Twitter headquarters 'tags' wall with #Ferguson hashtag; #Foley next?

Brett T. | 6:32 PM on August 21, 2014

Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, a St. Louis native, was on the ground in Ferguson relatively early after the shooting of Michael Brown, marching with protesters, tweeting pictures from the scene, and even handing out roses to demonstrators.

STL native and @twitter co-founder @jack passing out roses to demonstrators on w florissant #Ferguson pic.twitter.com/eHclLN2wv0

— Elise Hu (@elisewho) August 19, 2014

It’s no surprise, then, to find that someone has painted #Ferguson in huge letters on the wall at Twitter headquarters.

@Elyssa that's really cool

— Justin Taylor (@TheSmarmyBum) August 21, 2014

https://twitter.com/TalkofSTL/status/502563193928294401

Some criticized Twitter for not allowing #Ferguson to trend on Twitter itself.

https://twitter.com/garbageville/status/502541953267798016

Hey @Elyssa, #ferguson might be at twitter, but it definitely isn't ON @twitter pic.twitter.com/jg4oNyo8j6”

— Chuck Fina (@charleyamerica) August 21, 2014

@Elyssa @OpFerguson I'm assuming someone literally tagged it since they blocked it from trending

— Jessie-Lynne (@JessieLynne) August 21, 2014

Yet they didn't let it trend “@Elyssa: came into work to see #Ferguson tagged in the #TwitterHQ commons. pic.twitter.com/Tpuo07Ene9”

— Queen Antifa (@frazierapproves) August 21, 2014

https://twitter.com/CityNewsKJ/status/502572431052402688

As TechCrunch explained last week, there are technical reasons that kept #Ferguson from dominating Twitter for the week:

…Twitter trends are determined not by the total volume of tweets, but the acceleration of those tweets. A trend is a reflection of that acceleration, relative to the acceleration of other tweets about other subjects.

So people who didn’t see a #Ferguson hashtag may have had nothing but their own network of friends to blame. Or they may have been located somewhere that the hashtag wasn’t accelerating more quickly than the other hashtags that were being displayed to them.

To be clearer: Twitter wouldn’t – and didn’t – actively censor or remove this trend.

#Ferguson did receive special treatment at Twitter HQ, however. What next? There must be more walls in the building.