Another day, another Twitter test. This time Twitter has been reported to be experimenting a way to show tweets to users from accounts that they don’t follow, but that their friends follow.
Also Read: The Day Twitter Added A “Buy Now” Button
The experiment was first spotted by Twitter user @aleefbaypay who spotted a tweet from BuzzFeed on his timeline. Problem, he does not follow @BuzzFeed, but his friend does.
WTF @twitter, why am I seeing tweets from accounts that I don’t follow but are followed by someone whom I follow?
— aleefbaypay (@aleefbaypay) August 3, 2014
@EliLanger yup. The buzzfeed tweet is the one in question. pic.twitter.com/FTbHTXs2Z9
— aleefbaypay (@aleefbaypay) August 3, 2014
One can easily see how this test could be easily be an experiment on a new monetisation channel for Twitter, very similar to Facebook’s sponsored stories.
But if Twitter did implement this feature, it would probably meet the anger of users. Following an account on Twitter is a deliberate action, people decide whose tweet and retweets they want to see in their timeline. They will not easily accept seeing tweets they did not ask for, especially in a timeline which already gets easily cluttered.
Twitter tests features features like that all the time, most of them never make it to the confirmation stage. However, we can really see where Twitter is going with this.
We reached out to Twitter in the UK for more information, but no one responded.
Related Stories:
- Twitter 101: How To Generate Engagement [Infographic]
- Twitter Is Testing Ways To Comment on Retweets
- Twitter (Finally) Adds Animated GIFs
You might also like
More from Twitter
Twitter Makes It Harder To Switch To Reverse-Chronological Feed
Twitter has made it harder to switch between the Latest and Home feeds in the app, with the algorithm-based feed …
Twitter Unveils New Monetization Tracking Dashboard For Creators
Twitter recently unveiled a new Creator Dashboard to help creators make the shift into monetized content creation.
Twitter Is Working On A New Podcast Discovery Tab
User reports show a new podcast discovery button placed within the sidebar menu and the lower navigation panel of the …
Twitter Expands Birdwatch Access To More Test Users
Twitter has announced updates for its Birdwatch crowdsourced fact-checking program, and a new testing group of random US users.
Twitter Rolls Out New Bot Labels To Identify Good Bot Accounts
Developers can take part in the initiative and identify their accounts as bots, displaying a label on their profiles and …
Twitter Expands Beta Access To ‘Safety Mode’ Anti-Abuse Tool
The tool, which automatically blocks abusive accounts for seven days, has been extended to users in a number of English-speaking …
Twitter Adds Three New Payment Options To Tip Creators
Twitter is adding three more payment methods to tip creators in Africa and India, as well as adding support for …
Twitter Is Working On A Feature That Lets You Tweet Select Users Only
Twitter may soon be launching Flock, a feature that allows users to select a group of up to 150 close …