"Twitter revealed a new tweet-per-second record on Friday and it seems the 143,199 tweets-per-second milestone was triggered by the airing of a Japanese animated film. [...] In the film, the protagonists send the city's airborne fortress tumbling out of the sky with the magic word, "balus" which roughly translates to "destruction." [...] So strong is the pull of "Laputa" -- even apart from the Ghibli Rule--that during the last airing on Dec. 9, 2011, Twitter logged a then-record-breaking 25,088 tweets per second of fans posting "balus'' at the same time it was spoken during the movie--despite a public plea from the social-networking site to hold off."

Donna Tam, CNET 16/08/2013

I think Twitter always in a way tried to be the castle in the sky. Also, I think people just found it fun to mess with it.