Nearly Half Of Donald Trumps Twitter Followers Are Fake Accounts And Bots

Anyone can amass an exorbitant number of Twitter followers. You don't even have to be famous. All you have to do is pay for them. The comedian Joe Mande currently has a healthy 1.01 million followers, but his bio contains a caveat: "twitter is trash, facebook's the devil, i bought a million followers for like $400 none of this # matters antarctica is melting."

Mande even explained the stunt last November in The New Yorker. "The simplest way to tell who’s winning the Twitter game is by counting followers," he wrote. "The biggest celebrity accounts—Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga—seem to have millions of followers. But in 2012 I learned that only a portion of those are real humans; some are 'bots,' artificially created to boost an account’s popularity. Immediately, I knew that I had found my calling."

Source.

Trump is known for his narcissistic manipulation of the media. Back in the eighties and nineties, he would personally call gossip columnists and pretend to be someone else, "leaking" news of Trump's amorous conquests. It is completely plausible that he (or someone in his tiny entourage) would hire someone to create a fake hallelujah chorus.

ATS was ahead of the curve on this one. HerbertMountainDew spotted this back in February:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

You can check it out for yourself using TwitterAudit, which currently places his following at about 60% "real."

Snopes fact checked some other claims:

CLAIM
President Donald Trump got five million new Twitter followers in three days, and most of them are bots

RATING
MOSTLY FALSE

WHAT'S TRUE
President Trump, like other Twitter users with large followings, has a large number of new followers that appear to be bots or inauthentic, automated user profiles.

WHAT'S FALSE
Trump did not receive an influx of five million new Twitter followers in three days.

www.snopes.com...

However, they went on to add:

According to TwitterAudit, a web site that analyzes Twitter accounts, 51 percent of the president’s followers own authentic profiles. The quality of his following has deteriorated since his January 2017 inauguration. As of 29 January 2017, 73 percent of Trump’s followers were authentic Twitter users. Data generated by TwitterAudit shows as of 1 May 2017, 63 percent of Trump’s followers were authentic.
That number steadily degraded through the month of May — although TwitterAudit’s David Caplan cautioned that the margin of error for the fraction representing “real” users is large because of the large numbers in play.

Although many of Trump’s new followers do appear to be fake accounts that do not belong to actual people, the phenomenon is not specific to him. Recent followers to accounts like Kim Kardashian, Katy Perry and even CNN Breaking News that have larger followings seem to be experiencing the same pattern.

Why would a popular politician even need fake followers?



Mod Note: Do not use all caps for a thread title.

Here as a Twitter user allow me to clear the air here...

Nearly half of Twitter is bots.

There... feel better?

(insert story about boy who cried wolf and credibility here)

a reply to: DJW001

Why would a popular politician even need fake followers?

So people like you keep talking about him?

I follow him on "multiple" accounts

He is quite talkative

a reply to: DJW001

Seriously...
Twitter...
This crap really matters enough to you to all "caps?"
Wow...
Half of the bots are probably there from his enemies in order to troll his posts.

a reply to: toysforadults

Wow i didn't know that,i don't use Twitter or FB.So that means it was the same in the case of Obama's account then?

originally posted by: DJW001

Anyone can amass an exorbitant number of Twitter followers. You don't even have to be famous. All you have to do is pay for them. The comedian Joe Mande currently has a healthy 1.01 million followers, but his bio contains a caveat: "twitter is trash, facebook's the devil, i bought a million followers for like $400 none of this # matters antarctica is melting."

Mande even explained the stunt last November in The New Yorker. "The simplest way to tell who’s winning the Twitter game is by counting followers," he wrote. "The biggest celebrity accounts—Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga—seem to have millions of followers. But in 2012 I learned that only a portion of those are real humans; some are 'bots,' artificially created to boost an account’s popularity. Immediately, I knew that I had found my calling."

Because Donald Trump is the president of the United States and the most famous person on the planet, one wouldn't think he would need to employ a bot to boost his Twitter following. It appears, however, he might have done just that. As screenwriter John Niven pointed out Tuesday morning, Trump's Twitter account saw an unusual spike in followers over the weekend, many of which appear to have been created artificially.

Trump currently has 31 million followers and, sure enough, if you browse through them you will find an unusual number of tweet-less, picture-less accounts that joined the service in May 2017. If you're still curious, you can enter Trump's handle, @realDonaldTrump, into Twitter Audit, a service that assesses the authenticity of one's followers, and find that only 51 percent of Trump's are real.

Source.

