in a Google+ update. “If you click on this message, or select ‘Most recent’, then relevant posts will start appearing in real-time.”

    Now, I wonder when we’ll see this come back to Google search.

    Google+ also now has improved hashtag support. “People have long used hashtags to mark their posts with certain topics — just ask our very own +Chris Messina, hashtag inventor. You don’t have to use hashtags on Google+ (search works fine without them), but when you do, we’ll automatically link to search results.”

    Based on the feedback on Gundotra’s post, users are pretty fired up about the hashtags.

    Google said it would bring realtime search back to Google search (it went away after Google lost Twitter firehose access) with data from Google+ and other sources, but that’s not part of today’s announcement. Perhaps, they’re letting the user base grow more first.

  • Jerry Meals’ Braves/Pirates Call Controversy Spawns Amazing Twitter Trend

    We all know that officiating error is a part of most popular sports. Whether it is a poor strike three call on the outside corner, a referee missing an obvious traveling violation or a back judge calling a ridiculous offsides, human error is part of professional sports.

    In a way, it adds more excitement to the game. Would you want a robot calling balls and strikes? I sure wouldn’t.

    The latest sporting controversy involves a call by a home plate umpire in last night’s marathon MLB game between the Atlanta Braves and the Pittsburgh Pirates.

    The game ended in the 19th inning with a much disputed “safe” call at the plate on a runner that appears to be out by at least 3 or 4 steps. Many on the internet are calling this the “worst call in the history of sports.”

    Here’s the situation: Game tied at 3-3 in the bottom of the 19th inning. Men on 2nd and 3rd with one out for the Braves. Chopper to third base, the runner goes. The throw to home clearly beats Julio Lugo by a mile. The sweeping tag appears to get Lugo’s leg, but to everyone’s shock the umpire calls him safe.

    The Pirates appear perplexed, quite understandably.

    Here’s the video from the final play of the game –

    What do you think? Did the tag get Lugo, making this a comically horrible call? Or did Lugo escape the tag, making this one of the better calls I’ve ever seen?

    Lugo said he didn’t feel the tag in the postgame interviews. “He made the right call, I got in there,” he said.

    Either way, the Twitterverse is decidedly holding the belief that home plate umpire Jerry Meals made the wrong call and an incredible trending hashtag has emerged: #jerrymealssaysitssafe.

    Here are some of the best tweets –

    I’m playing Oblivion. I’m going to take off all my armor, discard my weapons and attack guards. Why? #jerrymealssaysitssafe 25 minutes ago via Twitter for BlackBerry® · powered by @socialditto

    #jerrymealssaysitssafe for playstation 3 users to type in their personal info for online play. 38 minutes ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto

    Letting Casey Anthony babysit your kid #jerrymealssaysitssafe. 43 minutes ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    Gonna cross these mountains with my new friends the Donners #jerrymealssaysitssafe 1 hour ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto

    An island full of dinosaurs in captivity? Count me in! #jerrymealssaysitssafe 1 hour ago via HTC Peep · powered by @socialditto

    Gonna wait until the last minute to raise the debt ceiling cuz #jerrymealssaysitssafe 3 minutes ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

    Sure NewsCorp, buy MySpace for 580 million dollars. #jerrymealssaysitssafe 1 minute ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    And the winner for both most timely and most insensitive goes to –

    Amy Winehouse doing drugs. #JerryMealsSaysItsSafe 1 minute ago via Twitter for iPad · powered by @socialditto

    The game last night, despite the controversial ending, made history. Clocking in at 6 hours and 39 minutes, it was the longest ever for both the Braves and the Pirates.

    Do you think it’s safe for Jim Joyce to come out now?

  • Which TV Shows are the Most Social?

    Which TV Shows are the Most Social?

    The relationship between social media and television has begun to intensify, and why not? The two seem like a match made in heaven. What could possibly provide a better outlet for discussing your favorite TV shows and connecting with not only other fans but people actually involved with the making of the shows?

    Twitter has made it a point as of late to partner with certain television events to promote the use of their service as the main means of discussion. And in turn, networks get a chance to promote their content through one of the top social networks in the world.

    So which TV shows do you buzz about most on Facebook and Twitter? Let us know in the comments.

    Comedy Central has been an early adopter of the hashtag promotions, first partnering with Twitter for the roast of Donald Trump, and more recently using the promoted trend #comedyawards for its first ever show of the same name, honoring comedians across all media forms. That latter made perfect sense for Comedy Central and Twitter, as many of the early Twitter stars have been comedians, proving they are masters of the 140 character joke.

