Open methodology
How we know something is moving—and when we can explain why.
The Attention Index is a transparent newsroom-prioritization signal. It is not a count of searches, audience size or public sentiment.
1. Detection
We poll the Google Trends Trending Now RSS feed every ten minutes for the United States and Great Britain. The regions stay separate. We store the topic, Google’s approximate traffic bucket, observation time and attached news metadata. Attached links are discovery leads only; their article bodies are not copied.
2. The WITT Attention Index
The index runs from 0 to 100 and is the sum of four capped components:
| Component | How it is calculated | Limit |
|---|---|---|
| Traffic level | A logarithmic normalization of the lower bound in Google’s displayed bucket. | 70 |
| Velocity | The ratio between the current and previous stored bucket for the same episode and region. | 15 |
| Coverage | Two points per distinct coverage item attached to the current public signal. | 10 |
| Cross-region | Presence of the same entity in another monitored region within the active window. | 5 |
Because public buckets are approximate, a change in the index can reflect a bucket boundary rather than an exact proportional change in searches. We preserve the readings so that the lifecycle can be audited.
3. Episode and momentum states
An episode begins when a topic first appears in a region. Growth can label it igniting, surging or peaking; a material fall labels it cooling. If it remains unseen beyond the stale window, it ends. A later spike can become a new episode rather than rewriting the old one.
4. Cause verification
A visible spike is not proof of its cause. Our research pipeline traces the earliest plausible trigger using original publishers, official statements, filings, direct creator posts and public records, then an independent pass compares the draft with that evidence. Claims are assigned confirmed, probable, disputed or unresolved status. If the trigger remains unresolved, the signal page says so and no indexable explanation is published.
5. Known limitations
- Google’s feed is selective and bucketed; it does not represent all searches.
- Attached coverage can lag or mischaracterize the underlying event.
- Cross-region presence is currently limited to monitored geographies.
- The index measures observed attention dynamics, not truth, importance or approval.
Questions about the formula may be sent to [email protected].