A new Twitter control setting allows users to choose who can reply to their post.
Twitter is testing a control setting that could potentially alter the nature of conversations on the site by allowing the tweeter the choice of who can reply to their tweet. Perhaps ironically, Twitter’s post on Wednesday announcing the test has been hit with thousands of replies that illuminate just what users think is wrong with this idea — namely that exclusive public conversations will just magnify echo chambers by stifling diverse conversation.
The new control setting, which can be accessed via a button on the bottom left corner of a tweet, is only available to a small percent of global users to start. The tweeter can select who can respond: “people you follow,” only “people you mention” or “everyone,” which is the traditional and default choice. If a user tries to reply to an exclusive convo, a window will pop up to let them know why they are unable to do so.
A user is alerted by Twitter as to why they cannot reply to an exclusive convo.
Twitter is both the impulsive id and the idealistic superego of mainstream internet conversation, a place where 10 percent of users tweet 80 percent of the content, and that content often being ill-prepared, poorly thought out or outright aggressive as a result of the company’s commitment to free speech and allowing anonymous users on the site. The sentence “Well that escalated quickly,” has come unbidden into the minds of anyone who regularly uses Twitter and has witnessed how a lighthearted post about preferring cats to dogs or not liking the new Ghostbusters movie can turn into an incensed audience accusing the original poster of being anything from a “cuck” or “simp” to a “cishet white male” or “fascist.”
It’s not clear when or if Twitter intends to roll out this feature to a wider audience in the future, or how small the “small % globally” is, but it’s an obvious attempt from the social media company to cut through the abuse, harassment and escalation of the noxious reply thread.
“Twitter is where you go to see and talk about what’s happening,” reads a blog post published on Wednesday. “But sometimes, unwanted replies make it hard to have meaningful conversations. (Ahem, reply guys.)”
This new feature is part of a larger attempt to give the user more control over the conversation they start, a move that started last November with the introduction of the “hide replies” feature. But some users see this as a threat to free speech on the platform and a move to suppress unpopular opinions.
A scroll through the replies to Twitter’s announcement reveal that some users fear misinformation and other harmful information, like “fake news,” may go unchecked without the broader Twitter community accessing the replies. In a reply that garnered 4.6 thousand likes, @SourceLocator said, “Imagine all the misinformation that can be shared on a mass-scale and no-one looking at it can double check an actual source of information in the replies. Whose idea was this?” @triviafall got 1.7 thousand likes for commenting, “this is not a good idea at all. giving racists, homophobes and transphobes a platform to just be bigots and get away with it.” Let’s unpack some of this.
To start, the new feature doesn’t hinder any user’s ability to quote retweet a conversation in which they are not involved, and thus amplify or “check” the post to a wider audience. Another new feature released this month allows users to see where their tweets have been quoted. And, as many commenters have pointed out, quote retweets are actually one of the main drivers of harassment.
The fear that exclusive convos will exacerbate echo chambers is valid, but it’s important to remember that Twitter itself has policies against misinformation and harassment, imperfect (and at times ineffective) as they may be. Twitter’s hateful conduct policy prohibits promoting harm or inciting violence against specific groups; repeated and non-consensual slurs, epithets, racist and sexist tropes or other degrading content; and hateful imagery, like the swastika symbol. Additionally, Twitter has ramped up moderation for any Covid-19-related content that is misleading or potentially harmful.
So far, the pioneering accounts have just taken this opportunity to make jokes about their exclusive tweets, rather than sow seeds of discord.
It’s almost as if Twitter’s post announcing this test was a test in itself, a chance to invite the world to scroll through the replies and behold the childish bickering between the extreme left and the extreme right. Hating this new policy should be a bipartisan issue, as both sides fear the unchecked powers of the other, yet instead of agreeing with each other and proving the decision-makers of Twitter wrong, they’ve used this opportunity to impulsively snipe, name-call and mock one another. Perhaps a time out is in order, after all.
