In “Race and Social Media,” Theresa M. Senft and Safiya Umoja Noble make reference to “Black Twitter.” The term describes a collection of public communication between people who identify as Black online and can connect over their shared experience, including similar concerns, tastes, and cultural practices. Although the phenomenon would normally go unnoticed by the rest of the platform’s users, Black Twitter users have managed to generate considerable attention through regular command of Twitter’s “trending topics” and savvy hashtag use. Recently, Black Twitter became the subject of an academic study, which was approached with scrutiny and suspicion (most prominently by the people it intended to study) quickly after it was announced.

Although the study had multiple issues, one of the most concerning seemed to be its researchers. It was first credited primarily to three White men, with one person of color also receiving credit. The distribution of the project team caused many to question the potentially exploitative nature of the research. Could the phenomenon be understood adequately and portrayed fairly by people who did not participate in Black Twitter and were not even Black themselves? Even after the seemingly accidental minimization of the lead researcher’s contribution was explained, the team’s research methods were found questionable. The researchers chose to record Black Twitter’s activity based on viewership of the television show Scandal, which was interpreted as trivializing the community, which tended to prioritize political activism more significantly than entertainment.

Lastly, the purpose of the study was not made clear, and many people interpreted the researchers’ desire to connect online activity to “offline participation in black culture and politics” as an attempt to identify Twitter users who would be likely to mobilize a protest based on events in that affect the Black community. The process of the study was not transparent; no one announced the research ahead of time and no one attempted to obtain consent from people affected by the study. The confusion surrounding the work highlighted questionable research practices and potential ethical dilemmas while managing to alienate the community being studied.