Why is Joe Biden, NASA, and Deadpool all posting one-word tweets? An accidental post from a train company sparks a bizarre viral trend
- Business Twitter accounts posted cryptic one-word tweets
- President Joe Biden tweeted “democracy” while NASA tweeted “universe.”
- They all participate in a viral trend mocking Amtrak, a US rail company
- Last night, the rail service tweeted the word “trains” without explanation.
If you’ve been scrolling through Twitter lately, you may have noticed unusual behavior from some of the popular accounts you follow.
President Joe Biden, NASA and Deadpool are just a few of the big names who have been posting one-word lowercase tweets as part of a bizarre new trend.
It started when US train operator Amtrak’s account accidentally tweeted the word “trains” at 8pm BST (3pm EDT) last night.
This weird post went viral, garnering more than 162,000 likes and 25,000 retweets after other Twitter users poked fun at the mistake.
Verified corporate accounts such as NPR and CNET also jumped at the opportunity to participate, not wanting to miss an opportunity for promotion.
President Joe Biden, NASA and Deadpool have all posted one-word tweets in lowercase as they partake in a bizarre new trend
Joining in yesterday’s fun was President Biden, who tweeted “democracy” – to which Amtrak replied “and trains.”
It all started when Amtrak’s account accidentally tweeted the word “trains” on Thursday evening. This went viral, garnering more than 162,000 likes and 25,000 retweets after other Twitter users poked fun at the mistake
While Amtrak has yet to explain its cryptic tweet, it has been busy responding to other companies who have poked fun at it.
At 2pm BST (9am EDT), the rail company doubled down on its mistake by tweeting: “Yesterday was weird. anyway it’s still trains.’
Joining in yesterday’s fun was President Biden, who tweeted “democracy” – to which Amtrak replied “and trains.”
The Washington Post tweeted “News,” while US space agency NASA chose “Universe,” giving the trend its own twist.
The verified account for the fictional Marvel character Deadpool, who may have been struggling for an opportunity to get in, opted for “Deadpool,” which has since racked up over 203,000 likes.
Indian cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar may have stunned some of his 37.7million followers when he tweeted the word ‘cricket’ without explanation.
If Amtrak’s original tweet really was a mistake and not a clever marketing ploy, it may have benefited from the “edit” button that Twitter announced it was testing.
Verified accounts for companies such as NASA, NPR and CNET also jumped at the opportunity to participate as they didn’t want to pass up the promotion opportunity
The social media platform has started internal testing and will soon extend testing to some users of its Twitter Blue subscription service.
The company announced earlier this year that it was working on a tool that would allow users to edit tweets after they’ve been posted, which is “our most requested feature yet.”
The company said tweets can be edited “a few times” in a 30-minute window immediately after they’re published, and edited tweets are shown with an icon, timestamp, and label to make it clear that the original post was changed.
Users can click to view a tweet’s edit history, which shows previous versions.
Twitter’s new edit button could be used to scam users with links to fraudulent websites, some experts fear after the new feature was announced this week
