Here are ten influential world figureheads and their respective number of followers on Twitter.
1. The Queen
More a ceremonial figurehead than an actual leader, Her Majesty The Queen sent her first tweet today, opening a gallery in the science museum. Tweeting from the @Britishmonarchy Twitter account, the Queen reached nearly 750,000 followers.
2. Barack Obama
With 48.5 million Twitter followers, Barack Obama @Barackobama signs off his tweets with -bo. But we wonder what phone he tweets from?
3. Francois Hollande
Hollande’s 722,000 followers might be somewhat overshadowed by his US counterpart, but tweeting only in French won’t get him too far outside of the country he runs.
4. Fidel Castro
We are dubious as to whether this is a real account, but with a biography saying that he is the leader of the revolution and savious of the Cuban people, @fidelcastro certainly tweets the talk to over 110,000 followers.
5. The Pope
The Vatican’s very own Pope Francis has over 4.6m Twitter followers, tweeting from @pontifex. Earlier this year, Facebook reps visited the Vatican recently to argue in cause of Pope Francis joining the world’s largest social network, but the church’s media strategy top dog, Claudio Maria Celli, told them Francis won’t be joining for fear of abusive comments.
6. Vladimir Putin
Putin has 723,000 followers on a Russian-speaking account and 150,000 followers on the English language account. Tweeting live from the Kremlin in two languages!
7. S B Yudhoyono
Indonesian president S B Yudhoyono tweets to 5.8m Twitter followers, just over 2% of the population of Indonesia!
8. David Cameron
The British Prime Minister is a prolific tweeter, discussing a broad range of topics from immigration to refusing to pay his bills. He has 824,000 followers.
9. Dalai Lama
The Dalai Lama currently commands almost 10m Twitter followers, and dishes out wholehearted advice on leading a better life, such as this tweet recently: "It’s not just money we need to lead a happy life; more important is to find inner peace."
10. George Bush Senior
George Bush Senior, a rare tweeter with only 130,000 followers, likes to talk about his wife Barbara when he does get around to tweeting.
