# Glossary ### Actor Actor is our generic term for all the different entities in the world who are communicating online, like organizations, people, companies, institutions, campaigns, community groups and so on. Actors own and operate online communications [*channels*](#channel) across different platforms, like Facebook accounts, TikTok accounts, YouTube channels, Telegram channels, and podcast feeds for example. Actors communicate across all these channels in coordinated and complex ways. Junkipedia allows you to [monitor all of an actor’s channels](https://docs.junkipedia.org/getting-started/social-media-monitoring/using-actor-sets), so you avoid missing important parts of their overall story.

Actors have many channels.

Let’s look at an example. Our *actor* will be [Randi McCallian, 2024 candidate for the US House of Representatives](https://www.junkipedia.org/actor_sets/2/actors/4027). McCallian has 5 *channels* being tracked in Junkipedia: accounts on [Twitter](https://www.junkipedia.org/channels/8398509), [Facebook](https://www.junkipedia.org/channels/25517069), [TikTok](https://www.junkipedia.org/channels/9358945), [YouTube](https://www.junkipedia.org/channels/25508229) and [Instagram](https://www.junkipedia.org/channels/25518008).

Actor Randi McCallian is linked to five channels being tracked in Junkipedia.

Actors are added to Junkipedia through [*actor sets*](#actor-set). ### Actor Set Actor sets are collections of common [actors](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Cv6ADWKy4X4Fam5Xhxr5neBlAxq6jM7l14SsMXZJfcE/edit#heading=h.mcbokasneg60) (like people and organizations) that [you can use as free starting points for your research](https://docs.junkipedia.org/getting-started/social-media-monitoring/using-actor-sets), provided by Junkipedia. For example, [US Politicians - Federal](https://www.junkipedia.org/actor_sets/2) is an actor set that includes politicians as actors—in fact, all the incumbents and candidates who ran for federal office in 2024 in the US House, Senate, and for President. In Junkipedia, you can [see the latest online activity](https://docs.junkipedia.org/getting-started/social-media-monitoring/using-actor-sets#monitoring-with-actor-sets) across all of the channels belonging to all of the actors in an actor set. With the actor set [US Politicians - Federal](https://www.junkipedia.org/actor_sets/2) for example, you can see[ the online posts with the most engagement across all these politicians in the last week](https://www.junkipedia.org/monitoring?sort_by=engagement\&sort_order=desc\&actor_set_id%5B%5D=2), and filter and [chart](https://www.junkipedia.org/monitoring?actor_set_id%5B%5D=2\&breakdown_attribute%5Bactor_set%5D=105\&group_by=1h\&sort_by=engagement\&sort_order=desc\&view_as=chart) these posts in all kinds of useful ways.

Actor Sets have many actors, who can each have many channels.

