What’s in a tweet? A lot, when there’s a set of latitude and longitude coordinates attached to it. Using the twitter streaming API, Rudin research assistant Chris Whong was able to compile three full days worth of geotagged tweets from around the New York City region, totaling more than 74,000 data points. Instead of simply visualizing the location and time of individual tweets, we can “connect the dots” through time and space for a given user, showing a movement vector across the map.
Played back at one minute per frame, the video clearly shows the ebbs and flows of activity throughout the day. The mass movement of people during rush hours is visible, as well as movement to and from several hotspots in the region. (Keep an eye on Metlife Stadium in New Jersey during the first 20 seconds of the video – you’ll many people who tweeted during a Monday night football game moving back to their homes – JFK airport also stands out as a key destination)