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Opinion

How Twitter Changed the World, in 25 Tweets

Opinion

How
Twitter
Changed
The
World,
In 25
Tweets

On Wednesday, Twitter announced that users who pay extra will be able to send their thoughts into the world in tweets of up to 4,000 characters, instead of 280 or less. A few hours later, the site glitched. Users couldn’t tweet; they couldn’t DM; #TwitterDown began trending. All of it — the muddled sense of identity, the breakdown of basic function — confirmed the sense that Twitter, a site that has hosted the global conversation for almost two decades, had become a rickety shell of itself, that its best days were behind it and that it would never be as significant again.

But what, exactly, is being lost? We wanted to capture the ways that Twitter — a platform used by a tiny percentage of the world’s population — changed how we protest, consume news, joke and, of course, argue. So we set ourselves to the task of sorting through the trillions of tweets sent since 2006 to determine which were just noise and which deserved a place in the history books. And then we asked: Could we maybe even … rank them?

What you see below is our list, compiled with the help of experts, of the 25 most important tweets. Like all such rankings, we hope it can serve as a starting point for discussions and arguments, both on Twitter and off. What was ranked too high? Too low? What did we leave off?

Yes, we know: There’s something a little absurd about this exercise. Twitter contains such a wide range of humanity: How do you rank the tweet that got Justine Sacco canceled against the tweet that ignited #MeToo?

And yet this list tells a bigger story about how 17 years of messy, vibrant, sometimes ugly, always lively conversation has shaped the world. Just where did “Hope I don’t get AIDS. Just kidding. I’m white!” land compared with “If you’ve been sexually harassed or assaulted write ‘me too’ as a reply to this tweet”? You’ll have to scroll to find out.

How We Did It: To compile this ranking, Times Opinion rounded up a group of panelists with widely varied backgrounds but one thing in common: They know a lot about Twitter. (The full list of panelists is at the bottom of the article.) We asked them to submit tweets they thought were good candidates for the most important of all time, with the only criterion being that the tweets had to be in English. We used these to create a list, then sent that list back out to our panelists with instructions to rank the tweets in order of importance and to share their insights about them: why they thought a tweet was important or why it wasn’t. We then crunched the numbers and compiled their insights, edited for content and clarity, into the list you see here.

No. 1
@Alyssa_Milano
Alyssa_Milano

If you’ve been sexually harassed or assaulted write ‘me too’ as a reply to this tweet.

Oct 15, 2017 19.8K
Backstory
The idea of #MeToo, first raised by the activist Tarana Burke, had been around for more than a decade before October 2017. But Alyssa Milano's tweet, combined with the force of new reporting on Harvey Weinstein, suddenly gave it a broad audience — and #MeToo stories were everywhere. Did they achieve meaningful change, though? We're still debating that.
Our Panelists Say
Moira Weigel, Professor of communication studies at Northeastern University
The hashtag #MeToo offered a new way for women to share our common experiences and solidarity without having to spill, or define ourselves by, stories of private trauma. Part of its stickiness also had to do with the debates it inspired about the digital public sphere and its limits. What counts as private and what counts as news in an era when whisper networks, like everything else, have become persistent, searchable and scalable?
Max Read, Journalist and author of the newsletter Read Max
#MeToo is probably the most successful sustained example of Twitter’s ability to raise the salience of a particular issue; even then, #MeToo’s failings (e.g., lack of attention or effort paid to sexual harassment in less-visible-on-Twitter industries like manufacturing or meatpacking) reveal the limits of Twitter: You’re mostly raising the salience of whichever issue to a superuser audience of college-educated professionals in media, entertainment, politics and tech, which can be useful but also limiting.
No. 2
@TheePharoah
Bruh.

