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A story carries four numbers describing the conversation behind it, when the desk could measure them. They are measured at publication, so the pulse describes the moment the story went out, not the moment you are reading it. Where the conversation could not be measured at all, the panel says so in place of the numbers.
The community pulse strip: mindshare, smart engagement, smart voices and reach, each with a caption explaining what it counts
Each number carries its own caption in the product, so you never have to remember which denominator you are looking at.

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The bar

Two of those numbers count only accounts that clear the desk’s bar, which separates established accounts from throwaways. It is deliberately dull. It keeps burner accounts out of the count without pretending to measure influence, because clearing the bar says nothing about whether an account is right. That is also why smart voices is shown as a fraction. Two voices out of five authors is a different story from two out of fifty, and the fraction keeps you from reading a small number as a big one.

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Missing is not zero

When the desk cannot account for every post behind a number, it withholds the number instead of estimating it, and the caption tells you which case you are looking at. A zero on this panel is a measured zero.
This is the rule that makes the panel worth reading. A dash means the desk could not measure it honestly. A zero means it measured, and the answer was nothing: nobody who cleared the bar engaged with it. Those are opposite facts, and most dashboards render them identically.

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What the pulse does not tell you

Not a price signal

Loud is not the same as going up. Chatter frequently peaks after the move, not before it.

Not a quality score

Reach counts impressions, not merit. A promoted narrative can travel far and still be empty.

Not live

Measured at publication. The market strip beside it keeps moving, which is exactly the contrast the page is for.
Read the pulse next to the community read and the audit panels. Volume of talk, direction of talk, and what is true on the chain are three separate questions, and the dossier keeps them separate on purpose.