    ABC News also partnered up with Twitter for the royal wedding, even providing a “total tweets” counter at the bottom of their television coverage of the event.

    But what are the most social shows on TV? A study from TVGuide based on episode check-ins, Facebook likes and comments on the site, and Twitter chatter has provided us with a top ten list:

    1. NCIS
    2. American Idol
    3. Criminal Minds
    4. Glee
    5. House
    6. Fringe
    7. Bones
    8. Castle
    9. Smallville
    10. Law & Order: SVU

    Note that these are all broadcast shows – that means network TV not cable.

    It turns out that the “most social” TV shows aren’t always the “most watched.”  In fact, only the top three most social shows (NCIS, American Idol and Criminal Minds) rank in the top 10 of Nielsen’s latest viewer ratings.

    Take for instance the #9 ranked social show on the list, Smallville.  It has consistently boasted a fervent fan base during its 10 season run, but has famously underperformed in the ratings. Or how about Glee?  It ranks as the 4th most social show but it is nowhere near the top of the Nielsen ratings.

    It would seem that TV shows that are more social tend to have strong internet presences that are bolstered by extremely enthusiastic fan bases.  I’m also less than shocked to see that Nielsen’s #7 show 60 Minutes doesn’t place in the top ten most social.  The last thing Andy Rooney ever tweeted was a link to his hard drive.  Just sayin’.

    What else did the TVGuide study find out about TV and social media?

    -Users said they are more likely to talk about their favorite shows on Twitter and Facebook before and after the show airs rather than during the show. Of users who talk on Twitter, 62 percent said they engage before the show airs, 69 percent after, and 47 percent during. Of users who talk on Facebook, 47 percent engage before the show airs, 68 percent after and 24 percent during.

    -Of those who browse social networks while watching TV, 35 percent of Facebook users said they talk about the show they are watching, while 65 percent said they do something else. Among Twitter users who browse while watching TV, 50 percent said they talk about the show they are watching, while 50 percent said they do something else.

    -Asked why they share what shows they are watching via social networks, users said the top three reasons are: 1) to tell friends what shows they like to watch (77 percent); 2) to help keep their shows on the air (66 percent); and 3) to telling their friends about new shows (57 percent).

    How do people interact with the content creators?  Mostly by retweeting celebrities.

    Lastly, one funny statistic – 20% of people said they were watching more live TV now simply to avoid spoilers from their friends on social media sites.  Seriously, these people need to get new friends.  Their friends how obviously never heard of [SPOILER] alert.

    This whole study begs a bigger question.  Where are you, Sons of Anarchy and Breaking Bad fans?  Possibly too distracted by the pure awesomeness of the shows to bother Tweeting about them? My Twitter followers sure know my love for Breaking Bad.  Honestly.  If you don’t watch Breaking Bad, you are doing yourself an enormous disservice.

    Are you surprised that any of these shows made the most social list?  Do you think some of these shows were only bumped to the top ten because they are on network TV? Talk some smack and let us know in the comments.

  • Twitter Promotes Mother’s Day

    Mother’s Day is this Sunday, April 8th. Twitter is promoting an interesting gift you can give her – the gift of social media.

    From the Twitter blog:

    When you’re hanging with your mom this Mother’s Day, try teaching her a thing or two about Twitter…moms on Twitter are like moms in real life: fun, funny, caring, adorable and engaging. It’ll bring you closer and provide some laughs as well.

    Twitter also prepares you for the resistance that may arise from your mother when you suggest she creates a Twitter account – statements like “But I don’t have anything to say” and “I don’t care about [following] celebrities.” They say to tell her that Twitter is an easy way for her to check up on you and that of course she wants to follow celebs, Martha Stewart is on Twitter!

    I love my mother, but I doubt those would be the roadblocks we would run into. Ours would be more like “People are going to steal my identity,” or “I’d love to, but my son didn’t get the hint and buy me a new computer last Christmas.” Perhaps “What’s the internet?”

    Psst, there’s a secret ending in this video. http://t.co/oCS7wA2 Hint: @ConanOBrien gets emotional.#MyMomTweets 21 hours ago via Twitter for Mac · powered by @socialditto

    Twitter is promoting the hashtag #MyMomTweets to promote mothers on Twitter, but it is a morphed version of that hashtag that is trending currently. #mamasays is the hot hashtag right now, and besides the obligatory #mamasays knock u out, here is my favorite that I’ve seen. Good one, Mitch.

    #MamaSays That You Tha Devil! 5 minutes ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    I can only imagine the Twitterverse using this and #MyMomTweets for nefarious purposes, however. Just imagine, combine an @ mention with #mamasays and the perfect mom jokes are born on Twitter.

