[Air-L] Update on simple historical Twitter hashtag searches

[Scott Rodgers]

Dear Air-L,



I thought I should follow up with a small but perhaps not so insignificant
update on my query to the list from January (see below) where I outlined my
difficulties in accessing 'historical'
Twitter data, specifically a simple search of all tweets using a specific
hashtag over around a two year period.

 

Without getting too
prematurely excited, it does seem that Twitter has listened to complaints that
this rather basic search functionality should be provided to general users, not
just big data analysis companies. Today when I searched for a specific hashtag
in the ‘discover’ tab, I noticed that a user can indeed now go back (apparently)
indefinitely and read all tweets using a particular hashtag.



Very best,

Scott



On Mon, Jan 28, 2013 at 10:22 AM, Scott Rodgers

<rodgers_scott at hotmail.com>wrote:

 

> 

> Hello all,

> 

> Apologies if I am about to jump in with a
question discussed previously

> (if so, I am happy to look through the
archives) but I have been spending a

> lot of time trying get a sense of how one can
access 'historical' Twitter

> data. A collaborator and I have a fairly
small-scale project, for which

> we'd like to look back about 2 years at maybe
1-3 specific hashtags all

> related to a local neighbourhood campaign.
>From what I have garnered from a

> lot of looking around, the only way to get at
historical data is by

> purchasing services from third parties with
access to the Twitter fire

> hose. The problem there is that such companies
only seem to offer much more

> extensive services than we need - we do not
need, for instance, full-scale

> quantitative analytics of tweet data, mood,
and the like. We simply want to

> generate a list of tweets using a certain
hashtag over a certain period,

> for the purposes of qualitative analysis (it
would be linked with

> interviews and other secondary information)

>  .

> 

> Any help or pointers would be much
appreciated.

> 

> Very best,

> Scott Rodgers

> www.publiclysited.com

>