Meta said it’s shutting down a data tool used by researchers and journalists to monitor viral content on Facebook and Instagram in August — just months ahead of the U.S. presidential election.
The social media company said Thursday it is replacing CrowdTangle with a tool called Meta Content Library. While CrowdTangle is used by news outlets, academic researchers, and regulators to monitor viral content, such as the spread of misinformation and conspiracy theories, Meta Content Library will only be available to nonprofit researchers and academics. That means most newsrooms, which are for-profit, won’t be able to apply for access. Meta noted that the five-month notice period “should give people time to complete any current projects they are using it for.”
However, CrowdTangle’s abilities have been limited over the years due to reporting aided by the tool rubbing Meta executives the wrong way, the Wall Street Journal reported. Meta has also had to change its data-sharing products to follow regulation and new technology and privacy standards throughout the years.
Meta said it is continuing to develop the Meta Content Library, which is hosted by the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) at the University of Michigan, and is taking applications from academic and nonprofit institutions to access the tool’s new features that were unavailable on CrowdTangle, including access to data on public comments. It also said it would add more features and data to the tool based on on feedback from early users.
“We believe in sharing data responsibly in pursuit of public interest research, which is why individuals from various institutions and organizations are able to apply for access to these new tools,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement shared with Quartz. “Outside of that, there are many publicly available tools that perform functions similar to CrowdTangle.”
Cody Buntain, a researcher at the University of Maryland’s College of Information Studies told the Wall Street Journal that although Meta Content Library’s features are helpful, it does not include a previous feature that allows for analysis of social media activity in specific locations. He added the replacement of CrowdTangle in August could interfere with research into political activity on Meta’s platforms leading up to election day.
Meanwhile, Rebekah Tromble, director of the Institute for Data, Democracy and Politics at George Washington University told the Wall Street Journal Meta’s new tool actually limits data search results, and privacy restrictions on the tool don’t allow users to download data from public posts by elected officials.
“If carried through to their full potential, there are a lot of features that could make Meta’s Content Library a more powerful tool for social science,” Tromble told the Wall Street Journal. “But we’re not there at the moment. Meta has a track record of making big promises to researchers, getting positive press coverage, and then backtracking.”