Biggest tweets of the year
As we near the end of 2014 it’s time to start looking back at the year gone by so Twitter has revealed the most mentioned moments and news on the social network. Topping the stats are posts about the summer’s World Cup and, of course, Tweets by members of One Direction. The footballing events in Brazil dominated the Twittersphere in 2014 with six of the top 10 most mentioned Tweets – the hosts’ historic 7-1 loss to eventual tournament winners, Germany, in the semi-finals was the most tweeted World Cup event. News-wise, UK Tweeters’ most talked about event was the disappearance of the Malaysia Airlines MH370 fight in March, followed by the Scottish independence vote. Twitter has dubbed 2014 ‘the year of the selfie’ – global stats show that the word was mentioned 92 million times, that’s up 500 per cent on last year – and the Ellen DeGeneres star-filled version at this year’s Oscars still holds the Twitter record for the most retweeted photo, with more than three million people sharing the post.
In the spirit of looking back, Skift.com has pulled together the most reviewed destinations on TripAdviser for 2014. Europe is home to six of top ten most reviewed cities in the world with London at number one followed by Italy and Paris at two and three respectively. According to the report, the highest numbers of reviews come from Americans, while most of the photographic content on the site is uploaded by the Japanese. Speaking of highs, a "Destination Expert" for San Francisco wrote over 1,000 reviews for the site between January and September, many of which were about the US state.
If you’re on the current London dating scene (or even if you are not) you would have inevitably heard of Tinder – swipe left for no, right for yes and then hope there is a connection. If only booking travel was as easy as finding a date these days. Welcome Tripinary, a new travel app based loosely on Tinder, which allows users to select attractions and places from around the world that interest them. Said to help users prioritise travel, the app uses a combination of data and personal preference. Right swipes are grouped together and on a separate page, flights to your selected locations are listed along with any restaurants or attractions in the same area so users can easily identify which destination really is top of their list.
And finally, you’ve heard of Instagram, but how about dronestagram? Here users can share their best aerial pictures to help build a world map of Earth with a bird’s eye view. Take a look at some of the best pictures of 2014 which quite literally bring a whole new perspective to the year gone by.
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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