The Twitter of 2017 might best be remembered as the platform for the U.S. president’s morning complaints and (un)diplomatic sparring, followed by, nesting ground for Russian troll accounts. (Other notables: Uneven or even bad enforcement of policies, congressional testimony, pushes into livestreaming…)
@realDonaldTrump’s tweets were not, however, among the top most retweeted on Twitter in 2017, according to Twitter’s year-end data. The global honor went to — wait for it — the kid who really wanted a year’s worth of free Wendy’s chicken nuggets, and was told directly by the brand he needed 18 million retweets to secure the prize (he sadly got 3.6 million, but also the nuggets). Second place went to former president Barack Obama’s Nelson Mandela tweet (1.7 million).
HELP ME PLEASE. A MAN NEEDS HIS NUGGS pic.twitter.com/4SrfHmEMo3
— Carter Wilkerson (@carterjwm) April 6, 2017
For news outlets, @FoxNews took the top spot when it came to appearing most frequently in tweets (the count includes replies and RTs), followed by CNN. Here’s Twitter’s list of the top 10, along with the “top tweeted journalist/commentator at each” news organization. No surprises here, that Sean Hannity gets brought up a lot, or David Fahrenthold, of do-your-work-in-public-on-twitter fame, is the Washington Post’s most tweeted staffer."No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion…" pic.twitter.com/InZ58zkoAm
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 13, 2017
@FoxNews: @SeanHannity
@CNN: @JakeTapper
@NYTimes: @MaggieNYT
@MSNBC: @JoyAnnReid
@WashingtonPost: @Fahrenthold
@TheHill: @JoeConchaTV
@NBCNews: @BraddJaffy
@ABC: @GStephanopoulos
@POLITICO: @ddiamond
@AP: @ZekeJMillerThe most tweeted sports journalist of 2017? Jemele Hill.
Twitter wouldn’t share additional information such as total volume of RTs, mentions, or replies around each news outlet and respective top staffer, but a spokesperson confirmed that these calculations exclude tweets from known bots and Russia-linked trolls.
Topping the most-tweeted activism-related hashtags are all the variations of #MakeAmericaGreatAgain and #Resist:
#Resist
#MAGA
#ImpeachTrump
#TrumpTrain
#WomensMarch
#NotMyPresident
#BlackLivesMatter
#NoDAPL
#TakeAKnee
#BoycottNFL
In 2017, Twitter has been working hard to reposition itself as a place for news, and where news happens. It’s hosting BuzzFeed’s — quite good — AM to DM daily morning live show, and working with Bloomberg on a Twitter-native 24-hour news channel. Its top most-viewed livestreams of 2017:
“U.S. President Inauguration Day 2017 special live coverage (PBS) (1/20/17)
“UK Election Night Results special live coverage (BBC)” (6/8/17)
“Chasing Eclipse (The Weather Channel)” (8/21/17)
“Global Citizen Festival” (9/23/17)
“Dreamhack Summer “ (6/19/17)***Multi-day event
“Billboard GRAMMYs Pre-Show” (2/12/17)
“One Love Manchester Benefit Concert” (6/4/17)
“ESL ONE NYC” (9/16/17)***Multi-day event
DreamHack Masters Malmo (8/31/17)***Multi-day event
“American Music Awards Red Carpet Live” (11/19/17)