Twitter Will Temporarily Place Some Limitations On Retweets To Fight Misinformation

These days it is incredibly easy to reshare, retweet, or forward a message. The problem with that is that sometimes the information we’re resharing, retweeting, or forwarding could contain false or wrong information, which could then lead to speculation, rumors, and to a certain extent, unrest.

Now that the elections are nearly upon us, Twitter is hoping to do their part in combating misinformation leading up to the elections, and one of the things they plan to do is place some limitations and restrictions on retweets. According to Twitter, whenever a user tries to retweet a post, they are encouraged to add a comment to give the post more context instead of just blindly retweeting it.

The company notes, “Though this adds some extra friction for those who simply want to Retweet, we hope it will encourage everyone to not only consider why they are amplifying a Tweet, but also increase the likelihood that people add their own thoughts, reactions and perspectives to the conversation.”

This is a temporary measure that they will be putting into place from the 20th of October until the end of the elections, but who’s to say that it won’t become a permanent feature. Platforms such as WhatsApp introduced a similar feature where they limit the number of times a message can be forwarded to help prevent the spread of misinformation. So far, it appears that it has been somewhat successful, so perhaps Twitter could be interested in making it a mainstay feature.

Tyler Lee
Categories: General
Tags: Twitter