Some German users have celebrated Twitter's expansion of its character limit from 140 characters to 280 by tweeting some notoriously long German words. The German language is well-known for its long, compound words – formed by putting together smaller words – which can reach dozens of characters long. The German Justice Ministry tweeted this 63-character word (Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz) which refers to the law about labelling food products made from cows and is German's longest word. The police force in Munich also got in on the action, tweeting this comparatively tiny 30-character word (Niederflurförderfahrzeugführer) which refers to the driver of a forklift truck. Not everyone was swept up by the wave of excitement, however. Steffen Seibert, Angela Merkel's spokesperson, tweeted a short message that translates as “Brevity is the sister of talent”.
