Bad week for Brazil, top week for Twitter
As Germany scored five goals in just 29 minutes against Brazil on Tuesday, the home team’s humiliation was painfully sensed by the rest of the world, with even the German fans muting their celebrations. Losing the game 7-1, Tuesday has officially been identified as the day that Brazilian Football was demolished on its home turf. More than just German and FIFA world records were broken however on this historic night, so too were that of social media giant Twitter. 3.6 million tweets recorded about the event, making it officially the most tweeted-about sporting event ever! It may have been an awful day for Brazil but it was a great day for Twitter!
American low cost flight provider, Spirit Airlines, has launched its Hate Thousand Miles giveaway campaign this week and invited wronged flyers to share their gripes and ‘Unleash that Hate’. The airline is offering customers in the U.S. the chance to get their issues off of their chest within 140 characters and in return they will be rewarded with 8,000 Free Spirit miles. This clever little campaign means that anyone keen to get a free flight will need to take a paid-for trip first as they won’t quite have enough to travel on the reward alone.
We can now say goodbye to carrying the extra baggage of maps and city guides when on our travels with the launch of the new offline feature on the TripAdvisor smart phone app. The feature requires users to download guides, city maps, photos, reviews and attractions whilst they have an internet connection so that they can access this material whilst offline on their travels. This allows travellers to enjoy maps on the go without having to search for free Wi-Fi spots or risk racking up bills for roaming charges whilst touring.
A young American cheerleader has found herself at the centre of controversy this week after over 332,000 people signed an online petition demanding Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerburg remove pictures of her posing alongside animals she hunted on safari in Zimbabwe. Facebook removed the pictures deeming them to glorify violence – dismissing claims they removed the photos under duress from animal rights groups – much to the ire of hunting advocates and gun-rights supporters.
We love a time-lapse video and this week’s find from Rob Whitworth is an absolute gem. This mesmerising, two-minute, "flow-motion" city tour of Barcelona is sure to have you booking your tickets to the coastal city before the video even ends. Reportedly the video took 363 hours to make, with 78 filming hours alone. A word of warning, while the video might give you serious wanderlust, it may also result in some serious motion sickness – well worth a watch though!
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Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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