Social media app Instagram is planning to launch a new feature that allows its users personalized control over the comments shared on each of their posts.
The company has long had blanket rules for what constitutes appropriate speech on its network, but the new comment filter ability will let each user tweak specific rules to their own liking, since "different words or phrases are offensive to different people" (via The Washington Post).
Some businesses have already gotten a look at the new feature, letting them automatically weed out comments and posters with specific triggering phrases. In the next few weeks, more "high-profile accounts" will get their hands on comment moderation, with the ability to also switch comments off completely on a post-by-post basis.
“Our goal is to make Instagram a friendly, fun and, most importantly, safe place for self expression," said Instagram's head of public policy, Nicky Jackson Colaco, in a statement to The Post. "We have slowly begun to offer accounts with high volume comment threads the option to moderate their comment experience. As we learn, we look forward to improving the comment experience for our broader community.”
Normal users will have to wait a while longer to moderate their own posts, since Instagram said it will launch the feature to all its users "in the coming months." The company is planning on using feedback from higher-volume accounts to fine tune the new feature before handing it out to its more than 300 million daily active users.
Instagram is available for free on the App Store. [Direct Link]
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