Social media and the unemployment line

The United Nations Global Pulse, along with analytics software specialist SAS, has revealed how social media streams can be used as predictors of national unemployment line spikes. By analysing more than half a million blogs, forums and news sites, the researchers were able to determine how social media chatter more specifically the 'conversation sentiment' expressed by it, could warn of pending unemployment increases as well as help to inform government policymakers of the likely impact of those increases.