After testing Fleets in several countries, Twitter is now expanding the Stories-like feature to all users globally.
Fleets are Twitter’s answer to Stories on other platforms, built for sharing momentary thoughts that disappear after 24 hours. Touted as “a new way to join the conversation,” they are meant to help make people more comfortable and put them under less pressure to talk about what’s happening right now.
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In this sense, they differ little from Stories on, say, Facebook, Instagram, or Snapchat. But Twitter wants to enhance the public conversation by encouraging users to share their “fleeting thoughts.”
After announcing Fleets a while back, Twitter has been testing the feature in Brazil, Italy, India, and South Korea, and recently launched in Japan. Through tests, Twitter was able to glean that “Fleets helped people feel more comfortable joining the conversation,” leading people to “talk more” on its platform, “sharing personal and casual thoughts, opinions, and feelings.”
Now, Twitter is announcing that Fleets will soon be available to all users globally.
https://twitter.com/Twitter/status/1328684389388185600
You can “Fleet” lots of things – text, reactions to Tweets, photos, or videos and can customize their Fleets with backgrounds and text. All you have to do to share a Tweet in a Fleet is tap the “Share” icon at the bottom of the Tweet and tap on “Share in Fleet.” You can then add text and emojis, while stickers and live broadcasts will also soon be available.
Your followers – and anyone who can see your full profile – can see your Fleets right at the top of their home timeline. Anyone can reply to your Fleets if you have open Direct Messages, and if you want to reply to a Fleet, tap on it to send a Direct Message or emoji to the person who tweeted it.
All users globally will have Fleets in the next few days – on iOS and Android.