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Rumor: Jack Dorsey to Leave Current Role as Twitter CEO

Andrew Orr ·

A report from CNBC on Monday claims that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey will step down from his role at the company.

It’s unclear who’s set to succeed Dorsey or the timing of a potential announcement. It’s also unknown why Dorsey, 45, would take a step back. But if he steps down, the next CEO will have to meet Twitter’s aggressive internal goals. The company said earlier this year it aims to have 315 million monetizable daily active users by the end of 2023 and to at least double its annual revenue in that year.

Update: Mr. Dorsey has confirmed the rumor and announced his resignation.

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Twitter 'Super Follows' is Now Available for All iPhone Users

Andrew Orr ·

Super Follows is a new Twitter feature that lets creators make money through subscriptions. It has now rolled out to all iPhone users.

The feature launched in September after first being announced in February. Super Follows are another tool for creators to earn money through the social media platform. Eligible accounts are able to set the price for Super Follow subscriptions, with the option of charging $2.99, $4.99 or $9.99 per month. Creators can choose to mark some tweets for subscribers only while continuing to reach their unpaid follower base in regular tweets.

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New Twitter Safety Mode Filters Replies, Blocks Accounts

Andrew Orr ·

Twitter is rolling out a new feature called Safety Mode. When you enable it for your account, it temporarily blocks accounts for seven days for using potentially harmful language or sending repetitive and uninvited replies or mentions.

You can find information about the Tweets flagged through Safety Mode and view the details of temporarily blocked accounts at any time. Before each Safety Mode period ends, you’ll receive a notification recapping this information. We won’t always get this right and may make mistakes, so Safety Mode autoblocks can be seen and undone at any time in your Settings. We’ll also regularly monitor the accuracy of our Safety Mode systems to make improvements to our detection capabilities.

I think a lot of things can be said about Twitter, but at least they’re trying (unlike Facebook).

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Twitter Partnering With AP And Reuters to Tackle Misinformation

Charlotte Henry ·

Twitter is partnering with news agencies The Associated Press (AP) and Reuters in a bid to tackle misinformation. Curation chief Joanna Geary explained how it is going to work in a blog post.

Twitter’s Curation team will increase our capacity to add reliable context to conversations happening on Twitter. This joint work will increase the scale and speed of the current work…by:  Increasing and improving context sharing: Ensuring that credible information is available in real time around key conversations as they emerge on Twitter, especially where facts are in dispute or when Twitter’s Curation team doesn’t have the specific expertise or access to a high enough volume of reputable reporting on Twitter. For example, people on Twitter can expect more Trends with contextual descriptions and links to reporting from trusted sources more frequently. Anticipating and proactively identifying emerging conversation: Proactively providing context on topics garnering widespread interest including those that could potentially generate misleading information. Rather than waiting until something goes viral, Twitter will contextualize developing discourse at pace with or in anticipation of the public conversation. Improving the effectiveness of product features: Supporting product experimentation and existing initiatives where additional credible context could make our work better. For example, Birdwatch will use feedback from AP and Reuters as one way to assess the quality of information elevated by Birdwatch participants.

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Twitter Tests New ‘Shop Module’ Feature for iOS Users

Andrew Orr ·

Twitter is piloting a new feature on Wednesday called Shop Module. It will let brands add a shopping section at the top of their profiles. The pilot is currently limited to iOS devices for people who use the service in English.

The Shop Module is a dedicated space at the top of a profile where businesses can showcase their products. When people visit a profile with the Shop Module enabled, they can scroll through the carousel of products and tap through on a single product to learn more and purchase — seamlessly in an in-app browser, without having to leave Twitter.

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New Twitter Feature Lets You Control Who Can Respond to You

Andrew Orr ·

Twitter is rolling out a new feature that lets users control who can respond to specific tweets.

Building on a 2020 feature that lets users choose who can reply when composing a message, this update could prove especially useful for folks whose posts receive unexpected attention or unwanted responses. Simply tap on the three-dot menu in the upper right corner of a tweet to modify the “Change who can reply” option.

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Twitter Lets You Use a Security Key as Only 2FA Option

Andrew Orr ·

Twitter announced on Wednesday that it will let people use a security key as their only form of two-factor authentication.

Today, we’re adding the option to use security keys as your sole 2FA method — meaning you can enroll one or more security keys as the only form of 2FA on your Twitter account without a backup 2FA method. We know this is important to people because not everyone is able to have a backup 2FA method or wants to share their phone number with us.

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Twitter Launches First-Ever Subscription Service - and it Let's You Edit Tweets

Charlotte Henry ·

Twitter announced that it is rolling Twitter Blue, its first-ever subscription service, in a blog post on Thursday. The new service is coming to Australia and Canada first, costing CAD$3.49 or AUD$4.49 per month respectively. It includes various features, including ‘Undo Tweet’, which gives you a brief window in which to preview and edit a tweet before it goes live.

