Ahead of the November 3rd US presidential elections, Twitter has implemented a change in the way its retweet button works.
The change was introduced to help prevent abuse, as well as the spread of misinformation about the forthcoming elections.
The update, according to Twitter “will increase context and encourage more thoughtful consideration before Tweets are amplified.”
The update, which started rolling out yesterday, will, according to Twitter, be on till, at least, the end of Election week in the US.
For the retweet function to be used now, after clicking the retweet button, users will be directed to the quote tweet interface, where they are encouraged to add a comment to the tweet, before retweeting.
“First, we will encourage people to add their own commentary prior to amplifying content by prompting them to Quote Tweet instead of Retweet. People who go to Retweet will be brought to the Quote Tweet composer where they’ll be encouraged to comment before sending their Tweet,” Twitter wrote on its official blog.
The move by Twitter to implement this update is connected to the company’s attempt to discourage people from retweeting indiscriminately. With this update, users are encouraged to not only retweet a tweet, but also add their reaction, comment, or emotions to the tweet quoted.
Although, Twitter did not entirely remove the option to retweet, the company says it is only trying to encourage “commentary prior to amplifying” a tweet.
Users who chooses not to add their opinion to a tweet can still just make a retweet. They will only have to leave the Quote Tweet composer empty before tapping retweet. This will make the tweet appear as the conventional retweet.
The retweet update is not the only change Twitter introduced. Twitter will also “prevent “liked by” and “followed by” recommendations from people you don’t follow from showing up in your timeline and won’t send notifications for these Tweets.”