Twitter today confirmed plans to begin experimenting with a "Hide Replies" feature starting in June, which will provide Twitter users with more control over the replies that are visible following a tweet.
As TechCrunch points out, this has the potential to be controversial because the original person who tweets will be able to control which replies are visible in a conversation thread.
The feature will be experimental, so it could ultimately be tweaked or scrapped entirely based on how users react to its implementation. Twitter has said that hidden responses wouldn't show up automatically, but would be viewable by others using a menu option.
Along with announcing the new feature, Twitter today also shared details on its efforts to create a "healthier service" through cutting down on abuse and spam.
Twitter says that it has suspended three times more abusive accounts within 24 hours of a report compared to the same time last year, 2.5 times more private information has been removed, and there's been a 45 percent uptick in efforts to suspend users who create a new account after a suspension.
In the future, Twitter says it plans to introduce additional safety-related features, such as making it easier for Twitter users to share specifics when reporting abuse, adding more notices within Twitter about rule enforcement, and debuting rules that are easier to understand.
Top Rated Comments
As someone that puts up with a lot of abusive people on Twitter as part of my job, I think the problem they're trying to address is the mobbing, where a relatively small number of people try to stir up outrage at you or your company.
Like, we had one influencer-type who was angry because we wouldn't give him free stuff so he used his audience to create all of this negative backlash all over our Twitter feed. Post-incident analysis showed that 75% of the people bashing our product, were posting from accounts where the person listed themselves as residing outside of the US, thus, they had never used our product and were simply jumping on the bandwagon.
It really does put people/companies in a weird situation where people can extort you, openly and publicly, but Twitter does not give you the tools to defend yourself. If you respond, you are basically highlighting this person to all of your followers who may not have even been aware of the controversy. So, your best option is to say nothing, which often adds fuel to the fire for not responding (silence = guilt in internet arguments).
Ultimately, moderation tools will either be used honestly or they won't and those that choose to moderate so that only people that agree with you or support you are allowed to comment, you'll end up destroying your own brand/reputation. But if you are able to use these tools to stop people from abusing you or trying to extort things from you, the only people that are going to get upset by it are jerks anyway.