Obtaining API access (Twitter, YouTube)

Obtaining API access (Twitter, YouTube)

Last update 23/01/2020

With VOSON Dashboard and vosonSML, you can collect network and text data from, Twitter, YouTube and Reddit. However for these data sources you will require access to the respective application programming interfaces (APIs). This section provides some information on how to get these API credentials (note: the APIs associated web pages do change periodically, so the information below may not be up-to-date).

  • Twitter
    To access the Twitter API, you need to have a Twitter account. To sign up for an individual developer account log into Twitter, then go to the Twitter Developers site, and press the "Create an app" button.  You need to indicate a primary reason to request API access e.g. doing academic research, and you will have to fill in some information including the name of the app e.g. "BigDataCourse", description, website, etc.  You do not need to enter the "Callback URL". You will have to supply a description on how the app will be used. Try to provide as much detail as possible, as Twitter developer accounts are increasingly difficult to obtain, and there can be a lengthy approval process. After agreeing to terms and conditions and (if you haven't already done so) supplying a valid phone number in your Twitter profile, your app will be created.  Access your app and go to the "Keys and Tokens" tab.  The "Consumer API keys" (API key and API secret key) and the "Access token" & "Access token secret" will need to be supplied to VOSON Dashboard or vosonSML. For security, API tokens (Access token and Access token Secret) are only displayed once. You will need to regenerate access tokens for previously authenticated apps. For more on Twitter apps, see the Twitter Developers Site.
  • YouTube
    To access the YouTube API, you need to have a Google account.  When logged into Google, then go to the Google APIs Console and create a project (if you already don't have one).  Then go to the navigation menu (top LHS) APIs&Services->Enable APIs and Services select and enable YouTube Data API version 3.  This API should then appear in the Enabled APIs tab.  Then go to APIs and Services->Credentials and generate a Public API access key.  The API key then needs to be supplied to VOSON Dashboard or vosonSML.

The following data sources used to be available for collection and have been removed because of changes in the APIs. Find them below for historical reference.

  • Facebook [ Not longer available] Facebook collection in vosonSML is no longer available, due to changes in the API (v2.11) which came into effect in February 2018. It is not possible to collect data on likes or comments on posts on Facebook pages, unless the API access token is created by the page's owner. 
  • Instagram [no longer available] Note that due to Instagram API changes effective 1 June 2016, vosonSML can no longer provide access to Instagram data.