For those wondering, no, a free Twitter is not going away, and never will. This subscription offering is simply meant to add enhanced and complementary features to the already existing Twitter experience for those who want it… Starting today, we will be rolling out our first iteration of Twitter Blue in Australia and Canada. Our hope with this initial phase is to gain a deeper understanding of what will make your Twitter experience more customized, more expressive, and generally speaking more 🔥.

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Twitter Launches Audio Conversation Feature ‘Spaces’

Andrew Orr ·

Twitter is one of the companies trying to complete with audio app Clubhouse. On Monday Twitter officially released its feature called Spaces centered around audio conversations.

Today, we’re bringing the ability to host a Space to all accounts with 600 or more followers on Twitter. Based on what we’ve learned so far, these accounts are likely to have a good experience hosting live conversations because of their existing audience. Before bringing the ability to create a Space to everyone, we’re focused on learning more, making it easier to discover Spaces, and helping people enjoy them with a great audience.

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Twitter's Jack Dorsey Sells First Tweet as an NFT For U.S.$2.9 Million

Charlotte Henry ·

Twitter boss Jack Dorsey has sold his first tweet. He did so as an NFT, with the asset earning around U.S.$2.9 million, Reuters reported.

The tweet – “just setting up my twttr” – was Dorsey’s first tweet, made on March 21, 2006. The NFT was sold via auction on a platform called Valuables, which is owned by the U.S.-based company Cent. It was bought using the cryptocurrency Ether, for 1630.5825601 ETH, which was worth $2,915,835.47 at the time of sale, Cameron Hejazi, the CEO and co-founder of Cent confirmed. Cent confirmed the buyer is Sina Estavi. Estavi’s Twitter profile, @sinaEstavi, says he is based in Malaysia and is CEO of the blockchain company Bridge Oracle. Estavi told Reuters he was “thankful” when asked for comment about the purchase.

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Comparing Privacy Policies: Clubhouse Versus Twitter

Andrew Orr ·

Clubhouse and Twitter Spaces are the newest entries to the audio space, but they both do different things with your data. Matt Binder examined their privacy policies.

The two platforms’ approaches to data storage really speak to a major difference in their intended uses. It seems Twitter users will be able to Spaces for more permanent content that they can repurpose for other platforms and mediums; whereas Clubhouse rooms will live strictly in the moment.

I don’t want to spoil the article but it sounds like Clubhouse audio recordings are more ephemeral.

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Twitter Announces ‘Super Follows’ and Communities

Andrew Orr ·

Twitter announced a couple of features on Thursday that will arrive in the future and change the nature of its platform.

The payment feature, called Super Follows, will allow Twitter users to charge followers and give them access to extra content. That could be bonus tweets, access to a community group, subscription to a newsletter, or a badge indicating your support.

Twitter also announced a new feature called Communities, which appear to be its take on something like Facebook Groups. People can create and join groups around specific interests — like cats or plants, Twitter suggests — allowing them to see more tweets focused on those topics.

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Twitter Client ‘Tweetbot’ Becomes a Subscription App

Andrew Orr ·

Tweetbot was updated to version six on Tuesday and it brings several notable features, including the move to subscription pricing.

Even though the Tweetbot subscription isn’t expensive, I think Tapbots owes its users more than it has delivered. It’s a shame because Tweetbot remains one of the premier third-party Twitter clients for iOS. Hopefully, the lack of new features in this update will be addressed in subsequent releases.

Another subscription app that I’ll be deleting. For me, the only advantage Tweetbot has over Twitter is the lack of sponsored tweets, aka ads. While that is a notable feature worth paying for, one downside to Tweetbot includes never getting timely notifications.

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Twitter Acquires Podcasting Company ‘Breaker’ for Twitter Spaces

Andrew Orr ·

Twitter has acquired a social broadcasting app called Breaker and its team to help build Twitter Spaces, a new product in beta that lets users chat in real time with voice.

On January 15, 2021, Breaker will shut down for good. Up until that point, Breaker users will be able to export their OPML file to transfer their subscriptions to another podcasting app. Breaker recommends apps like Apple, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or Castro as an alternative. For those hosting a podcast on Breaker, these can be transferred elsewhere via the RSS feed.

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Twitter Supports Physical Security Keys for Two-Factor Authentication

Andrew Orr ·

Twitter announced on Wednesday that its mobile app now supports physical security keys for iPhone and Android. The company added support for these keys in 2018 but people could only use them in a browser. But switching to the WebAuthn protocol brings the method to mobile devices.

Now anyone with a security key set up on their Twitter account can use that same key to log in from their mobile device, so long as the key is supported. (A ton of security keys exist today that work across different devices, like YubiKeys and Google’s Titan key.)

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Twitter Tests Voice DMs After Debuting Voice Tweets

Andrew Orr ·

After rolling out voice tweets this summer, Twitter is now testing voice DMs. RIght now it’s being tested in Brazil.

Similar to voice tweets, voice messages have a bare-bones, simple interface: there’s just a play / pause button, and the sender’s avatar pulsates as the message plays. The product team designed an “in-line recording experience to make it easier to send these messages as part of the natural conversation flow,” so that’s one difference from the current audio tweets interface.

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