I JUST SAW SOMEONE DIE OMFG

Aug 9, 2014 774
Backstory
Emanuel Freeman (@TheePharoah) provided essential on-the-ground reporting on the shooting of Michael Brown and what happened in the hours that immediately followed — Mr. Brown’s body lying in the streets, the protests in Ferguson, Mo., the police response — touched off a national firestorm that crystallized the nascent Black Lives Matter movement.
Our Panelists Say
Wesley Lowery, Journalist and contributing editor to The Marshall Project
#Ferguson was, if my recollection serves me correctly, the most-used social-issue-related hashtag in the first 10 years of Twitter’s existence. Insomuch as Twitter has been a space that has propelled the Black Lives Matter movement, it can be said to have started with Emanuel’s tweets.
Jeff Jarvis, Professor of journalism at CUNY’s Newmark Journalism school
This is the power of witness. The crimes of police against Black men could not be ignored and hidden. A movement ensued, demonstrating the internet’s power as the First Amendment brought to life, giving all the power of the press, of assembly and of petitioning for justice.
No. 3
@realDonaldTrump
realDonaldTrump

Peter Navarro releases 36-page report alleging election fraud ‘more than sufficient’ to swing victory to Trump washex.am/3nwaBCe. A great report by Peter. Statistically impossible to have lost the 2020 Election. Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!

Dec 19, 2020 67.2K
Backstory
Would there have been a Capitol riot without this tweet? Arguably not, according to the Jan. 6 House committee, which cited Donald Trump’s followers’ responses in making the case for the tweet’s significance — which also earned the former president the distinction of being the only person on this list with two tweets. “Trump just told us all to come armed,” one wrote. “This is happening.”
Our Panelists Say
Jane Coaston, Times Opinion writer
It was perhaps the only tweet I can think of that helped foment a takeover of the United States Capitol, which hastened the deaths of multiple people and led to an impeachment proceeding.
No. 4
@JustineSacco
JustineSacco

Going to Africa. Hope I don’t get AIDS. Just kidding. I’m white!

Dec 20, 2013 2678
Backstory
A random P.R. executive tweeted a joke about race, AIDS and Africa before getting on a plane in 2013; the public waited with giddy anticipation for what would befall her once she landed. (She was eventually fired.) Perhaps the definitive Twitter pile-on and cancellation, serving as both preview and cautionary tale.
Our Panelists Say
Robby Soave, Senior editor at Reason magazine
I absolutely support this tweet getting the top slot. Nothing else really comes close.
Emily Dreyfuss, Journalist and author of “Meme Wars”
This tweet alerted the mainstream public to the fact that tweets could ruin lives. It jump-started the pile-ons that would go on to define Twitter outrage culture for the next decade and forced journalists to grapple with the question of when and whether a person becomes a public figure by going viral online.
No. 5
@AdamBaldwin
AdamBaldwin

#GamerGate: pt. 1: https://t.co/VMIwtoFlhD pt. 2: https://t.co/bLrgB8JGwQ

Aug 27, 2014 169
Backstory
The actor and conservative activist’s tweet was the first to give a 2014 controversy over an indie game developer the name that stuck. Gamergate, ostensibly about ethics in game journalism, was about everything but; it spawned the online hothouses that gave rise to the alt-right and QAnon and was the leading edge of modern anti-woke sentiment. It goes too far to say that Donald Trump wouldn’t have won in 2016 without Gamergate, but it would have happened a different way.
Our Panelists Say
Joshua Benton, Founder of the Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard
Gamergate became the catchall title of one of Twitter’s first major waves of organized reactionary harassment. The name turned a network of (almost all entirely bogus) complaints into what felt to its proponents like a movement.
Sarah J. Jackson, Professor of communication at the University of Pennsylvania
The misogynistic discourse that arose from #GamerGate targeted women for abuse and incubated incel culture across the internet.
No. 6
@jkrums
Janis Krums

There’s a plane in the Hudson. I’m on the ferry going to pick up the people. Crazy.

Jan 15, 2009 319
Backstory
Janis Krums’s understated 2009 tweet, accompanied by an on-the-scene photo of a sinking US Airways jet, still seems unbelievable. It’s significant not just because it captured a dramatic moment firsthand but also because it was a preview of the ways Twitter would be used for citizen journalism — i.e., real people sharing information, often unverified, about news events — in the years to come.
Our Panelists Say
Jeff Jarvis, Professor of journalism at CUNY’s Newmark Journalism school
Ev Williams told me that at the start of Twitter they didn’t realize it would be the world’s news service, but in moments such as this, they soon saw it could be.
Farhad Manjoo, Times Opinion columnist
In retrospect, we made too much of it. Without Twitter, we would have found out about the crash a few minutes later. But we might have avoided years of people thinking of unsourced tweets as legitimate news.
No. 7
Anonymous

Neda died with her eyes open. That’s why none of us could ever live with our eyes closed.

