- Paul Fingleton
Who won the Leaders Debate according to increased Twitter Followers
Last night's Leaders Debate on RTÉ did not really show any clear winner, so we will have to resort to different means to try and gauge any advantage gained by the debate - Twitter.
Researchers from the Insight Centre for Data Analytics have been crunching the Twitter numbers as part of their Insight4Elections data analysis project. One participant won the night in the popularity stakes at least, gathering almost 1,500 new Twitter followers, Social Democrats Stephen Donnelly.

Who got the approval of Twitter last night?
Stephen Donnelly – +1457 followers
Richard Boyd Barrett - +555 followers
Gerry Adams – +308 followers
Lucinda Creighton - +181 followers
Micheal Martin - +157 followers
Enda Kenny - +125 followers
Joan Burton – +105 followers
How did the deputy leaders fare in their TV3 debate?
Mary Lou McDonald - +104 followers
Alan Kelly - +31 followers
Barry Cowen - +10 followers
James Reilly - +8 followers
Which parties have people been following in the past 24 hours?
Social Democrats - +424 followers
Sinn Fein - +165 followers
Fianna Fail – +129 followers
Green Party - +126 followers
Renua - +114 followers
Fine Gael - +113 followers
Labour - +69 followers
People Before Profit - +60 followers
Insight4Elections is a publicly available web tool where users can crunch the numbers for themselves. You can find the link here. http://insight4news.ucd.ie/