State of the Calgary Twittersphere – July 2009

Welcome to the fifth State of the Calgary Twittersphere, my look at the intersection of Twitter and Calgary. You can see last month’s stats here.

Apologies for the delay in getting this one posted. The source of the data this month has changed, slightly. In addition to Twitter Search, I added more data directly from Twitter itself. A total of 16,082 tweets were pulled from user timelines directly because they did not exist in Twitter Search.

User identification remains the same. If a user has his or her location set to Calgary, Airdrie, Okotoks, Cochrane, Strathmore, or matching lat/long coordinates, they are considered a Calgarian. If a tweet is “about Calgary” it contains either the word Calgary, the #yyc hashtag, or both.

For July 2009:

# of local users: 6626 (an increase of 980 from June)

To clarify, that means there were 6626 users who posted at least one tweet in July 2009 with their location set to something that makes them an Calgarian as described above. This number should be treated as a minimum – there are probably many more Calgary users without their location set or that were not captured for some other reason.

I’m happy with my previous stats posts existing as point-in-time snapshots. That said, I am continually improving my data set, making it more accurate over time. I am still happy with the numbers I posted for March through May – they are reasonably accurate (within about 100 users). The number I posted for June however, 5646 users, is not accurate. It was actually 6506, which means this month actually increased by 120 users (however I left the 980 above for consistency).

Here are the rest of the stats for July 2009:

# of tweets by local users: 238525
# of tweets by local users containing #yyc: 5028 (2.1%)
# of tweets by local users that were replies: 72969 (30.6%)
# of tweets by local users containing links: 58297 (24.4%)
# of tweets by local users that were retweets: 7713 (3.2%)
# of tweets by local users that were twooshes: 8159 (3.4%)

Here are the numbers above in graphic form:

Here are the top clients used by local users for posting updates. You’ll notice that API is now identified separately from web:

Some other interesting stats for the month:

Analysis

There wasn’t much growth in July, which isn’t altogether surprising considering it’s the summer. I suspect things will pick up again in the fall. I’m still fascinated by the difference in tagged tweets between Calgary and Edmonton (you can see Edmonton’s stats for July here).

Since I started recording the stats for Calgary back in March, I have identified just over 12,500 local users. The number above, 6626, is how many of them were active in July.

Twestival Local is happening in Calgary on September 12th! Click here for more info.

Notes for 8/23/2009

Here are my weekly notes:

Edmonton Notes for 8/22/2009

Here are my weekly Edmonton notes:

East Meets WestEast Meets West

Art Gallery of AlbertaArt Gallery of Alberta

Recap: artsScene Edmonton Summer Party

Last night was the artsScene Edmonton “Jekyll & Hyde” Summer Party. The unique event was held at two venues – first the “Jekyll” part at Latitude 53’s rooftop patio, then the “Hyde” part at Prohibition. I had never been to Latitude 53 before, so it was a great opportunity to check out the space. The crowd was a bit smaller than anticipated, but everyone had a great time chatting, drinking, and listening to the musical stylings of Keri Lynn Zwicker and Jay Sparrow.

At around 9pm, the crowd started to migrate to Prohibition where Peter Sagar, Roland Pemberton III, and The Cake Eaters performed. It seems that many people skipped the first part of the evening and went straight to Prohibition, because the place was packed. Ken Bautista, Chair of artsScene Alberta, mentioned that they did the two venue style event in Calgary with locations directly across the street from one another. I think that would have worked better here too.

One of the interesting things they did during the event was walk around with an iPhone survey using software by local firm TouchMetric. The results were displayed on an LCD screen at Prohibition, which was pretty neat.

You can see my photos from the evening here. Hopefully they’ll soon have much better photos (and video too) on the website.

artsScene Edmonton Summer PartyartsScene Edmonton Summer PartyartsScene Edmonton Summer PartyartsScene Edmonton Summer PartyartsScene Edmonton Summer PartyartsScene Edmonton Summer Party

In addition to the socializing, there was some news about upcoming artsScene events. The first is called boardLink:

boardLink is a live event that introduces and connect young professionals (ages 18-40) with local arts boards through a unique speed-networking format. boardLink creates opportunities for young people to be more actively involved in the leadership and development of Edmonton’s arts and culture scene.

