> "....learn about how not having [likes and retweets] could potentially change how people read things,” How does that change the way you interact in a conversation? That’s super interesting.”
So basically, a bunch of tiny iterative UX changes that won't move the needle one bit. This is the company where moving from from 140 to 280 chars happened over the course of a decade.
I feel for the product people, they are working with one hand tied behind their backs. Twitter is tailor-made for drama and outrage; nobody would be on the platform if it wasn't primarily a promotional channel; otherwise it'd just be you sending your thoughts into the void.
The way Twitter currently is is because that's the balance they struck between a microblogging platform and something you can actually make money with/on. Lowest-common-denominator content is the only thing that can generate enough eyeballs to pique the interest of fly-by-night T-shirt companies and diet pill peddlers who buy ads on it.
I'm not super optimistic about the changes, but getting rid of like/rt counts is not even close to a "tiny iterative ux change". Those counts are absolutely central to the way users interact with and understand conversation on the site. Getting rid of them completely is a massive sea change in the conversational dynamics.
> Those counts are absolutely central to the way users interact with and understand conversation on the site.
Maybe so, but the numbers won't be hidden to the algorithm, which ultimately decides which retweets and "high-engagement" posts to show you on the timeline. I would think that has a much bigger influence on the conversation. You won't reply to something if it never makes it to your feed in the first place.
Seriously, we have nearly 20 years of evidence at this point showing that, if you associate something with users’ online identities that looks like a score, they will treat it as such and start looking for ways to outscore everyone else.
So basically, a bunch of tiny iterative UX changes that won't move the needle one bit. This is the company where moving from from 140 to 280 chars happened over the course of a decade.
I feel for the product people, they are working with one hand tied behind their backs. Twitter is tailor-made for drama and outrage; nobody would be on the platform if it wasn't primarily a promotional channel; otherwise it'd just be you sending your thoughts into the void.
The way Twitter currently is is because that's the balance they struck between a microblogging platform and something you can actually make money with/on. Lowest-common-denominator content is the only thing that can generate enough eyeballs to pique the interest of fly-by-night T-shirt companies and diet pill peddlers who buy ads on it.