• See Trends for 100 more cities

    Wednesday, December 05, 2012

    Today, we’re bringing Trends to 100 more cities around the world including Istanbul, Frankfurt, Guadalajara and Incheon. With this update, we now surface the ‘most breaking’ news in more than 200 locations. To view Trends for different locations, just click “Change” in the Trends section.


    People around the world turn to Twitter to talk about a range of topics – from football to giving thanks to sharing information and resources during natural disasters and emergencies. This is why Twitter uniquely captures the pulse of the planet, and the pulse of your city: by surfacing the topics that people care about. We’ll continue to add Trends locations so that it’s easy for more people to quickly see what others are talking about, globally and locally.

    Posted by Kostas Tsioutsiouliklis (@kostas)
    Engineer, Search and Relevance
  • NFL on Twitter: Week 13

    Tuesday, December 04, 2012

    The @49ers and @STLouisRams were just 26 seconds away from their second tie of the season — but that didn’t land them on top of Twitter chatter this week. Instead, the top games were:

    

1. @giants vs. @redskins
    
2. @saints vs. @atlanta_falcons
    
3. @eagles vs. @dallascowboys

    

Players who received a good deal of Twitter attention this week were @drewbrees, Andrew Luck and @Mark_Sanchez.

 But understandably, fans and NFL players alike overwhelmingly expressed their shock and sorrow concerning the tragic deaths of @KCChiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher and Kasandra Perkins. Our thoughts are with the @NFL community and those affected. 




    Posted by Omid Ashtari (@omid)

    Head of Sports & Entertainment
  • Welcome, Pope Benedict XVI

    Monday, December 03, 2012

    Today, the Vatican announced that on December 12, which is the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Pope Benedict XVI (@pontifex) will be the first Pope to join Twitter. Beginning now, people everywhere will have a chance to Tweet questions relating to faith and belief using the hashtag #AskPontifex. Questions will be curated by the Vatican staff for the Pope to respond to via his new Twitter account on December 12th in a live tweeting event at the end of his weekly audience.

    Spiritual and religious leaders around the world spread their messages and maintain an exceptionally strong presence on Twitter. Perhaps not surprisingly, we see a very high level of engagement with religious and spiritual content: followers respond to these topics with replies, retweets, and clicks on links much more often than they do other subjects. From globally-recognized names to local pastors and faith groups, a wide range of spiritual leaders embrace Twitter to minister to their communities and share meaningful messages.

    While @Pontifex will be the Pope’s primary account in English, he will oversee many more accounts in major languages that offer translations of his Tweets, including these:
    - Spanish: @pontifex_es
    - Italian: @pontifex_it 
    - Portuguese: @pontifex_pt 
    - German: @pontifex_de
    - Polish: @pontifex_pl 
    - Arabic: @pontifex_ar
    - French: @pontifex_fr 

    The Pope’s presence on Twitter means that no matter where you live or where you are, you can connect with, and get inspiration directly from, one of the world’s most influential religious leaders.

    Posted by Claire Diaz Ortiz (@claire)
    Manager of Social Innovation
  • This Week on Twitter: 3 December

    On most Monday mornings, we’ll post “This week on Twitter” to alert you to key things happening in the coming week. Whether it’s a live chat with the cast of your favorite TV show, a Q&A with a political candidate or a pro sports team Tweepstakes, this is the way to keep current on the Can’t-Miss-Moments on Twitter for the week ahead. - Ed. 

    Dec 1-25: ABC Family’s 25 Days of Giving Back
    This effort started Dec. 1 and runs throughout ABC Family’s annual “25 Days of Giving Back.” The network is partnering with Feeding America (@feedingamerica) to help families in need during the holidays. To participate, you can donate and tweet by visiting www.abcfamily.com and following @abcfamily.


    Dec. 5: A&E’s Duck Dynasty (10:00-11:00 p.m. ET)
    A&E’s Duck Dynasty’s one hour Christmas Special will air this Wednesday, Dec. 5 from 10:00-11:00 p.m. ET. Fans are encouraged to tweet during the episode, and A&E will be rewarding tweeters with custom holiday cards based on the show’s characters. In addition, the series’ executive producer will answer your questions from @DuckDynastyAE.


    Dec. 6 - Scandal, ABC - #WhoShotFitz
    Following last week’s shocking episode of ABC’s Scandal (@scandalabc), you can speculate who shot character President Fitzgerald Grant using the hashtag #WhoShotFitz. Use the hashtag leading up to this Thursday’s airing at 10 p.m. ET., and visit the show’s event page here as the cast live-tweets the episode titled “Happy Birthday Mr. President”.


