Pew Compares Links Shared By Prominent Twitter Users With Those on Alternative Platforms

Pew Research Center shared a new study examining links shared by prominent Twitter accounts and how they differ from those shared on alternative social media platforms such as Parler and Truth Social.

The think tank compiled a list of 1,125 prominent accounts on Twitter and 200 apiece on seven alternative platforms—BitChute, Gab, Gettr, Parler, Rumble, Telegram and Truth Social—and analyzed all posts with links from those accounts last June, predating Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter.

Pew found that 66% of links shared by prominent Twitter accounts last June directed readers to media outlets including print publications, television and wire services, compared with just 5% of those shared by prominent accounts on alternative social media sites.

According to the research firm, the 10 most-shared sites by prominent Twitter accounts were the online sites of news organizations such as The New York Times, Reuters and The Washington Post, while the 10 most-shared sites by the other platforms in the study were primarily other social media channels and two digital-only outlets, The Gateway Pundit and Rebel News.

Pew director of data labs Aaron Smith and computational social scientist Regina Widjaya wrote in the study, “While these differences in linking practices between more established and alternative social media sites are notable, they may not come as a surprise to regular visitors of the alternative social media universe. In the center’s recent study, 52% of those who regularly get news on alternative social media sites say that they either extremely or fairly often see news on these sites that they would not have seen elsewhere.”