The Network is an ongoing project to visualize political activity on Twitter during the Swiss votes of October 2019. The project uses the Twitter API and supports the thesis that APIs always provide only a small insight into a network. Between the 17th and 20th of October, I collected around 12’000 Tweets with the help of a bot-like script written in NodeJs. Simultaneously this provided me with the necessary knowledge on programming a Social Bot. The search query consisted of the following political profiles from parties and candidates and political hashtags:

@SVPch, @jungesvp, #svp, #svpschweiz, #svpch, #jsvp, #jungesvp, #jsvpschweiz, #jsvpch, #svpwählen, jsvpwählen, #freiundsicher, #ZukunftVerteidigen, @BDPSchweiz, @JBDP_CH, #bdp, #bdpschweiz, #bdpch, #jbdp, #jbdpschweiz, #jbdpch, #bdpwählen, #jbdpwählen, #generationBDP, #langweiligabergut, @FDP_Liberalen, @Jungfreisinnige, #fdp, #fdpschweiz, #fdpch, #jungfreisinnige, #fdpwählen, #jungfreisinnigewählen, #jetztFDPwählen, #fdpwählen, #möglichmachen, #gemeinsamweiterkommen, @CVP_PDC, @JCVPSchweiz, #cvp, #cvpschweiz, #cvpch, #cvppdc, #jcvp, #jungecvp, #jcvpschweiz, #cvpwählen, #jcvpwählen, @spschweiz, @JusoSchweiz, #sp, #spschweiz, #spch, #juso, #jusoschweiz, #SPwählen, #jusowählen, #sozialdemokratischepartei, #Linksrutsch, #darumstarkeSP, #fürallestattfürwenige, #ändernwasdichstört, @GrueneCH, @jGruene_jVertEs, #grüneschweiz, #grünech, #jungegrüne, #jungegrüneschweiz, #jungegrünech, #klimawahl2019, #darumgrün, #grüngewinnt, #frauenjahr2019, #haltungzeigen, #KlimavorProfit, #grünewählen, #jungegrünewählen, @grunliberale, @jglpCH, #grünliberale, #glp, #glpschweiz, glpch, #jungegrünliberale, #jglp, #jglpch, #jglpschweiz, #glpwählen, #jglpwählen, #EsistZeit, #ZugStattFlug

The collected Tweets were pruned and geographically mapped across Switzerland. The project has shown that more complex undertakings usually require the use of different APIs to collect, analyze and visualize the data. For example, was the Twitter API used to collect the date, while two APIs by Google helped to define the Tweet's geographic origin and placing it on the map of Switzerland.

While the complete data set amounts to ruffly 12'000 Tweets, the work at present only visualizes 3456 Tweets. This is because the geographical origin could not be determined beyond doubt for all Tweets. A more in-depth analysis of the collected material will be carried out during spring 2020.