Two years have passed since Meta discontinued CrowdTangle, a dashboard that tracked the spread of posts across Facebook and Instagram. Journalists, fact-checkers, and researchers used it for over a decade to follow viral content and observe how it moved through the platforms.
A Nieman Lab article now asks whether an AI tool can take its place. The piece treats that as an open question. It does not claim that an equal solution has already arrived.
The departure of CrowdTangle matters because it left a gap in the toolkit for journalists and researchers trying to understand social media dynamics. What will ultimately replace it, if anything, remains to be seen.