Event partners include Emerging Business Leaders, InterVivos, Junior Chamber International Edmonton, and The Citadel Theatre. The first boardLink event will happen about a month from now:

WHAT: boardLink
WHEN: September 28, 2009 at 6:30pm
WHERE: Shoctor Lobby, The Citadel Theatre

Tickets are $15 – check the website for more information.

The second event we learned about is actually a series of events – the Behind the Scenes Series, featuring five of Edmonton’s major arts organizations.

At each Behind the Scenes event, young professionals (ages 18-40) discover the performing and visual arts in our community through exclusive talks with artists and artistic directors, stage and gallery tours, and opportunities to attend performances and exhibitions with follow artsSceners.

Here the the dates for each organization:

October 19, 2009 – Edmonton Opera: Featuring Rigoletto
November 9, 2009 – The Citadel Theatre: Featuring Rock ‘N’ Roll
January 18, 2010 – Edmonton Symphony Orchestra: Featuring Late Night Beethoven
April 8, 2010 – Alberta Ballet: Featuring Songs of a Wayfarer and The Seven Deadly Sins
May 20, 2010 – Art Gallery of Alberta: Discover the inner workings of the new AGA and see a new exhibition come to life

You can get tickets for an individual event for $19, or passes to all five for $79. Again, check the website for more information.

artsScene is starting to make some really cool things happen for young professionals in Edmonton. Stay tuned to their blog and Twitter for updates!

TweetSharp for Twitter developers using .NET

Since January I’ve been using a library called TweetSharp in my various Twitter-related programming projects (including my monthly stats posts). Not only has it saved me from all of the effort that would have gone into writing my own Twitter library for .NET, but it has also taught me a few things about fluent interfaces, OAuth, and other topics. Here’s the description from the relatively new official website:

TweetSharp is a complete .NET library for microblogging platforms that allows you to write short and sweet expressions that convert automatically to web queries and fly to Twitter on your behalf.

Maybe this is a generalization but I often feel that .NET developers get the short end of the stick when the “cool kids” release sample code for their APIs. Or more accurately, C# developers get the short end of the stick (because you can run Python, Ruby, and other languages on .NET if you really want to). Thus I’m grateful that Dimebrain (Daniel Crenna) has developed such a useful library.

TweetSharp is open source and under active development (hosted on Google Code), with a growing base of users reporting and fixing issues (I helped with the Twitter Search functionality initially). If you’re writing any kind of software for Twitter using .NET, you should be using TweetSharp.

FITC Edmonton 2009: October 17-18

For the first time ever, FlasintheCan (FITC) is coming to Edmonton. Very successful FITC events have happened all over the world since 2002, bringing together Flash, Flex, and AIR designers, developers, artists, and students to to educate, challenge, and inspire. Here’s what to expect:

It starts with the presentations. Two solidly packed days of presentations, both technical and creative. Presenters from around the world have been hand-picked for their skill and talent, and all are eager to share and meet you. It’s also about the networking. Being able to meet and talk to people who share your passion for this industry. Meet them at the presentations, in the exhibitor hall, or at the evening party.

The Edmonton event takes place on October 17th and 18th at NAIT. Here are the full event details:

WHAT: FITC Edmonton 2009
WHEN: Saturday & Sunday, October 17-18, 2009
WHERE: Shaw Theatre, NAIT, 11726 – 106th Street (map)

Ticket prices range from $49 to $299, but if you sign up before September 1st using the discount code “backintime” you can get in for just $99 (or $49 for students).

Among the impressive list of presenters are well-known locals Grant Skinner, Randy Troppmann, Erik Johnson, and Victor Rubba. If you’re at all involved in Flash and/or related technologies, this is one event you don’t want to miss!