Jun 21, 2009
Backstory
In the summer of 2009, Twitter was still so crude that there was no retweet mechanism; as a result, it’s hard to track down the original of this tweet marking the killing of Neda Agha-Soltan, 26, amid a crackdown on widespread protests in Iran. The video of her death — first posted on YouTube and spread on Twitter — and the flood of outrage from across the world that followed revealed Twitter’s power to quickly disseminate information about what was happening in faraway places; it would play this role again during 2011’s Arab Spring.
Our Panelists Say
Moira Weigel, Professor of communication studies at Northeastern University
Every year that I teach undergraduates about the cyberutopianism of the 1990s and 2000s, they find it less comprehensible. Today they seem more likely to associate social media with bullying, revenge porn and conspiracy theories. But I keep teaching sessions on Twitter and the Green Movement and Arab Spring because I want them to grasp the sense of liberatory potential that has made some of us care about it so much.
No. 8
@realDonaldTrump
realDonaldTrump

An 'extremely credible source' has called my office and told me that @BarackObama's birth certificate is a fraud.

Aug 6, 2012 20.6K
Backstory
Well before he was a candidate, Donald Trump harnessed the power of Twitter to direct the conversation and propagate his talking points. One of his go-to subjects — birtherism — contained many of the ingredients (conspiracy theory, dog whistle) that would help propel him to the presidency.
Our Panelists Say
Emily Dreyfuss, Journalist and author of “Meme Wars”
In this tweet we see Trump using social media to create an alternate reality that fit his own agenda, without having to face the consequences that would have attended uttering such an accusation in print or on TV.
Farhad Manjoo, Times Opinion columnist
This tweet hardly caused a ripple at the time, but I can’t help but wonder how history would have been different if Twitter had taken action back then to prevent misinformation and conspiracy theories from flowing freely online.
No. 9
@nateritter
Nate Ritter

#sandiegofire south shores, ski beach open to motor homes. fiesta island is open to first 500 livestock that come in.

Oct 22, 2007 4
Backstory
In 2007, Chris Messina, a Twitter early adopter frustrated by the platform’s lack of organization, pitched the idea of the hashtag to the platform’s co-founder Biz Stone, who dismissed the idea as too nerdy. But weeks later, Mr. Messina persuaded his friend Nate Ritter to use a hashtag when tweeting about a fire in San Diego. Other users quickly followed suit.
Our Panelists Say
Jacob Bakkila, Artist and creator of the Twitter account @Horse_ebooks
Redefining a vestigial glyph into a living index. Now that’s what I call hashtag epic win, baby! But really, this is probably the most important tweet ever.
Moira Weigel, Professor of communication studies at Northeastern University
Platforms like Tumblr and Facebook had already made it possible for users to share content and connect with friends. But the hashtag helped turn Twitter into a site for finding and amplifying messages posted by anyone anywhere in the world.
Jeff Jarvis, Professor of journalism at CUNY’s Newmark Journalism school
More than Twitter itself, more than social media itself, the hashtag is a platform. No one owns it. No one controls it. Those who use it imbue it with meaning and power.
No. 10
@reignofapril
April

#OscarsSoWhite they asked to touch my hair. 😒

Jan 15, 2015 185
Backstory
This snappy rejoinder to an all-white slate of acting nominations in 2015 not only lifted the veil on Black Twitter and its steady stream of jokes for a wider audience; it eventually became a catalyst for systemic change in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (with the membership intentionally overhauled) and larger entertainment ecosphere.
Our Panelists Say
Katie Notopoulos, Tech reporter at BuzzFeed News
This was such a good example of how Black Twitter is the most powerful force on the platform: It immediately effected real-world change on an institution that had previously been sort of impermeable to social media.
No. 11
@dril
dril

issuing correction on a previous post of mine, regarding the terror group ISIL. you do not, under any circumstances, “gotta hand it to them”

Feb 15, 2017 14.3K
Backstory
Dril is perhaps the most famous semianonymous user on Twitter and certainly one of its funniest. This tweet mordantly captured the tendency of Twitter to elicit both provocative rhetoric and the stilted apologies that soon follow.
Our Panelists Say
Ryan Broderick, Journalist and author of the newsletter Garbage Day
If Dril is the voice of everyone who’s ever posted too hard, then this tweet is the best example of people getting completely wrapped up in their own weird rhetoric and owning themselves.
No. 12
@elonmusk
elonmusk

Am considering taking Tesla private at $420. Funding secured.

