If you’ve ever had a gripe about Twitter – and hoped it might be fixed – your solution might well be included in this list.
Social media channels are always updating and upgrading the services they offer, to provide users a better, more enjoyable experience.
Recently, Twitter’s Vice President of Design and Research shared a significant Tweet, informing users of the five new features he’s most looking forward to in 2020.
If you’ve ever had a gripe about Twitter – and hoped it might be fixed – your solution might well be included in this list. Here are five new features coming to Twitter in 2020:
1. Remove me from this conversation
We’ve all been here.
We get involved in a Twitter conversation… then a few days or hours (or minutes!) later, we no longer want to be involved in it. With this new change, you can now remove yourself from an ongoing conversation whenever you wish!
2. Don’t allow RT of this tweet
Twitter currently allows users to stop all of their Tweets from being retweeted. But it doesn’t allow for users to choose specific Tweets they don’t want to be retweeted.
As of 2020, that will change.
If you’ve ever written a Tweet that is somewhat more private, or a Tweet you don’t want to be taken out of context, this might be a welcome change.
3. Don’t allow people to @Mention me without my permission
This is another great addition if you value a little bit of privacy. If you want to contribute to conversations but you don’t want to be tagged, you now have that option.
Sometimes keeping a low profile on social media can be hard. But this is a great step in that direction.
4. Remove this @Mention from this conversation
Let’s say you’ve involved someone in a conversation, and you no longer want that person involved in your exchange. You’re now able to remove the @mention from the conversation.
This is a good addition for avoiding lengthy online arguments.
5. Tweet this only to: Hashtag, Interest, or These Friends
This is perhaps the most useful and innovative of all the 2020 Twitter changes.
We all have different interests, different groups of friends and different facets of our personalities. And sometimes we don’t want to mix these friends or interests.
With this new feature, we can isolate our niche Tweets more readily. If you want to contribute to a certain hashtag conversation, but you don’t want your friends to see your input, you can do so.
Or say you want to engage in a political conversation without some of your followers seeing what you contribute – you can do that too.
What this means for Twitter users
The bottom line here is a little more freedom and a lot more nuance. Often, social media can feel like a machine crafted only to churn out large-scale engagements and conversations.
But these changes seem like a step in the right direction towards choice, freedom and (relatively) more private conversation.