By Pascal Oparada, Social Media/Tech Reporter
Twitter is testing new features in its new beta app. The company said it is in a bid to remain valuable and relevant.
In the coming weeks, the company is going to launch a new beta programme where a select group of users will have access to new features, by way of a standalone app, to use and talk about with others, reports TechCrunch.
Twitter, will, in turn, use data it picks up with from the usage and chatter to decide how and if it turns those tests into full-blown product features for the rest of the user base.
Those selected can talk about the new features openly with others, or even tweet about them.
“Unlike a traditional beta that is the last step before launch, we’re bringing people in super early,” Sara Haider, Twitter’s director of product management, said.
The first version of beta will focus on a new design for the way conversation threads work on Twitter. This will include a different colour scheme, and visual cues to highlight important replies.
“It’s kind of a new take on our thinking about product development,” explains Haider. “One of the reasons why this is so critical for this particular feature is because we know we’re making changes that are pretty significant.”
According to Haider, changes of this proportion should not just be dropped on users one day.
“We need you to be part of this process so that we know we’re building the right experience,” Haider says.
Immediately it is accepted into the beta programme, users can now download separate beta app, although Twitter is not yet sure this would happen.
During the first beta, participants will try out new conversation features which offer colour-coded replies to differentiate between responses from the original poster of the tweet, those from people you follow, and those from people you don’t follow.
In a development build of the beta app, Haider showed TechCrunch what this looks like, with the warning that the colour scheme being used has been intentionally made to be overly saturated – it will be dialled down when the feature’s launch to testers.
When you click into a conversation thread, the beta app will also offer visual cues to help you better find the parts of the thread that is of interest to you.
One way it’s doing so is by highlighting the replies in a thread that were written by people you follow on Twitter. Another change is that the person who posted the original tweet will also have their own replies in the thread highlighted.
In the build, replies from people she followed were shown in green, those from non-followers were blue, and her own replies were blue.
One of the big themes in Twitter’s user experience for power and more casual users is that they come up with workarounds for certain features that Twitter does not offer.
Take reading through long threads that may have some interesting detail that you would like to come back to later, or that branch off at some point that you’d like to follow after reading through everything else. Haider says she marks replies she’s seen with a heart to keep her place. Other people use Twitter’s “Tweets & Replies” section to find out when the original poster had replied within the thread since it’s hard to find those replies when just scrolling down.
The same kind of algorithmic sorting that Twitter has applied to your main timeline might start to make its way to your replies.
Already, replies on Twitter may be shown in ranked order, so the important ones — like those from your Twitter friends — are moved to the top, and what two people see in a group of replies may differ.
Now, those replies and the branches of conversation that come off them may start to become easier to follow, also based on algorithms.
Another experiment Twitter is looking at is what it should do with its engagement buttons to streamline the look of replies for users.
The build shown to TechCrunch did not have any hearts to favourite/like Tweets, or any icons for retweets or replies. when the Tweets came in the form of replies to another Tweet.
“We want to continue our power of observation and learning… what people want Twitter to be and how to use it,” Dorsey said concerning the new features. “It allows us to be valuable and relevant.”