Aug 7, 2018 14.2K
Backstory
Possibly a 4/20 joke, Musk’s 2018 tweet about taking Tesla private led to a $40 million settlement with the S.E.C. and Musk having to step down as chair. Is it possible that this episode and Twitter’s ability to directly affect the market became part of the lure for Musk’s eventual takeover of the site?
Our Panelists Say
Emily Dreyfuss, Journalist and author of “Meme Wars”
The tweet that made people realize market manipulation could be achieved in 280 characters.
No. 13
@dmorey
Daryl Morey

Oct 4, 2019 20
Backstory
This 2019 pro-democracy tweet from the Houston Rockets’ general manager made China angry. The near-instantaneous attempts to walk it back, by both the Rockets and the N.B.A., made Americans angry. Estimated total cost to the N.B.A. as a result? $200 million.
Our Panelists Say
Allie Funk, Researcher at Freedom House
The N.B.A.’s response to Beijing, as well as efforts by Beijing to penalize the N.B.A., exposed for Americans the true extent of the Chinese Communist Party’s global censorship efforts.
Robby Soave, Senior editor at Reason magazine
Of the more overtly political or policy tweets on the list, I’m partial to this one as the biggest deal. It really encapsulates something that has become a huge problem: self-censorship of American companies in order to appease China.
No. 14
@ericgarland
ericgarland

THREAD I'm now hearing this meme that says Obama, Clinton, et al. are doing nothing, just gave up.

Guys. It's time for some game theory.

Dec 11, 2016 4592
Backstory
A month after the 2016 election, the Twitter user and analyst Eric Garland used a thread to propound a gossamer-thin theory that purported to explain ... well ... everything. The thread, greeted with rapturous praise, derision and confusion, was the unofficial inauguration of an era in which one mode of popular political engagement was conspiratorial theories about the machinations that lay beneath the headlines — which happened to promise readers exactly what they wanted to hear.
Our Panelists Say
Max Read, Journalist and author of the newsletter Read Max
I have a theory that, due to a kind of delay in literacy for new media, just as boomers will believe anything they hear on TV, Gen Xers will believe anything they read in a Twitter thread.
Jane Coaston, Times Opinion writer
Donald Trump’s election seemed to prove to many people not only that they didn’t understand politics but also that they didn’t understand much of anything, so a tweet thread that purported to have answers, even if those answers made no sense, became a lifeline, a tether to something that could make sense of it all.
No. 15
@maplecocaine
maple cocaine

Each day on twitter there is one main character. The goal is to never be it

Jan 2, 2019 31.4K
Backstory
This tweet captures an essential process of Twitter’s ecosystem: the way it seems a mass of users can alight on an arbitrary tweet and turn it into the day’s topic of discussion. It’s Andy Warhol’s famous aphorism as a warning.
Our Panelists Say
Farhad Manjoo, Times Opinion columnist
Possibly the truest description of the danger we all flirt with every time we tweet.
No. 16
@_zolarmoon
Aziah King

Y’all wanna hear a story about why me and this bitch here fell out???????? It’s kind of long, but full of suspense 😂😭

Oct 27, 2015 2662
Backstory
A’Ziah “Zola” King’s supersize, ultraviral tweet thread, a tale about how a stripping trip to Florida went sideways, demonstrated Twitter’s capacity for a new kind of microserialized storytelling. It also showed off the way it can be used as a publishing platform for ordinary people: Zola’s story was adapted into a Hollywood movie a few years later.
Our Panelists Say
Ryan Broderick, Journalist and author of the newsletter Garbage Day
It’s absolutely one of the best threads ever written. It perfected the form and, I think, is one of the few things ever posted to Twitter that deserves to be considered part of the classic American folklore canon.
No. 17
@CT_Bergstrom
Carl T. Bergstrom

1. A very short thread on the power of data graphics and scientific communication. Roughly a week ago, some very smart person* sat down, drew this graph, and saved lives. (*It’s 2 A.M. Without an economist subscription, I can’t quickly discover whom. Maybe someone can help.)

