Twitter announces edit "feature"

[phenomlab]

You’ve probably heard in the news that Twitter is evidently trialing a “feature” that enables you to edit tweets. See below

https://news.sky.com/story/twitter-rolling-out-edit-feature-to-some-users-in-canada-australia-and-new-zealand-12711401

For me at least, this has been met with a degree of trepidation - ok, even sarcasm if I’m honest. If you read the article, you’ll notice that this is being targeted at those who actually pay for Twitter’s services - their Premium Blue Services to be precise.

Even Facebook, with it’s multitude of well documented privacy issues over the years offers you this for free - and also the ability to delete a post you’ve created. Whilst Facebook is far from perfect, they’ve at least given you this functionality for free, yet Twitter have the audacity to charge for even the most basic of features. Whilst I fully understand that some services, particularly those that extend the platform’s existing functions with a set of features that enhance the overall capability need to be offered as a paid service to provide the firm with a revenue stream, that (in my view) doesn’t extend to a feature that should be part of the core product suite, and should be free.

As an analogy, can you imagine buying a car only to find out that the wipers are a “premium” addition? If you’re like me, and produce plenty of typos in text you type - and let’s be honest - with a significant portion of devices connected to the internet being mobile, this is an ongoing trend that shows no sign of showing down, yet alone stopping altogether.

In this instance, you have to delete an entire tweet just to rectify poor grammar or spelling mistakes which by today’s standards is almost prehistoric. Admittedly, every platform, including this one, will retain the original post along with the edits you made. The difference here is that you have access to the edits, and can remove them completely if you so desire.

Seeing as it took Twitter years to go from 140 to 280 characters per message (and for the purists out there, I’m well aware of Twitter’s origins and it’s emergence as a micro blogging platform), I’m not expecting Twitter to make this edit “feature” mainstream meaning that every year can benefit from it as part of the core functionality.

My personal view is that it’s not right or acceptable to make users pay for basic functionality - and the ability to edit a post is paramount in my view. Let’s say that you’ve worded something in a way that could be misinterpreted, or misconstrued. After reading your post, you have a chance to rectify that and this is a feature I see being used on a daily basis here.

It’s no wonder that various tweets on Twitter often cause a backlash, and a wave of negative comments. The only saving grace is the ability to delete a tweet, but in terms of damage control it may be too late already.

I guess there’s always the argument that you should think before you post, but sadly, that doesn’t seem to be adhered to in several cases I’ve seen.

I’m interested in your views around this topic. Self moderation should be encouraged at all times, and it’s not something I’d expect to have to pay for either.