Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey recently asked his approximately 3.95 million followers what they wanted to see on the social media platform, with an edit button taking the top spot as the most requested feature of all.
In the end, the experiment boiled down to four themes that the company will look into for 2017: abuse, edit, topics and interests, and conversations.
Abuse
Online abuse is no stranger to Twitter, and the company has been rolling out a slew of features since long ago to fight against it, including but not limited to the keyword filter and the tool that lets users report multiple tweets simultaneously.
This shouldn't come as much of a surprise, though. Almost anybody on the website has been clamoring for a solution to keep online trolls at bay at some point.
Edit
At first glance, the option to edit a tweet seems like a good idea, not to mention that Facebook has been offering its users the ability to do so since way back, so why can't Twitter do it too?
Well, it's not that simple. Sure, it can help a ton of Twitter users who are left with no other choice but to delete an error-filled tweet and repost it to make a fix. However, adding the function may also have a negative impact on how the website can be used as a public record of sorts.
More than that, picture this: A Twitter user gets their post retweeted for how many times, and after that, they edit the tweet, which will change the content and meaning across all the retweets.
Needless to say, that's a big no-no, especially at a time when fake news has started to become rampant online.
Topics And Interests
Not much to hash out on this front. The gist of what the people want here is the ability to follow topics. At any rate, this opens up a world of possibilities — a bit exaggerated, but still — in improving Twitter users' experience.
Conversations
Same with topics, what users want to see on this department is an effective way to follow and manage conversations. In a word, it would be interesting to see what Twitter has in mind for it.
The Bottom Line
To sum things up, Twitter has a pretty long New Year's resolution list, and a ton of the feedback it received might not even see the light of day. However, Dorsey did say the company will take every one into consideration.
What do you think of Twitter's plans regarding these four themes for 2017? Drop by our comments section below and let us know.