Every actor set has a set of attributes that describe and categorize its actors, allowing you to filter and compare within the group. For example, the [US Politicians - Federal](https://www.junkipedia.org/actor_sets/2) actor set has many attributes. It has an attribute called ‘Registered Political Party’, which allows you to filter down to see [only online activity from ‘Democratic Party’ politicians](https://www.junkipedia.org/monitoring?actor_set_id%5B%5D=2\&breakdown_attribute%5Bactor_set%5D=105\&group_by=1h\&sort_by=published_at\&sort_order=desc\&view_as=card\&actor_set_attributes%5B105%5D=4020). It has another attribute, ‘State’, which allows you to filter down to look at [online activity from just the politicians running for office in Michigan](https://www.junkipedia.org/monitoring?actor_set_attributes%5B99%5D=4077\&actor_set_id%5B%5D=2\&breakdown_attribute%5Bactor_set%5D=105\&group_by=1h\&sort_by=published_at\&sort_order=desc\&view_as=card), for example. There is a lot of flexibility in how you can combine and compare these attributes, and also export the data for your extended analysis. Currently, new actor sets are being added by the Junkipedia team, however we know that many researchers have their own actor sets they would like to use and share through Junkipedia. Please [contact us](https://www.junkipedia.org/contact) if you have actor sets you would like to load into the system, as we are hoping to trial this new feature in the coming months. ### Alert Junkipedia allows you to subscribe to alert notifications when new [issues](#issue) matching pre-defined search criteria become available to you in the system. For more details on this feature, see [creating-saved-search-alerts](https://docs.junkipedia.org/getting-started/reviewing-tracked-content/creating-saved-search-alerts "mention"). ### Boolean Operators When using Junkipedia text search features, the "boolean operators" option allows symbolic logic expressions to be used. With this option following logical operators are supported: * `+` signifies AND operation ([When using the API, the code "%2B" may be substituted](https://docs.junkipedia.org/api/query-string-parameters/text-search-parameters#why-this-awkward-code)) * `|` signifies OR operation * `(` and `)` signify precedence * `-` signifies NOT operation * `"` quotes a literal string to signify a phrase for searching To use these operators, consider a sample database containing the following records: A.) lions and tigers and bears B.) snakes and lizards and bears C.) bears and snakes The following search string using the AND operation would yield results B & C. snakes + bears The following search string using the OR operation would yield results A & B. lions | lizards The following search string combines the above operations with parenthetical groupings and yields results A & B. lions | (snakes + lizards) The following search string using the NOT operator yields A & C. \- lizards The following search string using literal quotes yields A & B. "and bears" ### Channel A [platform](#platform) specific source of [social media posts](#post) is often called a channel. A channel can be as simple as all public posts from a specific social media user identity or something more complex that multiple users can selectively contribute to. ### Content In the context of social media [platforms](#platform), or websites in general, content refers to information shared in any of the various forms supported by the platform such as images, video, text, and links to other content. ### Engagement In the context of social media [platforms](#platform), engagement is ### Feed In the context of social media [platforms](#platform) a feed is a series of [posts](#post) that have been algorithmically placed in a queue for the user's consumption. ### Follower / Following [Social media users](#user) can influence the [content](#content) appearing in their [feeds](#feed) by subscribing to [channels](#channel) that they wish to follow. In many cases, it is possible to view the relationships between channels and their followers. Great attention is paid to the number of users following a specific channels as an [engagement](#engagement) metric. ### Issue In Junkipedia, an issue is a collection of information about a piece of tracked content. This content arrives to Junkipedia as a tip which generates an issue if it is if the tip is approor automated monitoring system. When the same piece of content is received multiple times, each source is tracked in the issue. Issues are specific to a network and can only be seen by other users in the same network. See [tip-issue-narrative-pipeline](https://docs.junkipedia.org/what-is-junkipedia/tip-issue-narrative-pipeline "mention") for an explanation of the relationship between tips, issues, and narratives. ### Link A means of referring to a specific piece of online [content](#content) such as a web page or [social media post](#post). ### List In the context of the Crowdtangle and Junkipedia social media monitoring systems, a list (a.k.a. monitoring list) refers to a list of content collection criteria. The criteria can include social media platforms, specific channels on those platforms, and specific search terms. ### List Group A list group (aka group list) is a container that allow multiple lists to be grouped together in a nested fashion like a computer file folder. This allows you to provide structure to your collection of lists when organizing a large number of them. For more details on this feature, see [Broken link](https://docs.junkipedia.org/reference-material/broken-reference "mention"). ### Monitoring The Junkipedia monitoring system allows you to describe content you are interested in collecting from social media platforms without having to go directly to those platforms for updates. Instead, you can set up a feeds that periodically collect data from the platforms and let you view it within Junkipedia. ### Narrative In Junkipedia, a narrative is a false or misleading story first noticed in one tip and tracked across multiple tips and issues as the story spreads through social media. ### Network A network is a group of [organizations](#organization) that share a focus. When organizations are added, Junkipedia staff members assign them to the appropriate networks. Network examples include: * Misinformation News Monitoring * Election Protection ### Organization Junkipedia relates users from the same organization or team by linking their individual user accounts to an organization account. ### Platform In the context of Junkipedia, a social media platform is a service such as Facebook or Twitter that allows people to post and share information (aka [content](#content)) online. ### Post A unit of [content](#content) shared via a social media platform. ### Role Junkipedia users can be assigned roles that determine privileges they have within the system. See [Inviting New Users](https://docs.junkipedia.org/getting-started/managing-your-team/inviting-new-users#junkipedia-roles) for specific role options. ### Saved Search A saved search stores pre-defined search criteria in the system. This allows you to come back to a complex search query for future use and allows to assign a search query to an automated process. For more details on this feature, see [creating-saved-search-alerts](https://docs.junkipedia.org/getting-started/reviewing-tracked-content/creating-saved-search-alerts "mention") ### Tag A tag is a term used to uniformly assign a specific meaning to items in the database. For example, the term "covid-19" is used as a tag assigned to [issues](#issue) relevant to the Covid 19 pandemic. Multiple users have collaboratively standardized on the use of this tag to eliminate questions about which of several synonymous terms should be used to identify this topic. ### Tip Tips refer to content on social media that someone suspects to be problematic. Tips can be submitted by Junkipedia by [within the app](https://docs.junkipedia.org/getting-started/reporting-and-documenting-misinformation/submitting-tips-within-junkipedia) or by anyone [from outside the app](https://docs.junkipedia.org/getting-started/reporting-and-documenting-misinformation/using-tiplines-outside-of-junkipedia) using [tiplines](#tipline). See [tip-issue-narrative-pipeline](https://docs.junkipedia.org/what-is-junkipedia/tip-issue-narrative-pipeline "mention") for an explanation of the relationship between tips, issues, and narratives. ### Tipline Tiplines make it easy for anyone to report problematic content. People can submit [tips](#tip) to Junkipedia through a tipline without having to set up an account and logging into the system. [Here is an example of a tipline as a web form](https://www.junkipedia.org/tips/031b60a2-71a3-4497-9101-13646a0f1ae1). Organizations using Junkipedia can create tiplines to be shared with their constituents via web forms, SMS, and other media. ### User A person using an online service such as Junkipedia or a social media platform is often referred to as a user. If the service can only be used with a registered identity, that identity is often established with a user account. --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://docs.junkipedia.org/reference-material/glossary.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.