Archiving Social Media Platform Content: An Exploratory Study of Projects and Software

Abstract

Human beings have used various means to communicate with others, including verbal, written, and visual forms. In the modern era, social communication has been profoundly influenced by the invention of the Internet and the subsequent emergence of social media platforms. By 2023, the number of social media users had reached 4.8 billion worldwide, representing 59.9% of the global population and 92.7% of Internet users. Statistics also indicate that social media has become an integral part of daily Internet use, with users spending an average of two hours and twenty-four minutes per day on social media and messaging applications.

This intensive use of social media platforms has transformed users from mere readers of content into publishers of content in all its forms. As a result, a massive volume of publicly accessible content has emerged within the scope of big data, reflecting users’ feelings, opinions, and ideas. Despite the informal nature of communication on social media platforms, archiving their content has become necessary due to the need to document the past and preserve the public record of accounts, particularly those of government institutions. Such content constitutes an informational asset for institutions, similar to email messages and official websites. Conversely, social media platforms state in their policies that they are not responsible for preserving users’ records, including all information published or shared through user accounts.

Accordingly, this study aims to identify the nature and importance of archiving social media platform content, examine the different methods used to harvest such content, highlight the most prominent global projects for archiving social media content, and identify the functional requirements of social media archiving software. The study adopts the content analysis method and uses an analysis form as a methodological tool for data collection. Its theoretical framework discusses the concept, history, importance, and challenges of social media archiving, as well as methods for collecting social media data and major global archiving projects. In its applied framework, the study examines eight social media archiving software tools, analyzing their general characteristics and functional requirements. It concludes with a set of findings and recommendations.