    But I am a pessimist. Mom awareness on Twitter could be a good thing. Seriously, with all the incessant crap that people tweet about, tweets with sound motherly advice or tributes to wonderful moms are quite welcome. Plus, at least in my family, teaching the parents about anything tech related is a win for all.

    Just don’t think that explaining Twitter to her counts as her present. You still have to get her flowers, guys.

  • TV Loves Twitter

    While this is not anything surprising or groundbreaking, the television medium is ate up with the idea of using Twitter to establish some kind of audience interaction. Again, this evolution has been fairly obvious, but the concept hit one of its many upcoming peaks during the recent Royal Wedding. Not only were would-be well-wishers huddling around their monitors/televisions, waiting breathlessly to catch a glimpse of the couple, they were also running to Twitter to share their reactions.

    “OMG! THE KISS WAS SOOOOOOOOOOOO BEAUTIFUL!!!! I’M SO JEALOUS!!!” or something along those lines, anyway. Not only were the tubes flooded with these kinds of tweets, but many of the television stations broadcasting the wedding were keeping track, adding them to “how many have tweeted” pile. If ABC’s numbers are to be believed, it’s pretty clear a whole lot of people watch TV with a computer/mobile device with Internet access close by:

    ABC Tweets

    Judging by the frozen frame, it’s not exactly certain at what point that image was captured. Nevertheless, considering the fact the Royal Wedding was not a 24-hour event — although, the run up to it certainly exceeded that — that’s a lot of comments featuring the #RoyalWedding hashtag.

    Or, as the Twitter Media Blog put it:

    Our work with TV partners like ABC, CNN, ITV, Sky and BBC shows that broadcast prompts like hashtags on-air immediately drive double to ten-fold increase in activity on Twitter.

    Another trend is for television shows to feature desired hashtags onscreen, prompting viewers to include them when they are tweeting about, say, the latest episode of CNN Money or the Comedy Awards presentation.

    There’s a video of this trend, and it shows just how omnipresent Twitter is in relation to interacting with a television audience.


    Clearly, if you aren’t engaging your audience with Twitter accounts and relevant hashtags, you’re denying your audience’s ability to interact in a more personal sense. Sure, message boards are still a chosen medium for those who want to react to visual entertainment — see the AV Club and Ain’t It Cool News if you need further proof — but the immediacy of Twitter, not to mention its ability to keep comments relatively categorized via hashtags streamlines the entire process.

  • Star Wars Day on Twitter, It Is

    Star Wars Day on Twitter, It Is

    Actually, Star Wars Day extends well beyond Twitter, but considering the “micro-blogging” site is the utility of choice when it comes to online communication, and the trending topics are a great barometer for what’s popular in the world at this particular moment, we’ll start here. And yes, for those of you asking about the grammatical mess in the title: My attempt at Yoda-speak, it was.

    So yeah, today, May 4, 2011, will forever be known as “Star Wars Day.” What’s the significance, you ask? Considering the original Star Wars movie — no “New Hope” here, oh, and Han did indeed shoot first — made its debut on May 25, 1977, today’s date isn’t an anniversary for George Lucas’ franchise. Besides fitting the “May the Force be with you” saying (“May the fourth be with you.” Witty, no?), today is also the day Star Wars completists can pre-order both trilogies (Episodes 1-3 and 4-6) on Blu-Ray DVD.

    Granted, the new formats won’t be available until September 16th, but you can still give more of your hard-earned money to the Lucas foundation.

    As with anything popular nowadays, Twitter is vehicle of choice when it comes to celebrating “Star Wars Day,” and the resulting tweets, which make use of the following hashtags — #starwarsday, #maythe4thbewithyou, and until recently, #Yoda — still have that Star Wars spirit. You know? The spirit that comes from such creations as The Empire Strikes Back? It’s the same spirit that led adults to camp out for movie tickets to see the new trilogy installments, disappointment in Jar-Jar Binks be damned.