Mar 6, 2020 10.6K
Backstory
The gap between scientific expertise and public understanding narrowed when the biology professor Carl Bergstrom tweeted a chart — originally adapted by population health analyst Drew Harris — alongside a thread in March 2020 explaining how locking down could flatten the Covid curve. Cut to three years of the hammer and the dance, aerosol spread and a far more science-literate populace than before. (On the flip side, authoritatively written science-y threads would also make it easier for misinformation to spread.)
Our Panelists Say
Brian Ott, Professor of communication at Missouri State University and author of “The Twitter Presidency”
This tweet raises the issue of how scientific facts and knowledge increasingly became subjects of political debate in our digital world. To be sure, science has always been used politically, but the digital ecosystem allows for the crazy spread of anti-science.
Jeff Jarvis, Professor of journalism at CUNY’s Newmark Journalism school
Before Twitter was used to spread disinformation, it was vital for spreading information, and that continued through the pandemic.
No. 18
@TonyLaRussa
Tony La Russa

Lost 2 out of 3, but we made it out of Chicago without one drunk driving incident or dead pitcher... I’d call that an I-55 series.

Apr 19, 2009
Backstory
The famous blue check may have been in part a technical solution to a legal problem: The St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa sued Twitter in 2009 because an account impersonating him was making him look bad with terrible tweets. But it also inaugurated an era of respectability and importance with verified accounts, making it more inviting for brands, celebrities and politicians to join the platform.
Our Panelists Say
Max Read, Journalist and author of the newsletter Read Max
My take is that even more important than brand respectability, the creation of the verified status and the decision to extend it to anyone working at a news media company who asked severely traumatized a number of prominent technology executives and caused them to do stupid things like buy Twitter.
No. 19
Oreo
Oreo

Power out? No problem.

Feb 3, 2013 13.1K
Backstory
Multiple case studies have been done on how Oreo managed to pull off a topical tweet during the 2013 Super Bowl blackout. We have “Dunk in the dark” to thank for the thousands of brands that now scramble to piggyback off every conceivable viral moment.
Our Panelists Say
Katie Notopoulos, Tech reporter at BuzzFeed News
The brand tweet that launched a thousand ad budgets.
No. 20
@2020fight
Talia

This MAGA loser gleefully bothering a Native American protester at the Indigenous Peoples March.

Jan 18, 2019 19.6K
Backstory
In January 2019 an anonymous Twitter account tweeted a short video that appeared to show white high school students in MAGA gear taunting and mocking a Native American elder. Outrage ensued, and multiple news outlets scrambled to catch up. Then more footage of the encounter emerged that complicated the social media narrative, and conservative media (plus Donald Trump) cried foul. But wait — why was this national news, anyway? Because a video went viral.
Our Panelists Say
Farhad Manjoo, Times Opinion columnist
A perfect illustration of Twitter’s ability to jump the gun and roil up an angry mob.
No. 21
@robbercat
rubber cat

@ChuckGrassley where are the jobs. where are they. also what is your favorite food - robert in des moines

Dec 14, 2009 22
Backstory
In 2009 @robbercat was one of the first to understand that you could just … tweet things at a senator. Which is how we know that Chuck Grassley’s favorite foods are “ice cream first, beef second and pork third.”
Our Panelists Say
Jacob Bakkila, Artist and creator of the Twitter account @Horse_ebooks
The first or at least a very, very early instance of someone on the internet realizing that tweets didn’t happen in a vacuum — very powerful people read them, and very powerful people responded to them; ergo, very powerful people could be trolled, too.
Gabriel Malor, Lawyer and writer
Part of Twitter’s charm is the ability of any user to talk to any other user. That’s also part of Twitter’s horror.
No. 22
@MBuhari
Muhammadu Buhari

Many of those misbehaving today are too young to be aware of the destruction and loss of lives that occurred during the Nigerian Civil War. Those of us in the fields for 30 months, who went through the war, will treat them in the language they understand.

