Twitter celebrates seventh birthday today

Seven years ago today, Twitter co-creator Jack Dorsey sent out the first tweet. Since then, the micro-blogging site has proven that 140 characters can really do more than anyone thought.

To celebrate the milestone, Twitter released a video showing the site’s evolution from 2006 to 2013. In the video, they track the addition of hashtags and retweets on some of the most remarkable events that were tweeted as they happened. These are the events that have made live-tweeting something that nearly everyone with an account does.

Twitter says that it now has 200 million active users writing 400 million tweets a day.

Thanks to Twitter, users from around the world have been able to track events as they happen. Twitter has played a key role in events like the 2009 Iran uprisings and the response to Haiti’s tragic earthquake. In November, an image showing President Obama and Michelle Obama hugging after their victory became the most retweeted image ever.

For celebrities, Twitter has become an invaluable way to connect with fans, so much so that we even do a Celebrity Tweets column. Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber are the most-followed accounts. Gaga has over 35.2 million. She follows over 130,000 accounts, has retweeted fans and has used it to promote her good causes. Bieber is now up to 36.3 million.

One of the best recent examples of celebrity-fan interaction came just last week, when Kristen Bell and Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas thanked fans for their support in the Kickstarter campaign to get the movie made.

Here’s to another seven years, Twitter.

image: Twitter