A teen's tweet asking for free Wendy's chicken nuggets just surpassed Ellen DeGeneres' record for the most retweets of all time
On Tuesday, Carter Wilkerson officially became the author of the tweet with the most retweets in Twitter history, taking the crown from the previous record holder, Ellen DeGeneres, who got more than 3,430,240 retweets on her famous star-studded selfie taken at the Oscars.
More than one month ago, on April 5, the 16-year-old tweeted, asking Wendy's how many retweets he would need to get to get a year of free chicken nuggets.
The fast-food chain responded that it would take 18 million retweets.
Wilkerson's tweet - which reads "HELP ME PLEASE. A MAN NEEDS HIS NUGGS" - quickly went viral, as people attempted to help the teen reach the seemingly impossible goal.
In less than a week, the tweet had been retweeted nearly 2.5 million times.
Google got in on the action, with a nugget inspired Google Doodle. Twitter created a #NuggsForCarter emoji. And, Wendy's pledged to donate $100,000 to the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption if Wilkerson's tweet broke the record.
Wilkerson's nugget tweet has surpassed Ellen DeGeneres' tweet from the 2014 Oscars.
DeGeneres seems to have embraced the mock competition. In mid-April, she invited the teen to appear on her show and gave him a television and a "year's supply of Ellen underwear," a gift she said she would rescind if Wilkerson's tweet surpassed her's in retweets.
While Wilkerson now has the most retweeted tweet of all time, he is still coming up short of Wendy's demand that he get 18 million retweets before the fast-food chain gives him free nuggets. However, the fast-food chains seems likely to cough up the nuggets, after the extraordinary amount of free advertising provided by Wilkerson's nugget stunt.