    Follow the Scandal cast and team on Twitter:
    Kerry Washington @kerrywashington
    Columbus Short @ColumbusShort1
    Guillermo Diaz @guillermodiazyo
    Katie Lowes @KatieQLowes
    Joshua Malina @JoshMalina
    Darby Stanchfield @darbystnchfld
    Tony Goldwyn @TonyGoldwyn
    Dan Bucatinsky @DanBucantinsky
    Jeff Perry @JscandalP
    Bellamy Young @BellamyYoung
    Shonda Rhimes @ShondaRhimes
    Scandal Writers @ScandalWriters

    Posted by Rachael Horwitz (@rachaelrad)

    Communications Team
  • NFL on Twitter: Week 12

    Tuesday, November 27, 2012

    It's no surprise that the @DallasCowboys, aka America’s team, and phenom rookie QB @RGIII placed the Cowboys / Redskins game as the most mentioned on Twitter for Week 12. Meanwhile, the other NFC East team, the @Giants, ended the @Packers' winning streak with a big 38-10 victory over Green Bay.

    Here are this week's most buzzed-about games:

    1. @DallasCowboys vs. @Redskins 
    2. @Packers vs. @Giants 
    3. @HoustonTexans vs. @DetroitLionsNFL 




    And the week's most tweeted-about player was @RGIII . 
    Posted by Omid Ashtari (@omid)
    Head of Sports & Entertainment
  • Twitter Fiction Festival selections

    After reviewing a wide array of entries from 20+ countries, the Twitter Fiction Festival selection panel has chosen a diverse array of storytelling projects to showcase during the Festival. The external panel was composed of experts from around the publishing industry in the US, but the showcase they’ve selected includes published and novice authors from all over the globe. These special Twitter experiments will be highlighted on a dedicated showcase page during the Festival, starting Wednesday.

    The Festival showcase will be a completely virtual event, taking place on Twitter with participants from five continents and stories in five languages. For five days, Wednesday, November 28 to Sunday, December 2, you’ll be able to find creative experiments in story-telling on Twitter around the clock.

    As the stories chosen by the panel are showcased during the Festival, we invite everyone else (whether you submitted or not) to tell your stories on Twitter during the Festival too! We’ll highlight a number of your stories from the @twitterbooks account.

    Whether you have a big idea or not, there are still some easy ways to get involved:
    - create a character and tell a story in his or her voice
    - tell a story from your own account
    - tell a story in a single Tweet
    ...and of course, any other creative ideas you have. Make sure to use the #twitterfiction hashtag so that readers can find your work.

    The Twitter Fiction Festival isn’t just for writers— it’s for readers too! You can enjoy the showcase selections at the #twitterfiction page. There will be stories being told on that page at all hours of the day during the Festival. You can also find and follow accounts telling stories during the festival by searching the #twitterfiction hashtag.

    Without further ado, here are the selections:

    Starting with the idea of a Twitter feed used as evidence, author Elliott Holt (@elliottholt) will tell the story of a crime. The audience will see that story unfold via three different perspectives, and then will have to weigh the presented evidence for themselves.
    Wednesday at 7pm EST (24:00 GMT) 

    Author Jennifer Wilson (@writerjenwilson) will invite Twitter users to help her write epigraphs for gravestones. Posting photographs of the existing stones, the community input will inspire short stories about each of the departed.
    Friday and Sunday at 12noon EST (17:00 GMT) 

    HarperCollins Australia (@HarperCollinsAU) presents “Around the World in 80 Hours”, a globe-trotting, media-mixing, collaborative story of intrigue. This story will be told with the help of authors Nikki Gemmell (@NikkiGemmell) and Greg Barron (@gregorybarron).
    Begins Thursday at 12am EST (05:00 GMT) 

    Perhaps no story is more powerful than a myth. Lucy Coats (@lucycoats) from Northampton UK, will re-tell 100 Greek myths in 100 Tweets.
    Wednesday 21 Nov. till Sunday 25 Nov. 9am EST (14:00 GMT) 

    “Censortive” is a story by a Chinese author that combines the words “censor” and “sensitive” and will explore the idea of permitted speech in the People’s Republic of China.
    Every night at 2am EST (7:00 GMT) 

    The Museo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología is itself a fiction: @munacyt is meant to create the desire for a Mexican national museum dedicated to science and technology. Over the course of the Festival, the Museum will take us on an expedition in Spanish to a future island in Mexico.
    Thursday through Sunday at 11pm EST (4:00 GMT) 

    Digital publisher Plympton and Code Meets Print have joined forces to invite readers to submit “Very Short Fiction” using the hashtag #VSS.
    Throughout the Festival 

