Twitter Turns 8: How To Fail In 140 Characters

10 IT Leaders You Should Follow On Twitter

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Eight years ago Friday, Twitter cofounder Jack Dorsey published the microblog's first-ever tweet: "just setting up my twttr." Three days later, he uploaded an early sketch of the service to his Flickr account and detailed the evolution of his project, which began in 2000.  

One night in July [2000] I had an idea to make a more "live" LiveJournal. Real-time, up-to-date, from the road. Akin to updating your AIM status from wherever you are, and sharing it. For the next 5 years, I thought about this concept and tried to silently introduce it into my various projects... The idea has finally solidified... and taken a novel form. We're calling it twttr... It's evolved a lot in the past few months.

Since then, more than 240 million users have joined the service and send more than 500 million tweets each day. For brands, Twitter has become an indispensable communication tool, though not without some very memorable missteps.

From rogue employees to poorly executed marketing campaigns, here's a look at eight unforgettable brand faux pas from Twitter's first eight years.

1. McDonald's hashtag goes awry
McDonald's meant well when it launched a campaign in 2012 to promote the hashtag #meetthefarmers. McDonald's intended it to draw attention to the company's fresh produce guarantee. Later that day, it published a tweet that read, " 'When u make something w/ pride, people can taste it,' McD potato supplier #McDstories."

It was that second hashtag that took off on Twitter and led to thousands of people tweeting McDonald's horror stories and other snarky posts. A statement from the McDonald's social media director explained that the promotion did not go as intended:

While #meetthefarmers was used for the majority of the day and successful in raising awareness of the Supplier Stories campaign, #mcdstories did not go as planned. We quickly pulled #mcdstories and it was promoted for less than two hours. With all social media campaigns, we include contingency plans should the conversation not go as planned. The ability to change midstream helped this small blip from becoming something larger.

Hashtag: #lessonlearned

2. JPMorgan Chase cancels Q&A
JPMorgan could have learned a thing or two from McDonald's hashtag fiasco when, last November, it asked followers to send questions to an executive using the hashtag #AskJPM.

The company said it was an opportunity for college students to communicate with an executive. What the company didn't expect was the barrage of angry and snarky posts, including "Can I have my house back?" JPMorgan Chase cancelled the Q&A.

3. Chrysler's temper tantrum
Never confuse your personal Twitter account with your corporate Twitter account. That's the lesson one social media professional learned the hard way.

[Social media can be a marketer's best friend or worst enemy. Read 10 Worst Social Media Meltdowns Of 2013.]

In 2011, Chrysler's official Twitter account posted a tweet that used inappropriate language and condemned Detroit drivers. The employee, who worked for the agency New Media Strategies, reportedly had a bad commute to work -- and presumably an even worse commute home after he or she was fired.

Chrysler later fired the agency, too, and NMS's CEO apologized: "New Media Strategies regrets this unfortunate incident. It certainly doesn't accurately reflect the overall high-quality work we have produced for Chrysler. We

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