'Truthy' Government Initiative Tracks Twitter Usage

A new government funded study is monitoring what you post on Twitter. The initiative is called "Truthy," and it tracks how ideas spread throughout popular culture.

Researchers at Indiana University are spearheading the initiative.

"Truthy is a system to analyze and visualize the diffusion of information on Twitter," researchers explained. "The Truthy system evaluates thousands of tweets an hour to identify new and emerging bursts of activity around memes of various flavors."

"The data and statistics provided by Truthy are designed to aid in the study of social epidemics: How do memes propagate through the Twittersphere? What causes a burst of popularity?" they said.

Researchers also say their efforts could be used to "mitigate the diffusion of false and misleading ideas, detect hate speech and subversive propaganda, and assist in the preservation of open debate."

The name "Truthy" comes from a term used by TV host Stephen Colbert.
     
The Washington Post reports the National Science Foundation is pumping nearly $1 million into the research.