In an
interview with Joe Rogan recently, Jack Dorsey said Twitter is considering on an edit system where you would be able to see the original and edited version of a tweet. Speaking at a Goldman Sachs event today, Dorsey also floated the idea of a “clarify” feature.
As noted by
Recode, Dorsey said that Twitter is “thinking about” a feature that would allow users to go back and add clarification or annotations to tweets. This feature makes sense in many ways.
Often times, a tweet can go viral even if it’s false or misconstrued. This sort of annotation feature would allow users to clarify what they meant while also preserving the original tweet. The original tweet, however, would not be able to be retweeted, with Twitter instead retweeting the clarification.
Here’s how Dorsey explained the feature:
“How do we enable people to quickly go back or to any tweet, whether it be years back or today, and show that original tweet — kind of like a quote retweet, a retweet with comment — and to add some context and some color on what they might have tweeted or what they might have meant. By doing so you might imagine that the original tweet then would not have the sort of engagement around it. Like you wouldn’t be able to retweet the original tweet, for instance. You would just show the clarification, you would be able to retweet the clarification, so it always carries around with it that context. That’s one approach. Not saying that we are going to launch that but those are the sorts of questions we are going to ask.”
Of course, if
Kara Swisher’s recent interview with Dorsey is any indication, Twitter is “thinking about” a lot of things. It’s anyone’s guess as to what might actually be shipped as a functioning feature.
