Most followed Twitter accounts in SA
Twitter has released its year in review for 2014, showing the biggest moments and hottest topics in the South African Twitterverse.
The top events that created the biggest spikes in South African Twitter traffic in 2014 showed that the country is definitely a nation of sports fans.
The most Tweeted about moment in SA during the year was the semi-final between Germany and Brazil in the 2014 FIFA World Cup, which saw Germany defeat the host nation by 7-1.
During the game fans around the world sent more than 35.6 million Tweets – a new Twitter record. There were more than 672 million Tweets during the World Cup, the social media network said.
The South Africa versus Wales rugby match caused the second biggest spike on Twitter locally in 2014, while the controversial Oscar Pistorius trial also kicked up a storm, with real-time updates coming out of the courtroom by journalists giving on-the-ground news minute- by-minute.
In terms of the most popular South African personalities on the platform, YouTube sensation Caspar Lee remained the country’s most followed person, with SA-born UK cricketer Kevin Pietersen ranking second.
SA’s top 10 most followed on Twitter
| # | Twitter Handle |
Person | Followers |
| 1 | @Caspar_Lee | Caspar Lee | 2,128,810 |
| 2 | @KP24 | Kevin Pieterson | 2,046,551 |
| 3 | @Trevornoah | Treveor Noah | 1,725,515 |
| 4 | @ABdeVilliers | AB DeVilliers | 1,502,313 |
| 5 | @DaleSteyn62 | Dale Steyn | 1,155,599 |
| 6 | @NelsonMandela | Nelson Mandela | 1,009,465 |
| 7 | @bonang_m | Bonang B Matheba | 888,466 |
| 8 | @angelcandice | Candice Swanepoel | 872,395 |
| 9 | @GraemeSmith | Graeme Smith | 735,660 |
| 10 | @GarethCliff | Gareth Cliff | 530,924 |
World’s top Twits
According to Twitter’s data, the “golden tweet” (the most re-tweeted message) of 2014 belongs to comedian and talk show host Ellen DeGeneres, who tweeted a star-studded selfie from the 2014 Oscars. The tweet has been republished over 3 million times, to date.
Ellen Tweet
Twitter also listed the most popular tweets by their peaks re-tweets, led by Justin Bieber tweeting to his fans, which hit a peak of 471,000 re-tweets.
Justin Bieber Tweet
Other popular tweets came from pop group One Direction, and The Oscar Academy’s tribute to late actor Robin Williams.
The Academy Tweet
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