    Besides the usual minutiae of Twitter users riding the waves of trending topics, there are some gems within these Star Wars Day hashtag-related tweets, two of which courtesy of Simon Peeg (he of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz fame), who offered the following:

    Goodnight everyone. May the third be with you. Too soon?less than a minute ago via Mobile Web Favorite Retweet Reply


    And:

    Good morning everyone. The fourth of May be with you.less than a minute ago via TweetDeck Favorite Retweet Reply


    Other gems include the top tweet from the Death Star PR blog, which offers some suggestions on how to enjoy Star Wars Day:

    If you aren’t celebrating #StarWarsDay by blowing up planets and kidnapping Princesses, you’re doing it wrong. #MayThe4thBeWithYouless than a minute ago via web Favorite Retweet Reply


    Their suggestions continue on the blog. All I know is I’m considering kidnapping a princess before the day is done. Watch out, Kate Middleton. Speaking of attractive ladies, Jane Wiedlin, former member of the Go-Gos, offers a winning suggestion, especially for all the Chewbacca fans out there:

    May The Fourth Be With You!
    Happy #StarWars Day everyone! Go kiss a Wookieeless than a minute ago via Echofon Favorite Retweet Reply


    Naturally, there’s a public service announcement from the Emperor himself:

    It’s #StarWarsDay, May the Fourth be with you, Sithizens. Just remember, next comes The Revenge of the Fifth.less than a minute ago via web Favorite Retweet Reply


    Over at StarWars.com, the May 4th celebration is in full swing, inviting visitors to pre-order the upcoming Blu-Ray set which are priced at 59.99, 59.99 and 99.99. The 59.99 prices are for the individual trilogies, while the 99.99 price point is for all six movies. According to ComicBookMovie.com, there are 40 hours of special features, which will be available with the 99.99 purchase. There’s also a trailer for the upcoming releases, as if you needed any further encouragement:


    With that in mind, be with you, may the Fourth. The Force, too.

  • Twitter, Stephen Colbert and Jon Kyl

    Twitter, Stephen Colbert and Jon Kyl

    Quite often the world of politics and comedy crash together and yield great results.  Both Bill Clinton and his indiscretions and George W. Bush and his inability to pronounce became classic fodder for anyone looking to generate laughs.  With technology becoming a more integral part of everyone’s life, especially social media, it only follows that the Politics/Comedy/Social Media mash will explode.

    This time, it was epic.

    First, the background.  If you don’t know, there has been a political struggle going on for some time now regarding the budget.  Back and forth, back and forth like a tennis match, except much more strenuous on the watcher than the participants.  One bone of contention has been the funding of Planned Parenthood.

    On Tuesday, the Republican junior Senator from Arizona Jon Kyl said something on the Senate floor that raised eyebrows.  He said that over 90% of Planned Parenthood’s activities consist of abortions.  The actual number, confirmed by the organization, is closer to 3%.

    As soon as Jon Kyl misspoke, his staffers presumably went into damage control mode because hours later, they issued a statement on his behalf.  The statement said that the figures Jon Kyl had quoted about Planned Parenthood were “not intended to be a factual statement.”

    This crafty response was obviously picked up by most news outlets and it dominated the news cycle that night.  Satirist and Colbert Nation leader Stephen Colbert was no exception.  He jumped on Senator Kyl and the next day began to flood Twitter with absurd and painfully funny lies about Kyl, always followed by the hashtag #notintendedtobeafactualstatement.

    The twitterverse exploded.

    Now, I’ve written this article as straight as I can.  I’ve tried to leave out all political bias and simply state what happened.  Whether you are a Democrat or a Republican – a anarchist or a communist – left or right – blue or red – or anywhere outside and in between, most of us will agree that this is some funny stuff.

    Here are a couple of my favorite Colbert tweets:

    Jon Kyl was sent from the future to kill Sarah Conner. #NotIntendedToBeAFactualStatement 2 days ago via SocialOomph · powered by @socialditto

    For the past ten years, Jon Kyl has been two children in a very convincing Jon Kyl suit. #NotIntendedToBeAFactualStatement 2 days ago via SocialOomph · powered by @socialditto

    In 2009, Jon Kyl lost $380,000 wagering on dwarf tossing. #NotIntendedToBeAFactualStatement 2 days ago via SocialOomph · powered by @socialditto

    Using Trendistic, a site that measures Twitter trends, Wednesday night at midnight was the prime time for tweets with #notintendedtobeafactualstatement.  That hour, .13% of all tweets contained that hashtag.  When you think about all the tweets that are sent out in an hour, that amounts to a good chunk.

    Of course, tweets with that hashtag have waned, but even a whole day after Colbert stopped talking about it, people are still tweeting wildly about it.  In an incredibly unscientific experiment, I have concluded that at the hour of this article’s posting, around 600 new tweets will contain that hashtag.

    Two of my favorite user generated tweets are “John Kyl likes to give kids stubble burns” and “Jon Kyl turned down the role of Zoolander.”

    Of course, these are followed by #notintendedtobeafactualstatement.  If you don’t include that, well, then you’re just lying.