10 Years Of Twitter: The Tweets That Shook The World

It has been 10 years since Twitter first opened its doors and a social revolution was born.

Since then the site has amassed 300 million followers, given birth to an entirely new form of journalism and has pioneered the use of live video.

The road has been bumpy - by its very nature Twitter is humanity's stream of consciousness which inevitably means the good, and the bad have made use of it.

To celebrate those 10 years, here are some of Twitter's most iconic moments:

2006: The first tweet is sent, courtesy of CEO Jack Dorsey

2007: Early user Chris Messina invented the hashtag.

2008: When the Mars Phoenix Lander found ice on Mars, NASA tweeted the news first.

2009: Janis Krums happened to be on a ferry when a plane went down in the Hudson River.

2010: Prince William’s engagement to Kate Middleton is announced via Twitter - a royal first.

2011: Up late one night, Sohaib Athar inadvertently live-tweeted the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan.

2012: President Obama tweets that he has won his second presidential race. Within hours it becomes the most retweeted for the year.

2013: Two bombs shook the Boston Marathon – and the world. As news of the blasts and the manhunt spread, Twitter became crucial for journalists, police and citizens alike.

2014: The #BringBackOurGirls movement was created when more than 250 schoolgirls were abducted in Chibok, Nigeria by Boko Haram militants.

2014: The European Space Agency historically lands a spacecraft onto a moving comet.

2015: As the horrific attacks in Paris unfolded in November, the world united to support people in the City of Light using the hashtag #PrayForParis.

2016: #Oscars: Leonardo DiCaprio finally wins an Oscar for 'The Revenant'. This news generates 44,000 tweets per minute.