Chicago resident and blogger Andrew Huff has published a smashing post on the community driven website Metafilter listing all Twitter accounts that are named after countries of the world, and what each of them represents.
With the exception of @Israel, which is maintained by the Foreign Ministry's Digital Diplomacy Team, and @Australia, which is the country’s official tourism account, none of the rest of the near 200 Twitter accounts listed are officially affiliated to any of the countries by which the accounts are named. A few of them belong to travel companies or news sites, but the majority of them are just regular personal accounts created by people who may or may not be residing in the said country. A handful of these accounts are banned for whatever reasons.
Image credit: Paul Thurlby
In my opinion, the sheer list represents nothing but a huge list of missed opportunities.
I’ve taken the liberty to republish the list in its entirety here, with some formatting for easier reading.
Africa
- @Algeria "loves my country muchly" but not enough to tweet anymore.
- @Angola is a protected personal account.
- @Benin has only posted once.
- @Botswana shares news from Southern Africa.
- @BurkinaFaso is some dude in Portland.
- @Burundi hasn't tweeted yet,
- @Cameroon or @CapeVerde haven’t tweeted either
- @CentralAfricanRepublic isn't on Twitter.
- @Chad is unsurprisingly not the country.
- @Comoros, @CoteDIvoire (or @IvoryCoast) haven’t tweeted.
- @Congo exists, but you really want @DemRepCongo or @CongoRT.
- @Djibouti's been on hold for a long time.
- @Egypt IS NOT THE COUNTRY, OKAY?
- @EquatorialGuinea doesn't exist
- @Eritrea and @Ethiopia are suspended.
- @Gabon is silent
- @Gambia is dormant.
- @Ghana is a tour guide.
- @Guinea is privately parked.
- @GuinneaBissau doesn't exist.
- @Kenya is a woman.
- @Lesotho is a public one.
- @Liberia is protected, with a dead bio link.
- @Libya went silent in 2011.
- @Madagascar was parked by DreamWorks Animation.
- @Madeira wants you to visit.
- @Malawi is protected.
- @Mali brings you news.
- @Mauritania is empty.
- @Mauritius shares island news.
- @Morocco is quite active.
- @Mozambique is a missionary's protected account.
- @Namibia hasn't tweeted.
- @Niger tweeted twice in 2007.
- @Nigeria is suspended (for Twitter scams?)
- @Rwanda is suspended too
- @SaoTome and @Principe aren't the islands.
- @Senegal and @Seychelles are both silent,
- @SierraLeone is suspended.
- @Somalia hasn't tweeted since 2008.
- @SouthAfrica is for tourists.
- @SouthSudan covered 2010's elections
- @Sudan hasn't tweeted at all.
- @Swaziland is a Belgian.
- @Tanzania is on-topic but dormant.
- @Togo is a guy in Tokyo.
- @Tunisia is a protected placeholder.
- @Uganda is emo.
- @Zambia is conversational.
- @Zimbabwe is "listening to megans song."
Asia
- @Abkhazia and @Afghanistan are suspended.
- @Azerbaijan says "South Azerbaijan is not Iran."
- @Bangladesh likes photos of the country.
- @Bhutan hasn't tweeted in awhile.
- @Brunei is suspended
- @Cambodia hasn't tweeted yet.
- @China has only tweeted six times.
- @HongKong is a guy in Hong Kong.
- @India is run by a site that now appears closed.
- @Indonesia is a news portal.
- @Japan is on hold.
- @Khazakhstan has failed to launch.
- @NorthKorea and @SouthKorea might be a joke.
- @Korea is in Korean.
- @Kyrgyzstan isn't doing much.
- @Laos is a guy in Nashville named Ray.
- @Macao is a tourist site.
- @Malaysia is "in no way affiliated with the government."
- @Maldives is a bit touristy.
- @Mongolia posted once in 2008.
- @Myanmar was spam from the start.
- @Nepal is a designer in Kathmandu.
- @SouthOssetia hasn't tweeted.
- @Pakistan is suspended.
