It’s that time of the year where we get to write a lot of “Best ____ of 2015” articles. In the spirit of the end of the year, Twitter released its annual year in review through the #YearOnTwitter hashtag.
That video showcased the biggest events that took place in the year as seen through how they took place on Twitter.

Most Influential Event: Paris Terrorist Attacks of November 13, 2015 #ParisAttacks

What can we say about the Paris terrorist attacks of November 13? In chaotic times like this, we get to see exactly how good and bad social media can be.
On the good side of things, we had the #PorteOuverte movement, where Parisians offered shelter to random strangers through social media.
On the negative side of things, the social media confusion and misinformation in the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks caused widespread panic throughout the city and made it difficult for law enforcement officials to identify where threats were coming from.
In any case, Twitter has ensured that major global events will never be the same again. Here are some of the other events Twitter picked as the “most influential” of 2015:
Runners Up:
-Support for Marriage Equality
-New Horizons Mission
-Caitlyn Jenner
One of the interesting things about the New Horizons Mission is that Twitter didn’t even exist when that mission was first launched back in 2006. By the time the mission had reached Pluto and taken stunning pictures, Twitter had grown to become the world’s second biggest social network.

Caitlyn Jenner made Twitter history for becoming the fastest person to reach one million followers. She achieved that goal in four hours and 3 minutes.
It seems like just yesterday Ashton Kutcher was the first to reach one million Twitter followers. Today, you can do it in an afternoon.
Here’s the video that Twitter released as part of its end of the year wrapup:

Look back at the most influential moments of the #YearOnTwitter: https://t.co/xPFcNl1GzWhttps://t.co/2UnakTtWE7

— Twitter (@Twitter) December 7, 2015

#BlackLivesMatter

The #BlackLivesMatter campaign was one of many recent movements that started its life as a Twitter hashtag and snowballed into a real world social movement.
Twitter reports that the hashtag was tweeted 9 million times in 2015. It served as a unifying rallying cry for communities across America, including in Ferguson, Charleston, and Baltimore.

#RefugeesWelcome

Twitter helped the world ensure that love reigned supreme over hate. Instead of shutting their doors to refugees, citizens around the world turned to Twitter to chime in their support for the #RefugeesWelcome campaign.

#IStandWithAhmed

Muslim student 14-year old Ahmed Mohammed built a clock. The clock kinda looked like a bomb. Ahmed was arrested  by the real police – despite being a high school freshman who had simply completed a science project.
Within minutes of the photo of Ahmed being led away in handcuffs being posted online, the #IStandWithAhmed hashtag was being retweeted by users all over the world.
This issue led to one of the most-retweeted tweets of the year by President Obama @POTUS:

Cool clock, Ahmed. Want to bring it to the White House? We should inspire more kids like you to like science. It's what makes America great.

— President Obama (@POTUS44) September 16, 2015

#FIFAWWC

The FIFA Women’s World Cup took place this summer in Canada. Twitter reports that tweets about #FIFAWWC were viewed 9 billion times between June 6 and July 5, making the tournament one of the largest global sporting events of the year.

The magic of the #FIFAWWC Opening Match http://t.co/tQZuouH422 pic.twitter.com/65AKc2USkN

— FIFA Women's World Cup (@FIFAWWC) June 4, 2015

#TheDress

As serious as the above hashtags are, one of the best hashtags of the year was #TheDress. In February 2015, users logged into Twitter wondering why on earth people were tweeting things like “Blue and Black” and “White and Gold”.
The two color teams debated nonstop with one another, each one being 100% confident in what they were seeing.
This led to 4.4 million tweets about #TheDress between February 26 and 27. There was no winner between #BlueandBlack and #WhiteandGold – but let’s be honest, that black magic dress changed colors for everyone.
You know the issue is big when Tay Tay chimes in with her opinion:
https://twitter.com/taylorswift13/status/571131244634877952?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Most Retweets of the Year

Twitter released a list of its most retweeted tweets of the year.
As you might expect, these tweets came from some of the world’s most influential political leaders and brightest minds.
Just kidding. They all came from boy band members.
Literally, the most retweeted tweet of the year occurred when Harry Styles tweeted “All the love as always. H” That was retweeted and favorited about 750,000 times:

All the love as always. H

— Harry Styles. (@Harry_Styles) March 26, 2015

the other most-retweeted tweets were from Zayn Malik, Liam Payne, and Louis Tomlinson. So yeah, Twitter is still ruled by boy bands.
Twitter summed up their year-end review by saying:
“Thank you for making Twitter great this year.”
Read the full blog post from Twitter here. Or, follow the #YearOnTwitter hashtag to get more information about the biggest moments of the year.