Report showed what grabbed people's attention on social media The Syria hashtag was one of the popular country hashtags on Twitter in 2012. In its annual report, "2012 on Twitter," the social media giant has outlined the top ten trending countries on the website, and #syria is at number one . The report defines trends as "the topics for which we see noteworthy spikes in Twitter conversations," adding that the 2012 Trends "reveal what captured our attention, rather than what terms were consistently popular."
China, Japan, Iran and India complete the top five, with Afghanistan, Australia, Israel, Italy and Canada making up for the top ten.
Tweeting on Syria mainly revolved around the Assad regime's battle with rebels from the Free Syrian Army, the latest chapter in the Arab Spring where social media has played a significant part.
Twitter's report also looks at the most tweeted about events in 2012, with the London Olympics beating both the US presidential election and the MTV Video Music Awards.
On the Olympics, the report reveals that, "the 16-day Summer Games generated 150 million Tweets. The closing ceremonies amassed the largest Games-related spike, 116,000+ Tweets per minute. The largest competition-related conversation took place when Jamaica’s Usain Bolt (@UsainBolt), most-discussed athlete, won gold in the 200m sprint (80,000 Tweets per minute)."
President Barack Obama's tweet after re-election was the most popular tweet of 2012. The tweet "Four more years" with a photo of Obama hugging wife Michelle received over 810,000 retweets and was favourited over 300,000 times.