    In a project inspired by Italo Calvino’s “Italian Folktales”, @00serialTW is posting Twitter versions of folk tales in Italian.
    Thursday through Sunday at 4am EST (09:00 GMT) 

    Marcel Lasoen, a very old man, has taken to Twitter to reconnect with his family. Author Marc Capelle, tweeting in French, will bring us @MarcelLasoen's story.
    Thursday through Sunday at 6am EST (11:00 GMT) 

    Shakespeare is eminently quotable, and publisher W.W. Norton (@wwnorton) will take advantage of that to offer “Found Shakespeare” selections, retweeting classic lines together into segments of the Bard’s plays.
    Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday at 12noon EST (17:00 GMT) 

    The Gronsteins are a modern American family going through a tough time after Dad lost his job. In Ben Schrank’s (@BDSchrank) story, they share a Twitter account from which they chronicle life in their home.
    Wednesday through Saturday at 1pm EST (18:00 GMT) 

    London-based Faiq Muneef brings an Arabic language story to the Festival with the story of “The Crying Canary”.
    Sunday at 8am EST (13:00 GMT) 

    Writing in French, Fabrice Colin (@fabricecolin) will bring us the serialized story of five strangers trapped on a bus and sharing an incredible experience.
    Thursday to Sunday at 7am EST (12:00 GMT) 

    Emmy Laybourne (@emmylaybourne) and Anna Banks (@byannabanks) will put a humorous spin on the paranormal young adult story with love affair between a teenage girl and a...Sasquatch.
    Wednesday through Sunday at 4pm EST (21:00 GMT) 

    For author Kurt Crisman (@unpublishedguy) online descriptions of TV episodes tell a story all their own. He’ll weave a whole story together out of these to describe five seasons of a science fiction show with an absurdist twist.
    Every day, updated hourly

    In the 1960s, @FathomButterfly was a notorious English B-movie star, beauty queen and showgirl. Author Josh Gosfield (@JoshGosfield) has recently convinced her to write a “memoir in Tweets”.
    When: Wednesday through Sunday at 5pm EST (22:00 GMT)

    “ManyPasts” (or “MuchoPasados”) is a writing game designed by Alberto Chimal (@albertochimal). In English and Spanish, and with the help of the Twitter community, Tweets will form branching stories.
    Friday and Sunday at 8pm EST (01:00 GMT) 

    Plenty of mothers overlook the faults of their children, and The Proud Zombie Mom might be one of the worst offenders. According to Andrew Shaffer (@andrewtshaffer) she insists her zombie daughter only has “life allergies.”
    Wednesday through Sunday at 11am EST (16:00 GMT)

    Come to dinner with Dana Sachs (@DanaSachs), who will be working with different literary characters to serve up Stone Soup, a celebration of great writing and (perhaps) truly bizarre food. 
    Saturday at 8pm EST (01:00 GMT)

    Ifeoluwapo Odedere offers a satire, written in the style of the King James Bible, about a Nigerian community whose attempts to find a sustainable power source are continually thwarted by a saboteur.
    Thursday through Saturday at 8am EST (13:00 GMT) 

    Stevie Ronnie (@stevieronnie), from Newcastle UK, will tell an interactive poem of 50 lines that, when complete, can be read in either direction.
    Saturday and Sunday at 10am EST (15:00 GMT)

    In a tense psychological thriller, Andrew Pyper (@andrewpyper) re-tells the classic Henry James ghost story “The Turn of the Screw” — set in a present-day White House. We will follow the Tweets of the new nanny, who is increasingly convinced something strange is afoot.
    Thursday through Sunday at 7pm EST (00:00 GMT) 

    Writing from South Africa, author Lauren Beukes (@laurenbeukes) will challenge herself to write #LitMash stories: taking incongruous community suggestions (the weirder the better!) and telling a story that matches them.
    Wednesday, Thursday and Friday at 10am EST (15:00 GMT) 

    From the city that brought us Dashiell Hammett, author Scott Hutchins (@ScottHutch) will tell a modern day detective noir tale illustrated with pictures from around San Francisco.
    Wednesday through Sunday at 6pm EST (23:00 GMT)

    Lily is a girl who has to make a tough choice of one of two paths. Thanks to this story from Zoe Ruderman (@zoemarianna), we’ll be able to follow Lily’s story down both routes.
    Thursday at 8pm; Friday through Sunday at 1pm EST (18:00 GMT)

    Joe and Veronica are two cubicle serfs who had a relatively banal love affair and break-up. Alina Simone (@alinasimone) will enliven the re-telling of their story with illustrations and other media. 
    Thursday at 2pm EST (19:00 GMT) 

    A group of four authors in Paris plan to work together to build collaborative sonnets in French, which they call #TwitRature.
    Thursday to Sunday at 5am EST (10:00 GMT) 

    Over a hundred years ago Ambrose Bierce betrayed a man by the name of Ulysses McGraw. Now come back to life, McGraw will tell his story with the help of Brian O’Connor, writing from South Korea.
    Friday to Sunday at 1am EST (06:00 GMT) 

    Writing in Argentina, Marcos Pereyra will bring us a prequel to his Spanish language Twitter thriller “Te sigo” (“I am following you”).
    Thursday to Sunday at 10pm EST (03:00 GMT) 

    See you tomorrow at the Festival!