Jun 2, 2021 1082
Backstory
For seven months in 2021, all of Nigeria — a country with some 215 million people — was barred by its government from using Twitter. The ban was enacted after the platform deleted President Muhammadu Buhari’s tweet that threatened violence against separatists. What followed was a standoff. Twitter eventually blinked and agreed to the government’s terms — a prelude to similar fights between Twitter and other increasingly authoritarian regimes with big markets.
Our Panelists Say
Emily Dreyfuss, Journalist and author of “Meme Wars”
This tweet and the actions taken by Twitter perfectly encapsulate the power struggle between world governments and technology companies.
Allie Funk, Researcher at Freedom House
The Nigerian government exploited its role as gatekeeper to the country’s enormous market, effectively coercing Twitter into agreeing to onerous terms of operation. Across the world, governments and tech companies are engaged in a high-stakes battle for control of the internet, and internet users are paying the price.
No. 23
@femme_esq
Brienne of Snarth ☔

I’m so finished with white men’s entitlement lately that I’m really not sad about a 2yo being eaten by a gator bc his daddy ignored signs.

Jun 15, 2016 55
Backstory
This one has it all: casual cruelty, an extreme position, virtue signaling, moral high dudgeon and a name that references “Game of Thrones.” Was it the collective force of tweets like this one that combined to convince a significant portion of America that another significant portion of America had become unhinged?
Our Panelists Say
Ryan Broderick, Journalist and author of the newsletter Garbage Day
Just a completely insane tweet. Perfect example of someone leaning all the way in for retweets and just completely flopping. Really excellent stuff all around.
Max Read, Journalist and author of the newsletter Read Max
Probably the funniest thing about the Russian effort to influence the 2016 presidential campaign through insane social media posts is that it’s a huge waste of money to write new stupid tweets from attention-hungry fringe figures.
No. 24
@NayNayCantStop
NayNay Thompson

#EndFathersDay bc it's a celebration of patriarchy and oppression.

Jun 13, 2014 32
Backstory
One of the more successful tweets from a 4chan-led troll campaign to get #EndFathersDay trending in an attempt to discredit Black feminism and feminism more generally. (This particular tweet was cited on a “Fox & Friends” segment.) The 2014 campaign was an early preview of tactics that would be deployed by, among others, Russia’s Internet Research Agency.
Our Panelists Say
Sarah J. Jackson, Professor of communication at the University of Pennsylvania
This tweet offered a preview of the disinformation tactics used in the 2016 election, which frequently used fake accounts to generate identity-based resentments. Black women on Twitter raised an early alarm about this form of political manipulation.
Ryan Broderick, Journalist and author of the newsletter Garbage Day
On Twitter and, by extension, on the internet, anyone can be anyone. And all people have to do is grab your attention to make their voice heard, no matter how bad faith their intentions are. And if they do manage to create enough attention, they can hack the rest of the world’s mainstream media apparatus to completely hijack the way we see the world and each other.
No. 25
@HillaryClinton
HillaryClinton

Delete your account.

Donald J. Trump Jun 9, 2016
Obama just endorsed Crooked Hillary. He wants four more years of Obama—but nobody else does!
Jun 9, 2016 440.7K
Backstory
Hillary Clinton’s deployment of a Twitter idiom paired with a quote-tweet dunk illustrates the extent to which the platform had become important to national politics. But it also demonstrated the difference between having a good social media manager and being a true Twitter master.
Our Panelists Say
Max Read, Journalist and author of the newsletter Read Max
A sort of simplistic way to describe the difference between Clinton and Trump on social media is that the Clinton campaign was crafting tweets to get a lot of retweets and the Trump campaign was crafting tweets to get free media from TV news anchors reading them out loud.
Ryan Broderick, Journalist and author of the newsletter Garbage Day
Clinton’s slick and snarky social media messaging was crushed by Trump’s belligerent stream-of-consciousness ranting and sent Democrats scrambling for years.