NEW: @C_AguilarGarcia and I ran the numbers on the party leaders& #39; Facebook pages.

It& #39;s not scientific, but it does tell you something about the campaign

Mainly: the new social media star system is real disadvantage for Jo Swinson https://news.sky.com/story/general-election-jo-swinson-has-a-facebook-problem-11855013">https://news.sky.com/story/gen...

This is the leaders& #39; pages measured by the number of likes they have. That& #39;s just one signal on Facebook - and a pretty weak one if all your likes are old - but it still influences the algorithm and helps generate social proof

Swinson& #39;s page is tiny compared to her rivals

Swinson& #39;s page has grown by almost 50% since she became leader of the Lib Dems, the most of any party leader

But when it comes to absolute numbers, that growth is very small

This is the really interesting bit. @C_AguilarGarcia analysed the emoji reactions to the leaders& #39; Facebook posts.

You know how on Facebook you can react with https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="u2764ufe0f" title="Red heart" aria-label="Emoji: Red heart">, https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="ud83dude2e" title="Face with open mouth" aria-label="Emoji: Face with open mouth">, https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="ud83dude06" title="Smiling face with open mouth and tightly-closed eyes" aria-label="Emoji: Smiling face with open mouth and tightly-closed eyes">, https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="ud83dude25" title="Disappointed but relieved face" aria-label="Emoji: Disappointed but relieved face">or https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="ud83dude21" title="Pouting face" aria-label="Emoji: Pouting face">? Here& #39;s what responses the leaders generated
https://news.sky.com/story/general-election-jo-swinson-has-a-facebook-problem-11855013">https://news.sky.com/story/gen...

I find the details here so fascinating. For instance, why does Corbyn generate much more sadness than other leaders?

One reason is this post here. Between July 22 and November 4 it received more sad reactions than any other post by a party leader

This is the post that received the most angry responses - inevitably it came from Facebook anger machine Nigel Farage. Fully 40% of the reactions to his posts are anger!

This is another really interesting thing. We looked at which platforms the leaders use - and what stands out to me is how often Jo Swinson posts to Twitter rather than Facebook (where in general there& #39;s more engagement)

This is not, I would suggest, a very efficient strategy

Anyway, it& #39;s all in here, with @C_AguilarGarcia& #39;s lovely graphs made using @f_l_o_u_r_i_s_h. We& #39;ll be returning to this over the course of the campaign to see what, if anything, changes https://news.sky.com/story/general-election-jo-swinson-has-a-facebook-problem-11855013">https://news.sky.com/story/gen...