Notes for 8/16/2009

Here are my weekly notes:

Edmonton Notes for 8/15/2009

Here are my weekly Edmonton notes:

Fringe 2009Fringe 2009

artsScene Edmonton Summer Party – August 20th

Back in May I attended the launch party for artsScene Edmonton – a fantastic event at Planet Ze Design Centre in Old Strathcona. I had a great time, and suggested that artsScene events could become “must attend” events for local creatives. The first test of that is coming up next week:

On August 20, we’re ready to bring you our second party – a “Jekyll & Hyde” themed summer party that promises to be bigger and better, with two venues, more featured artists, DJs, and live music acts!

They have since announced the performers, and they include: Kerri-Lenn Zwicker, Jay Sparrow, Field + Stream, The Outdoor Miners, and guest DJs The Cake Eaters and Roland Pemberton III.

The “Jekyll” part of the event starts at 6pm at Latitude 53 (10248 106th Street), while the “Hyde” part gets underway at 9pm at Prohibition (11026 Jasper Avenue). Tickets are just $15 online or $20 at the door and include access to both venues. You can pickup your tickets here.

Don’t forget artsScene Edmonton is on Twitter, Facebook, and they have a mailing list. They also recently joined LinkedIn, so get connected!

Hope to see you on the 20th!

State of the Edmonton Twittersphere – July 2009

Welcome to the seventh State of the Edmonton Twittersphere, my look at the intersection of Twitter and Edmonton. You can see last month’s stats here.

The source of the data this month has changed, slightly. In addition to Twitter Search, I added more data directly from Twitter itself. A total of 19,199 tweets were pulled from user timelines directly because they did not exist in Twitter Search.

User identification remains the same. If a user has his or her location set to Edmonton, St. Albert, Sherwood Park, Leduc, Nisku, Stony Plain, Fort Saskatchewan, Beaumont, Spruce Grove, or matching lat/long coordinates, they are considered an Edmontonian.

For July 2009:

# of local users: 5133 (an increase of 1491 from June)

To clarify, that means there were 5133 users who posted at least one tweet in July 2009 with their location set to something that makes them an Edmontonian as described above. This number should be treated as a minimum – there are probably many more Edmonton users without their location set.

I’m happy with my previous stats posts existing as point-in-time snapshots. That said, I am continually improving my data set, making it more accurate over time. I am still happy with the numbers I posted for January through May – they are reasonably accurate (within about 100 users). The number I posted for June however, 3642 users, is not accurate. It was actually 4581, which means this month actually increased by 552 users (however I left the 1491 above for consistency).

Here’s a graph to illustrate local user growth in 2009:

Here are the rest of the stats for July 2009:

# of tweets by local users: 210162
# of tweets by local users containing #yeg: 12879 (6.1%)
# of tweets by local users that were replies: 73119 (34.8%)
# of tweets by local users containing links: 43702 (20.8%)
# of tweets by local users that were retweets: 8393 (4.0%)
# of tweets by local users that were twooshes: 7185 (3.4%)

Once again, the number of tweets containing #yeg actually includes all local hashtags, such as #yegtransit or #yegfood (though most often they are used together anyway).

Here are the numbers above in graphic form (not corrected for June):

Here are the top clients used by local users for posting updates. You’ll notice that API is now identified separately from web:

Some other interesting stats for the month:

Finally, here are the top ten users in Edmonton by followers (most followers first): Pat_Lorna, revtrev, DrBarryLycka, LesM, subunit1, garrymullen, redneckmommy, mastermaq, NHL_Oilers, dan_cote.

Analysis

Looks like we’re getting some growth again, which is a little surprising considering it’s the summer. A couple of things helped to boost July’s stats, including the City Centre Airport issue and the big summer storms. I counted 1464 tweets posted by local users with the #ecca hashtag in July, and I already posted some stats on the storm here. Additionally, July 8th (which is when the Council meeting on the airport was held) was the second busiest day of the month.

Since January, I have identified just over 9200 local users. The number above, 5133, is how many of them were active in July.

I’ll post the Calgary stats as soon as I can – still some manual processing to do, so it might be next week before I get it all finished.