Trump is known for his narcissistic manipulation of the media. Back in the eighties and nineties, he would personally call gossip columnists and pretend to be someone else, "leaking" news of Trump's amorous conquests. It is completely plausible that he (or someone in his tiny entourage) would hire someone to create a fake hallelujah chorus.

ATS was ahead of the curve on this one. HerbertMountainDew spotted this back in February:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

You can check it out for yourself using TwitterAudit, which currently places his following at about 60% "real."

Snopes fact checked some other claims:

CLAIM
President Donald Trump got five million new Twitter followers in three days, and most of them are bots

RATING
MOSTLY FALSE

WHAT'S TRUE
President Trump, like other Twitter users with large followings, has a large number of new followers that appear to be bots or inauthentic, automated user profiles.

WHAT'S FALSE
Trump did not receive an influx of five million new Twitter followers in three days.

www.snopes.com...

However, they went on to add:

According to TwitterAudit, a web site that analyzes Twitter accounts, 51 percent of the president’s followers own authentic profiles. The quality of his following has deteriorated since his January 2017 inauguration. As of 29 January 2017, 73 percent of Trump’s followers were authentic Twitter users. Data generated by TwitterAudit shows as of 1 May 2017, 63 percent of Trump’s followers were authentic.
That number steadily degraded through the month of May — although TwitterAudit’s David Caplan cautioned that the margin of error for the fraction representing “real” users is large because of the large numbers in play.

Although many of Trump’s new followers do appear to be fake accounts that do not belong to actual people, the phenomenon is not specific to him. Recent followers to accounts like Kim Kardashian, Katy Perry and even CNN Breaking News that have larger followings seem to be experiencing the same pattern.

Why would a popular politician even need fake followers?

My main problem with this post....you used snopes as a factual non biased site...which it is not.

originally posted by: BlueJacket
a reply to: DJW001

Seriously...
Twitter...
This crap really matters enough to you to all "caps?"
Wow...
Half of the bots are probably there from his enemies in order to troll his posts.

No, I was quoting the title of my source exactly, as required by T&C. The original was in ALL CAPS. Does this matter to you so much you have to point it out?

a reply to: odinsway

My main problem with this post....you used snopes as a factual non biased site...which it is not.

So you disagree with their conclusion? That means that 5 million bots joined his feed in just a weekend!

My guess is it was done by WH insiders like his advisers. They got tired of hearing him constantly whine that he had less followers than Katy Perry, Obama, and Pee Wee Herman so they did it just to shut him up.

a reply to: DJW001

It was probably the Russians trying to hack the next election cycle early.

originally posted by: Raxoxane
a reply to: toysforadults

Wow i didn't know that,i don't use Twitter or FB.So that means it was the same in the case of Obama's account then?

No, see for yourself. Obama is 80% real, Trump 62%.

originally posted by: jtma508
My guess is it was done by WH insiders like his advisers. They got tired of hearing him constantly whine that he had less followers than Katy Perry, Obama, and Pee Wee Herman so they did it just to shut him up.

My thought exactly. Maybe even Melania.

a reply to: DJW001

It's actually 79%. Wouldn't care except you're being nitpicky. POTUS is at 70%

a reply to: DJW001

To be honest? I don't think Melania gives a rat's ass about Donald. Based on some of their public interactions I think she'd kill him in his sleep if she thought she could get away with it. Just my opinion of course.

originally posted by: DJW001

originally posted by: Raxoxane
a reply to: toysforadults

Wow i didn't know that,i don't use Twitter or FB.So that means it was the same in the case of Obama's account then?

No, see for yourself. Obama is 80% real, Trump 62%.

BZZZZZZZZZ, inaccurate....

Comparatively, about 79 percent of former President Obama's Twitter followers are real, according to Newsweek. But Obama's personal account also has 89.3 million followers, compared to Trump's 31.1 million. Obama actually has more fake followers overall than the current president even though his percentage is lower.

Well, that's awkward!!

a reply to: JinMI

POTUS is at 70%

Sorry, I see 62%. What is your source for this alt-fact?

a reply to: DJW001

www.twitteraudit.com...

I guess doing your own research is tough this day in age, huh?

Keep at it though bud!

a reply to: DJW001

Doesn't he have two Twitter accounts?
He also has the POTUS account.
Why a bunch of followers just this past month and why this account and not the other?

a reply to: DJW001

I don't know anything about Twitter.

Do you have to approve each follower or can anyone just start watching you? If anyone can just start following you at any time then how do you control who your followers are?

Is this going to be the smoking gun for liberals? Will Trump finally be impeached over illegal Twitter flowers?

This could be HUGE!