According To Twitter’s Trending Topics, Lady Gaga Is Still Trapped On The X Factor

You may have noticed that Lady Gaga has once again breached Twitter’s trending topics. I wonder what she’s done this time? I know – let’s click on the trending topic directly and find out what Twitter has to say about it.

Um, I don’t think so. As the description actually states, Gaga’s performance on The X Factor was back on December 6. It seems extremely unlikely that this would be trending almost a month later, and doing a little research on the (far more reliable) What The Trend? or What The Hashtag? tells me that the real reason Gaga is trending is because she’s announced a tour in South America, including Brazil, in 2010.

If you look closely, #GaGainBrazil is also in Twitter’s top ten, clarifying the meme. And interestingly, they’ve got the right information there.

It’s a good idea to have explanations about the trending topics built into your own website, but it’s really, really poor that nobody has bothered updating this since December 6. Outdated explanations are of less value than no explanation at all.

Sort it out, Twitter. Hire some better people if that’s what it takes. Because if I have to leave your site to find out what is going on within it, you’ve failed.

UPDATE: Seconds after writing this article, Lady Gaga was removed from the trending topics, which is strange as she was nowhere near the bottom when I began to write it. I’m guessing Twitter favoured booting her off the list and having just the one Gaga-related meme, as opposed to, you know, doing a bit of work instead.

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