    Posted by Andrew Fitzgerald (@magicandrew)
    Media R&D
  • Giving and receiving thanks

    Wednesday, November 21, 2012

    That most American holiday, Thanksgiving, is upon us. Lots of you are turning to Twitter to express gratitude for the things you feel most grateful for this year — and it turns out that besides being an easy way to give thanks, Twitter is a useful tool for discovering more ways to give back. Food banks and volunteer organizations are tweeting about how people can give back this Thanksgiving season. You’ll find lots of opportunities to support a wide range of community needs. As #Sandy victims are still very much in need, some of the Twitter examples here suggest ways to help make this season brighter for those affected by the storm:
    No matter where you live, you can follow your local food bank on Twitter to help your neighbors. Here are a few Twitter accounts serving regional and local communities around the country. Posted by Karen Wickre (@kvox) Editorial Director
  • #OnlyOnTwitter: Taking office

    Friday, November 16, 2012

    During this election cycle, candidates used Twitter to take voters all along the campaign journey. Now, the winners have headed to Washington to prepare for the new term. Tweets from the new and re-elected members offer a glimpse of what the Capitol will look when the 113th Congress convenes.

    Senators-elect Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Ted Cruz of Texas and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts shared pictures as they visited their new digs:

    News also broke out about who will fill leadership positions in the upcoming session:
    Veteran Congressional leaders also celebrated the historically diverse influx of new electees, with record numbers of women and minorities.
    House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi reflected on this diversity:
    Senator Barbara Mikulski, the longest-serving female in Congress, hosted a lunch for current and incoming women Senators:
    The record number of women Senators also presented a bit of logistical problem, as we learned from two Senators who tweeted about an impromptu meeting with their new colleagues:
    Posted by Bridget Coyne (@bcoyne)
    Government, News, & Social Innovation Team
  • Search for a new perspective

    Thursday, November 15, 2012

    Over the last few months we’ve made it easier to search for what’s happening in real time with autocomplete, related queries and spelling corrections. And starting today you’ll see better search results that highlight the photos, videos and news shared on Twitter, all wrapped up in more social context tailored for you.


    Here are three new elements you’ll see when you search:

    View photos and videos first: People tell incredible stories on Twitter through photos and videos. When you search for a person, an event or a hashtag, you can now see a grid of the most relevant media above the stream of Tweets.

    See headlines and photos: You can also see media instantly in your search results stream on iPhone and Android. Photos and article summaries automatically show previews to give you a bird’s eye view on what’s happening.

    Understand context: About a year ago we launched tailored ranking of your search results, but until now you couldn't see why a specific Tweet might matter more to you. Now you can see context like who favorited or retweeted right there in the Tweet.

    You can enjoy these results now on twitter.com and updated mobile apps for iPhone and Android. Stay tuned, as we continue to make search on Twitter an easier, more delightful experience.

    Posted by Tian Wang - @wangtian
    Engineer, Search and Relevance

  • More to see on iPhone and Android

    In the past few months we’ve expanded the Tweet so you can enjoy more with 140 characters. You can now view article and photo previews from more than 2,000 partners or view photos and videos in beautiful fullscreen. And now it’s easier for you to see this great content when you check Discover or search to find out what’s happening.


    See headlines and photos: Now you can preview photos and article summaries without a tap in Discover and search results. This new design for mobile brings the content of each Tweet front and center, so you can easily enjoy the view.

    Discover popular Tweets: Find out what’s popular among the people you’re connected to in a simple stream of Tweets, like Discover on twitter.com. Just tap “View all Tweets” to see a continuous stream of news, photos and other stories shared by the people in your network.

    Search for a new perspective: In search, photos from relevant results also appear right at the top of the stream so you can see what’s happening from multiple perspectives. You can also understand what's resonating in your network with context like who favorited a Tweet.

    Keep an eye out as we continue to improve search and Discover so that you can learn about what’s happening around the world, while you’re out in the world. Get the new apps to see more today.

    Posted by Sung Hu Kim - @sunghu
    Product Manager, Mobile