Twitter’s long-standing 140-character limit for messages isn’t going anywhere, but the social media giant is once again revamping the way it counts the characters: Usernames will no longer count toward that limit, but only for reply messages.
Twitter announced the change today, rolling out its third update to the way in which it allows user to express their inner-most thoughts for the entire world to see.
Under the revamp, Twitter won’t delete the “@username” handle, but it will rearrange it. Now, users are replying to will appear above the Tweet text rather than within the Tweet text itself.
When viewing a conversation, Twitter says users will actually see what people are saying, rather than seeing lots of @usernames at the start of a Tweet. Additionally, users can tap on the “replying to…” button to easily see and control who is part of a conversation.
The change, Twitter says, will make communication and following conversations easier to read. That was an issue many users who got their hands on the updates early encountered, as the @username had simply vanished.
Users expressed confusion and frustration over the way Tweets appeared with respect to conversations. Many said the change made it difficult to pick and choose who they speak with and seemed to be an indication that the networking site didn’t care about their input.
Sam Sharma, a producer for Playstation, Tweeted at the time of the first update that users helped to invent the @(username) reply to show their acknowledgement of others and to keep some conversations less visible.
“The updates we’re making today are based on feedback from all of you as well as research and experimentation,” Twitter said Thursday, adding that its “work isn’t finished.”
by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist
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