So long, Twitter. It was nice knowing ya.
According to a report from Re/code, the social networking site is set to move away from its 140-character limit, broadening its horizons to 10,000 characters in order to fall more in line with Facebook et al. Though Twitter’s focus upon short, snappy messages has frustrated some in the past, it’s the defining feature of the site and a vast number of its users will undoubtedly be displeased to see it being replaced by a far larger limit. In reality, it’s difficult to see Twitter surviving this transition without losing many of its followers (pun absolutely intended).
This transition to a 10,000 character limit is reportedly being branded ‘Beyond 140′ from those within the company, and will allegedly allow tweets lengthier than 140 characters to show up on users’ timelines via the click of a ‘reveal all’ button. The site has been struggling to think of ways to grow its user base, but this change could well see many move away from the site under the weight of a sea of long-winded tweets.
Which leads us to our next point of contention; they’re called tweets, for God’s sake. That word is short and sweet by its very nature – you don’t “tweet” a 10,000-character epic about gun control. It just doesn’t make sense.
Twitter’s 140-character limit has been around for a decade, and prior to this announcement it seemed likely that it would stay that way, despite frequent rumors that the site was looking to make such a change. A user has already pointed out how tweets could look in the near future thanks to ‘Beyond 140,’ tweeting the following:
Just wanted to show you how long 10,000 characters is. $TWTR pic.twitter.com/XPeeKFQJOe
— Dan Primack (@danprimack) January 5, 2016
Twitter has not yet made an official announcement regarding this report, though it will follow a number of recent changes made to the social network, including the introduction of its ‘Moments’ news summary feature, and the rumor that it is set to introduce a new timeline that will no longer see tweets appearing on users’ timelines in reverse chronological order.
