A new policy on Twitter may change the very common habit on social media platforms: sharing an article without reading the content, and just the headlines. If you're guilty on this, don't worry-- you're not alone.
Are you sharing an article based on headlines?
Former Arsenal player Ian Wright tweets about his food at a breakfast with bloggers at Tiong Bahru market during day 2 of the Barclays Asia Trophy Ticket Launch 2015 on May 13, 2015 in Singapore.
Imagine scrolling through Twitter and saw an intriguing article with a click-bait headline. Most people will tend to share the article and totally forget about reading the content. Just the headlines would be okay.
Admittedly, a lot of people tend to do this online. It's quicker, faster, and less time-consuming if you're not such a fan of reading news articles.
Sad to say, old habits like this may not work on Twitter anymore.
In June, Twitter began a 'read before you retweet' test to a few of their users online. Now, the social media platform is ready to make the new feature worldwide.
How does it work?
A close-up view of the homepage of the microblogging website Twitter on June 1, 2011 in London, England. Anonymous Twitter users have recently claimed to reveal the identity of numerous high-profile individuals who have taken out legal privacy injunctions.
Starting 'soon,' the social media app will force its users to read an article first before retweeting it online.
This means that in order to retweet a specific article on the platform, a notification will first pop into your screen, saying 'Headlines don't tell a story.' It will require users to open the website wherein the article was located first before retweeting it all over the media.
Twitter says that this policy will hopefully change how people react on fake news and misinformation-- which are rampant on any social media nowadays.
The Verge quoted Twitter saying, this change will "help promote informed discussion." Not depending on a few words on the headlines, which may claim misleading info.
What’s next:
Making the prompt smaller after you’ve seen it once, because we get that you get it
Working on bringing these prompts to everyone globally soon pic.twitter.com/08WygQi06G — Twitter Comms (@TwitterComms) September 24, 2020
The company shared about their found positive statistics in the 'read before you retweet' policy. At least 33% of users no longer read headlines only and read articles before retweeting the post.
Meanwhile, 40% of Twitter users more often open articles after they see a Twitter prompt of the feature. However, some choose not to retweet the post at all.
For Twitter, that's more like it.
This article is owned by Tech Times
Written by Jamie Pancho
