Olamide Olaniyan

Every World Cup there's a moment. Some player nobody outside their domestic league had heard of scores an absolute screamer in a knockout match, and by the time they've finished celebrating, their follower count is climbing like a rocket. I always found that fascinating, but I could never see it happening in real time. By the time the "X gained 3 million followers!" tweets show up, the surge is already over.

Every World Cup there's a moment. Some player nobody outside their domestic league had heard of scores an absolute screamer in a knockout match, and by the time they've finished celebrating, their follower count is climbing like a rocket. I always found that fascinating, but I could never see it happening. By the time the "X gained 3M followers!" tweets show up, the surge is already over.

I wanted a single screen that told me what the internet was feeling during a World Cup match — which teams and players were spiking, whether the mood was joy or rage, and which moments were about to go viral. The enterprise social listening tools that do this cost more per month than my rent. So I built my own over a weekend. Here's the architecture and the code that matters.