The 2012 Olympics Generated 150 Million Tweets
According to a study from Twitter, the 2012 Olympic Games generated over 150 Million tweets, with Usain Bolt taking the spotlight on a big chunk of those. The social site found that Bolt’s 200m and 100m races triggered the most chatter, with approximately 80,000 tweets per minutes (tpm) and 74,000 tpm respectively.
However, he was just 1 of 10 olympic athletes to rake in over 1 million tweets. Here is the full list of Twitter famous athletes:
1. Usain Bolt
3. Tom Daley
4. Ryan Lochte
6. Andy Murray
7. Kobe Bryant
8. Yohan Blake
10. LeBron James
Among all these, other events that were explosive on Twitter were:
1. Andy Murray’s gold medal in the men’s tennis singles
2. Jamaica’s gold in the 4×100 relay, a time which set a world record
3. USA beats Spain, wins gold in men’s basketball
4. Hope Solo’s diving catch in the women’s soccer USA v. Japan finale
5. Kobe Bryant’s massive dunk at the end of the USA v. Spain final game
Soccer tweets led the pack with 5 million mentions, but swimming, track & field, gymnastics and volleyball followed close behind. BUT, the most tweeted Olympic related event was not associated to athletics. Rather, it was the return of the Spice Girls during the closing ceremonies, sweeping up 116,000 Tweets per Minute, completely overwhelming Bolt’s achievement. The day of closing ceremonies racked up 2,288,901 tweets alone.
McKayla is not impressed!