- @Philippines is based in Manila.
- @Singapore is "the more relevant Tweets to Singapore."
- @SriLanka is "hosted by a citizen."
- @Taiwan hasn't tweeted yet.
- @Tajikistan stopped tweeting on his first day of work in 2009.
- @Thailand alternates between English and Thai.
- @TimorLEste weirdly tweets about movies
- @EastTimor is an Australian lawyer.
- @Turkmenistan covered the country until mid-2013.
- @Uzbekistan appears to be for sale.
- @Vietnam is suspended.
Europe
- @AlandIslands went dormant in 2009.
- @Albania has been taken over by spammers, unsurprisingly.
- @Andorra is empty.
- @Armenia is protected.
- @Austria is possibly not official.
- @Belarus is newsy.
- @Belgium is empty.
- @Bosnia got sick and forgot about Twitter in 2008
- @Herzegovina never got started.
- @Bulgaria likes to retweet.
- @Croatia has tweeted intermittently.
- @Cyprus and @NorthernCyprus are tourism accounts aimed at the Brits.
- @CzechRepublic is Adam Koehler
- @CeskaRepublika isn't anything.
- @Denmark is nothing
- @FaroeIslands is silent.
- @Estonia is relatively active.
- @Finland fills you in on Finnish name days.
- @France is French news.
- @Georgia is the wrong one; @GeorgiaRepublic is the right one, but dormant.
- @Germany mostly retweets.
- @Gibraltar isn't Gibraltar.
- @Greece is dormant.
- @Hungary is registered but that's it.
- @Iceland is something.
- @Ireland stole @Sweden's idea (see Sweden)
- @Italy is newsy.
- @Kosovo is spammy.
- @Latvia doesn't tweet.
- @Liechtenstein lives in Mexico.
- @Lithuania is official.
- @Luxembourg tweets regularly.
- @Macedonia protected, but links to a conspiracy.
- @Malta is constant news.
- @Moldova has a personal touch.
- @Monaco is suspended.
- @Montenegro is Leslie, not the country.
- @Netherlands is suspended.
- @Norway tweets news.
- @Poland is suspended.
- Portugal is mostly about futbol.
- @Romania used to be videos; now it's the same questionable links as @Kosovo.
- @Russia is silent
- @SanMarino is silent too.
- @Serbia is "a place with too much history."
- @Slovakia signed up for Twitter in 2008.
- @Slovenia is pretty quiet.
- @Spain is for tourists.
- @Sweden is run by a different Swede each week.
- @Switzerland is a news feed
- @Turkey publishes news
- @Ukraine is suspended
- @UnitedKingdom is suspended but @GreatBritain is verified
- @Scotland is nothing
- @Wales is Carolyn
- @Cornwall has been dormant a long time
- @England is a test account.
- @Britain is a guy in Ann Arbor.
- @Guernsey hasn't tweeted
- @IsleOfMan cut some wood in 2008
- @Jersey is spam
- @VaticanCity is suspended
- @Pontifex is pretty active.
Middle East
- @Bahrain is an activist.
- @Iran is a project.
- @Iraq has been suspended
- @IraqiKurdistan is just empty.
- @Israel's account is maintained by the Foreign Ministry's Digital Diplomacy Team.
- @Jordan is an American designer
- @Kuwait is just some Kuwaiti.
- @Lebanon is a feed of Daily Star of Lebanon headlines.
- @Oman is Indonesian.
- @Palestine is a news aggregator.
- @GazaStrip has only tweeted once
- @WestBank is in Chinese
- @Qatar waited six years between tweets.
- @SaudiArabia says "Peace upon you" in Arabic.
- @Syria stopped tweeting about the revolution in 2011.
- @Turkey tweets out Turkish Topix.com posts.
- @UnitedArabEmirates doesn't exist, and @UAE is out of service.
- @Yemen tweets all things Yemeni.
North America, Central America & the Caribbean
- @Anguilla is dark.
- @Antigua is a guy who loves his island.
- @Aruba has been suspended.
- @Barbuda isn't much of anything.
