Twitter may double tweet length to 280 characters
Social media platform Twitter is testing a longer character limit so users can "easily express themselves." It has doubled the character limit from 140 characters to 280 for a handful of users. Twitter said the current character limit was "a major cause of frustration" for some users. Twitter has been experiencing slowing growth and the shift could be aimed at attracting new users.
Twitter product manager Aliza Rosen said: "Trying to cram your thoughts into a Tweet - we've all been there, and it's a pain." "We understand since many of you have been Tweeting for years, there may be an emotional attachment to 140 characters - we felt it, too." However, after trying it, her team fell in love with "this new, still brief, constraint."
This is a small change, but a big move for us. 140 was an arbitrary choice based on the 160 character SMS limit. Proud of how thoughtful the team has been in solving a real problem people have when trying to tweet. And at the same time maintaining our brevity, speed, and essence! https://t.co/TuHj51MsTu
— jack (@jack) September 26, 2017
The new longer character limit experiment won't apply to Japanese, Chinese and Korean as these convey more information in a single character. Rosen said, unlike English users, those tweeting in Japanese aren't left frustrated because of the 140 character limit. She said, "when people don't have to cram their thoughts into 140 characters and actually have some to spare, we see more people Tweeting."
Twitter's expanded character limit experiment has attracted mixed reactions. However, for many, a concern remains whether the world's most prolific Twitter user, US President Donald Trump, would be given access to the "bigly" tweets. Twitter has clarified to CNBC that the feature will be rolled out to a "random sample," so it's possible Trump could get it.
