In Malaysia (in terms of social media platforms), Facebook is king. As compared to Twitter and Instagram, Facebook is way more dynamic, allowing netizens to share thoughts, pictures, articles (their own or others’), videos, engage in conversations, and even run their own businesses. Perhaps this is why outlets like Twitter pale in comparison, what with its 140-character limit (before TMI).
But a re/code post says that’s about to change. In a big way. About 10,000-character big.
Yup. 10 years after its inception, Twitter is finally building a new feature for longer tweets. The new 10,000-character limit is already being used for the company’s Direct Messages product so it was only a matter of time before they implemented it for tweets. But what does it mean for tweets, you ask?
10,000 characters would allow a tweet of more than 1,000 words with spaces in between words and punctuations. Twitter Inc co-founder and CEO Jack Dorsey “showed” an example of what it would be able to do for the platform, and strongly hinted at the possibility of it happening:
— jack (@jack) January 5, 2016
There hasn’t been an official launch date set in stone but Twitter is targeting to roll out the new feature towards the end of Q1 2016. But people are already freaking out over the possibility of tweets that are way too long to digest at one glance. Some users have taken to Twitter to disagree with the forthcoming feature via the #beyond140 hashtag.
On another note, Twitter has been going through some changes as of late so we wouldn’t put it past them to continue to evolve. In recent times, the platform added polls to tweets, rolled out a “Moments” tab on its app, allowed videos, and replaced its star-shaped “favourite” icon with a heart-shaped icon called “like”.
Also, it’s important to note that the character limit could change before the final version of the product is unveiled. Let’s just wait and see!
Would you want to write essays on Twitter, though? Will this draw a clear divide between tweeting and blogging? What do you guys think? Would a 10,000-character limit be just a little too much?
Sources: recode, Reuters via CNA / Featured image from ajr.org.
