Twitter maps track which cities are friendly and which ones are impolite
Buffalo, New York, is one of the rudest places in America and residents of New York City are far friendlier than folks in the Midwest and the South, according to a series of maps compiled using Twitter comments.
The head-scratching revelations are the result of studying the prevalence of two simple phrases — ‘good morning’ and ‘f*** you’ — over the course of several days in June and early July.
Vertaline, a company that tracks works and phrases on Twitter for paying clients, conducted the study across 462 cities.
Naughty: Buffalo, New York, is bright red, showing an explosion of the use of ‘f*** you’ among tweeters in the city
Nice: Lubbock, Texas, and Philadelphia wants to wish the world a good morning, as shown on this map
The maps are patterned in the form of heat intensity images, with lighter colors meaning the term is less frequent and darker colors inferring a greater use of the term.
The results vary hour-to-hour and day-to-day as the maps unfold, though some conclusions are clear.
Lubbock seems an awfully friendly place. Without fail, ‘good morning’ blooms around the north Texas city every day of the study.
About 350 miles southeast in Dallas, Twitter users are significantly less polite and are shown piling on the ‘f*** yous’ more days than not.
Angels and Demons: Southern California was home to a host of both friendly and furious tweeters
Los Angles seems to be both the city of angels and of demons. Users in southern California offer plenty of polite greetings, but also dish out a tremendous amount of curses.
It still doesn’t compare to Buffalo. The city in western New York state is surprisingly upset.
It’s more vulgar than Philadelphia. Angrier than New York City. More miserable than Detroit and less content than Chicago.
That is, if the output of the town’s Twitter users is to be believed.
New York City, on the other hand, for all its hard reputation, seems to have a higher prevalence of ‘good mornings’ than any part of the South or the Midwest — both regions known for their hospitality.