You're on Python, but it might make sense to look at the choices made by https://github.com/hotsh/rstat.us and https://github.com/gargron/mastodon , to get some ideas. They're in Ruby, but the language is more similar to Python than PHP is, and some of the tooling and libraries in Python and Ruby are inspired by each other too.

It always helps to look at those who came before you.