Twitter finds most popular tweets spread God's love

Our take: One-liner social media site Twitter started to research why some "tweets" were more popular than others and found something that surprised them. The tweets that were forwarded or reposted and responded to the most had been posted by well-known evangelical leaders like Joyce Meyers and Max Lucado and contained inspirational messages about God's love. According to Twitter, people are finding and spreading spiritual connections through these God-based messages more than they are reading anything by favorite pop culture icons.

Why are some tweets more popular than others?

When a Twitter staff member set out to answer that question 10 months ago, he thought the answer would emerge among posts from N.B.A. players, politicians or actors. Instead, he found a mystery: a set of messages that were ricocheting around Twitter, being forwarded and responded to at a rate that was off the charts.

They were punching way above their weight, said Robin Sloan, who discovered the anomaly but did not recognize the names behind the tweets.

Joyce Meyer, Max Lucado and Andy Stanley were not well known inside Twitters offices. But they had all built loyal ranks of followers well beyond their social networks they were evangelical Christian leaders whose inspirational messages of Gods love perform about 30 times as well as Twitter messages from pop culture powerhouses like Lady Gaga.

Read more about tweets spreading God's love on The New York Times.