Twitter’s biggest update to date 

Perhaps Twitter’s biggest update ever saw the light of day yesterday: the number of characters in tweets was increased from 140 to 280. The character count increase may not sound like a big change, but it is. 

The whole nature of the platform will change, and the reform will also change the most sacred thing about Twitter: its unique conversational culture.

Some say it will destroy the very idea behind it. In the past, you might have found yourself in situations where you had to be creative to fit what you wanted to say into your tweets, but now this is rarely necessary anymore.

Why such a radical change?

We believe that Twitter also wants to invest in a higher quality conversation culture in its service. 

The old 140-character limit made the conversation choppy in places, with little or no justification for views. Now the new 280-character limit sets the stage for more in-depth tweets. At the same time, you no longer need several tweets to address the same issue.

Creating a better discussion platform for users is Twitter’s way of attracting users to its service and, more importantly, of serving existing users. By providing a forum where the conversations are reactive but of high quality, it tries to counteract the ever-increasing ‘noise’ on the rest of the internet. 

With this change, Twitter is trying to overcome its reputation for being a “shouting match” for most users, with no real content. With higher quality content, the number of time users spend on Twitter will increase.

Ultimately, all listed social media platforms are motivated by economic considerations. The money will follow when users are satisfied and spend more time on the service.

FIGURE: THE TABLE SHOWS THE SLOWDOWN IN TWITTER’S USER GROWTH OVER THE LAST TWO YEARS.

140-character challenge

The 140-character limit is a problem for English-speaking users. “I have a red dog”= 16 characters. To say the same thing in Japanese or Korean, for example, would require only eight characters.

The table clearly shows how the growth in the number of monthly Twitter users has slowed down considerably over the last two years.

The 140 characters were originally intended to be equal for all. Still, Twitter did not consider language differences, which left English-speaking Twitter users at a disadvantage compared to, for example, many Asian languages. The statistics illustrate this well: 9% of English tweets ended up in 140 characters, compared to just 0.4% for Japanese.

140 characters will be missed, for a moment

Twitter’s 140-character limit created insightful tweets, where the most creative ones managed to squeeze their message in every time. It steered internet culture towards a “condensation” of words that influenced the content of other channels. 

Acronyms, letters replacing words, and #something replaced entire sentences and the mighty chain of multiple tweets. These were all created because of 140 characters.

But 280 is the new normal. Now Twitter is changing in a direction where more and more people can tweet their thoughts more easily. If users respond positively to the call of the 280 characters, Twitter’s slowing growth rate may once again take the wind in its sails.

#140

Contact us