Twitter is finally bringing an edit button to the platform. App code sleuths have lately been sharing evidence of an ‘edit tweet’ feature, but so far, the company has remained officially silent on any such developments. In fact, the blue bird platform even trolled users on April 1 with a cruel joke that an editing functionality was in the pipeline. So far, many had dismissed it as a pipedream, raising some valid concerns as to why such a feature is a bad idea?
Hopes were very recently rekindled when Tesla chief Elon Musk was uncovered as the largest stakeholder on Twitter this week, winning him a seat on the company’s board of directors. As if Musk had already sensed the impending barrage of requests from his followers, the number of which exceeds 80 million on Twitter, the new stakeholder conducted a poll asking users if they want an edit button on the social media platform. Of course, an overwhelming majority answered positively, and Twitter CEO Parag Agarwal even hyped that the poll results will have consequences. Well, it looks like that was another troll in itself.
Twitter has actually been developing a Tweet editing feature for a while now. The official Twitter Comms handle confirmed that the edit feature has been on the preparation table since last year and there are plans to kick off testing within its circle of paid users that have purchased a Twitter Blue subscription. Twitter has only given a vague timeline of “coming months” regarding the feature’s rollout, but an official animation of the feature shows it will only be a click away. The user will just need to tap the three-dot menu button on a Tweet, and select the 'Edit Tweet' option in the drop-down menu. However, a lot still remains under the wraps.
Big Change, Bigger Concerns
Jay Sullivan, Head of Consumer Product at Twitter, addressed some of the concerns that come with the ability to tweak one’s Tweets after posting them. “Without things like time limits, controls, and transparency about what has been edited, Edit could be misused to alter the record of public conversation,” Sullivan wrote. So far, the company hasn’t shared technical details such as the time window allowed for editing a Tweet, whether a tweet that has been edited after posting will be highlighted as such, and if there will be a system to see the original version.
In the months leading up to the feature’s rollout for Twitter Blue subscribers, the company says it will be collecting inputs and suggestions from experts on how to implement the editing feature in the best way possible. Experts have raised concern that if a person with influence decides to share bad content, such as hate speech or vaccine-related misinformation, and is allowed to mend ways after the original Tweet has reached their core followers, the aspect of accountability will forever be lost. It will also open a whole new universe of problems for Twitter as far as content policy enforcement goes. If the original Tweet is problematic, but the edited version is not, Twitter might be in a tricky situation on how to take action, like blocking or suspending accounts.
Sources: Twitter Comms/Twitter, Jay Sullivan/Twitter