The "most talked about topic" for American Facebook users this year was (groan!) sports, with the 2013 "Harbaugh Bowl" as the single most mentioned event in the United States, the Washington Post reported. No surprise there as the 2013 Super Bowl between the Ravens and 49ers was the most watched stateside event in 2013 and the most watched television program ever with a 48.1 Nielson rating. (The strange power outage actually helped ratings, according to NBC).

Worldwide, Facebook users were most concerned about Pope Francis, who took over as head of the Catholic Church in March 2013. Pope Francis was sixth on the U.S. list. The second biggest trending topic worldwide was less specific: "elections," which could apply to any number of different scenarios (though several countries had major elections this year).

According to Facebook activity, the United States was more concerned about the war in Syria than the world. That issue ranked fourth on the U.S. top ten and didn't make the world's top ten.

A few recent events qualified. Nelson Mandela (spurred by his death last week) was 10th worldwide and 9th in the U.S. The November typhoon in the Philippines was fourth worldwide.

Three issues specific to the United States -- Miley Cyrus, the Harlem Shake, and the Boston Marathon bombings made it onto the world list, though Miley Cyrus didn't even make the U.S. list. She was number 7 in the world, right behind Harlem Shake at number 6, and ahead of the Boston Marathon at number 8. The Boston Marathon was number three for the United States (behind government shutdown at 2) and Harlem Shake at number 5.

The world demonstrated its love for cycling as the Tour de France was number nine on its list and likely didn't even crack the top 1000 for the United States.

Facebook's annual report also tracked the most popular "life events" worldwide. Number one was entering a relationship. Five of the top ten activities can be indicated manually on one's Facebook account and show up as an update on one's newsfeed (meaning, one can click "in a relationship" or can change their current location, the number three most popular life event). Surprisingly, the number two most popular life event, traveling, is something users can only indicate by updating their status.

The full report.