Project for Excellence in Journalism

Blogs and Twitter Talk WikiLeaks

December 9, 2010

The raging controversy over the leak of classified State Department cables generated major attention in both the blogosphere and Twitter last week. The responses highlight the differing emphases of bloggers and Twitter users.

For the week of Nov. 29-Dec. 3, fully 16% of the news links on blogs and 24% on Twitter were about WikiLeaks, according to the New Media Index from the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism. That made it the No. 2 topic on both blogs and Twitter.

Attention among social media users even tracked closely with that of the mainstream press, where the topic also ranked No. 2 last week, according to PEJ's News Coverage Index, at 16% of the newshole.

Bloggers responded to a number of stories about WikiLeaks last week. But the one linked to most often was a Nov. 29 Washington Post column by Marc Thiessen. In the column, Thiessen accused the Obama administration of failing to stop the release of the documents and offering a weak response once they went public.

The bloggers that responded largely agreed with Thiessen, voicing criticism of Obama and of government overall.

"Where was the Obama administration the last two times that Wikileaks posted classified information?" wrote Silvio Canto Jr. "Why didn't Pres BO ‘blow up' the last two times and demand a review of controls over this classified information? Who is minding the store? It is not Pres BO!"

"We trust our Government to protect us," griped Mad Mike, "Looks like they can not protect themselves. They are too busy running every detail of your life. It is really simple."*

"Inaction is tacit acceptance of the destructive and criminal activities of WikiLeaks," grumbled the Quipster, "A lack of leadership is cleary on display from the White House."

Some bloggers chose to blame the media. "It is craven malfeasance that nobody in the Fourth Estate has issued a mea culpa for their failure of duty in service to this republic," wrote Pascal Fervor.

On Twitter, although the subject was the same, the focus was markedly different. The stories linked to here were not politically focused. Instead, most related to either technological or international aspects of the leak.

The greatest number of links was to a Nov. 28 BBC article about computer hackers attacking the WikiLeaks site shortly before the release of documents. Other technology-related stories shared on Twitter included a Dec. 1 Associated Press article about how Amazon forced WikiLeaks to stop using its computers to distribute documents and a Dec. 2 Wired piece about the introduction of anti-WikiLeaks legislation that would make it a federal crime for anyone to publish the name of a U.S. intelligence source.

The international angles highlighted here included an article about leaked information regarding China's frustration with military actions of North Korea and its readiness to accept Korean reunification and a story on Interpol's ‘red notice' for the arrest of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Continue reading the full report at journalism.org.

_{*For the sake of authenticity, PEJ has a policy of not correcting misspellings or grammatical errors that appear in direct quotes from blog postings.}