Twitter debuts its 'Fleet' feature, as the social media giant reveals on its blog on Tuesday (11/17).
Product manager Sam Haveson and design director Joshua Harris acknowledge the pressure of racking likes and retweets on permanent tweets. To tackle the issue, Twitter announced 'Fleet,' a similar feature to Instagram story and Snapchat.
"Fleets are for sharing momentary thoughts - they help start conversations and only stick around for 24 hours," Haveson and Harris write.
Snapchat pioneered the 24-hour long format before Instagram adopted it in 2016. Facebook, Instagram's parent company, also rolled out the same feature not too long ago, followed by social media known for professionals, LinkedIn.
In fact, this is not the only new innovation Twitter has rolled out this year. Previously, Twitter released a feature that lets users tweet recorded voice notes.
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What Is 'Fleet'?
As mentioned above, Fleet carries the same feature as Snapchat and Instagram story.
Users can share Tweets, pictures, and videos, and they will disappear after 24 hours. Like Instagram, Fleets will appear atop the app's homepage, and it's yet to come on the desktop.
"Fleets helped people feel more comfortable sharing personal and casual thoughts, opinions, and feelings," the blog reads.
In several countries like Brazil, Italy, India, and South Korea, Twitter users were among the Fleet feature's first trialists back in March this year.
Warnings and labels, like the ones we see amidst the coronavirus pandemic and the recent presidential election in the US, will also be implemented on Fleets.
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Mixed Reactions
Twitter is known for its simplicity. Back in the days, the microblogging site only lets users tweet below 140 characters before doubling it to 280 in 2017. This simple feature makes Twitter unique from any other social media. Ads were hard to come by back then, but it seems to be all over the place now.
This new feature, Fleet, is exceptionally far from 'simplicity.'
Social media giants, including Twitter, have been under pressure to create a space for freedom of speech and a safer platform from online harassment and abuse at the same time. Along with a couple of other features rolled out before, this Fleet feature is among the decisions to support the cause.
However, since its release, Fleet has met with somewhat mixed reactions from users. Many meme-fyed the decision.
As The Guardian reported, the tech giant has confirmed its newest work called Spaces. It's a live audio feature that allows users to talk publicly in group chat conversations, and its beta will come soon.
Due to safety concerns, Twitter revealed that "women and historically marginalised communities" will be the feature's first trialists.
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