- @Bahamas tweeted once in 2008.
- @Barbados is touristy.
- @Belize is an indie travel guide.
- @Bermuda is a triangle.
- @Bonaire is protected.
- @Canada was taken over by Canada in 2012, but they haven't done anything with it.
- @CaymanIslands has gone quiet.
- @CostaRica mostly aggregates other Costa Ricans' tweets.
- @Cuba has been suspended.
- @Curacao is protected.
- @Domenica is a Macedonian woman.
- @DominicanRepublic doesn't exist.
- @ElSalvador has been suspended.
- @Guadeloupe is an aggregator.
- @Greenland has tweeted twice in Japanese.
- @Grenada lives in Fort Worth.
- @Guatemala is a Methodist missionary.
- @Haiti is a photographer and teacher.
- @Honduras is a protected Montrealer.
- @Jamaica shares local news.
- @Martinique is a woman in San Francisco.
- @Montserrat is someone's first name.
- @Mexico retweets people.
- @NavassaIsland doesn't exist.
- @Nicaragua has been suspended
- @Panama is also suspended.
- @PuertoRico hasn't tweeted.
- @Saba is a Japanese woman who wants to be a cat.
- @SaintBarthélémy hasn't tweeted yet.
- @SaintKitts is empty
- @Nevis is also empty
- @SaintKittsNevis is suspended.
- @SaintLucia is silent.
- Neither @SaintMaarten nor @SaintMartin is active.
- @SaintPierre is going swimming
- @Miquelon is an activist.
- @SaintVincent is neither the country nor the rocker you think it is
- @TheGrenadines just tweets travel deals.
- @SanAndres has only tweeted once
- @Providencia is a Brazilian beer.
- @SintEustatius has a population of over two thousand people
- @TrinidadTobago hasn't tweeted yet, but @Trinidad is just chilling and @Tobago is a photographer.
- @TurksandCaicos has been hacked.
- @UnitedStates is for conservatives only, @US is a .us domainer, @USA is "USA facts," and then there's @America.
- @USVirginIslands shares island news.
South America
- @Argentina is suspended
- @Bolivia is suspended
- @Brazil has World Cup fever.
- @Chile is a guy in Chicago who loves soccer.
- @Colombia is suspended.
- @Equador hasn't tweeted yet.
- @Galapagos tweeted once.
- @FalklandIslands is Malaysian?
- Neither @Guyana nor @FrenchGuiana has tweeted.
- @Paraguay is suspended
- @Peru is suspended.
- @Suriname is a news feed about the country.
- @Uruguay is suspended
- @Venezuela is suspended.
Australia, New Zealand & Oceania
- @Australia is the official tourism account.
- @ChristmasIsland has been hacked.
- @CocosIslands hasn't tweeted.
- @CookIslands is a tourism account.
- @CoralSeaIslands doesn't exist.
- @EasterIsland is protected.
- @Fiji used to be a Japanese cat, but hasn't tweeted since 2007.
- @FrenchPolynesia is protected.
- @Guam is suspended.
- @Kiribati is silent.
- @MarianaIslands isn't sure how to use Twitter.
- @MarshallIslands is suspended.
- @Micronesia is a guy named Alfred.
- @Nauru is someone in Maryland.
- @NewCaledonia is an inactive tourist page.
- @NewZealand has written two cryptic tweets.
- @Niue is looking for a new job.
- @NorfolkIsland hasn't tweeted.
- @Palau is suspended.
- @PapuaNewGuinea's tweets are protected.
- @PitcairnIslands has remained silent.
- @Samoa used to retweet photos (@AmericanSamoa is suspended.)
- @SolomonIslands is suspended.
- @Tokelau was a bit raunchy.
- @Tonga lives in Chiba, Japan.
- @Tuvalu tweeted in German in 2007.
- @WakeIsland is a dude named Molokai.
- @WallisandFutuna is a resident of the islands.
- @Vanuatu is a protected "pacificxpat."
Antarctica
- @Antarctica tweeted twice in 2007.
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