In a rather funny twist of events, Ellen Degeneres' Oscar tweet has been surpassed in retweets by a teenager

May 9, 2017 14:09 GMT  ·  By

There's a new Twitter king and it's not anyone you would expect - it's some kid who asked Wendy's for a year's supply of chicken nuggets. His message has now officially received the most retweets in history. 

Back on April 5, Carter Wilkerson wrote a tweet to Wendy's asking the food chain how many retweets he'd need for a year's supply of chicken nuggets. Wendy's replied 18 million, most likely in jest, since no one had even come close to that number.

In fact, the most retweeted message until Wilkerson took the wheel was signed by Ellen Degeneres, who posted a famous Oscar selfie with half of Hollywood's A-listers back in March 2014. That message currently has 3,430,284 retweets and some 2.3 million likes.

Wilkerson's message has managed to pass this number, reaching 3,431,043 at the time of writing, although it's surely going to keep climbing. It's also impressive that he managed this feat in just a little over a month, while Ellen's tweet has been around for three years already.  

"It’s official. Carter Wilkerson’s (@carterjwm) call for a year’s supply of free nuggets from @Wendys has become the Tweet heard around the world. With 3.42M Retweets, it has officially surpassed Ellen’s infamous selfie as the most Retweeted Tweet of all time," Twitter acknowledged the record.  

Wendy's is game 

"We didn't expect Carter's response, and we couldn't anticipate the overwhelming support he has received," a spokesperson for Wendy's told BBC. The company has also pledged to donate $100,000 to charity in his name. Wilkerson has tweeted that the money will be going to the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, which works to find homes for children in foster care.

Following the tweet going viral, other companies have jumped at the chance of getting a little publicity out of this. Even United Airlines promised to give Carter a free flight to any Wendy's in the world, although the events from recent weeks will make the teenager think twice before boarding that flight.

For its part, Wendy's is getting quite a bit of bonus brownie points for not ignoring the message and taking the situation in stride. Of course, given how much good publicity it has received, Wendy's won't really think about the cost of a year's supply of chicken nuggets.

Here's Twitter's graphic for how fast Wilkerson's tweet climbed to the top:

A speedy race to the top
A speedy race to the top

Update:

Wendy's announced it was also giving Wilkerson a one-year supply of chicken nuggets, even without hitting 18 million retweets.

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Twitter has a new king
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