Cape Town - Twitter on Tuesday announced that it would roll out a 280-character limit for a small group of users as an experiment.
"Trying to cram your thoughts into a Tweet – we’ve all been there, and it’s a pain," wrote Twitter engineer Ikuhiro Ihara and product manager Aliza Rosen in a joint blog post. "Although we feel confident about our data and the positive impact this change will have, we want to try it out with a small group of people before we make a decision to launch to everyone.
"What matters most is that this works for our community – we will be collecting data and gathering feedback along the way," the pair wrote.
"We’re hoping fewer Tweets run into the character limit, which should make it easier for everyone to Tweet."
Reaction on Twitter was swift with users making use of the microblogging service's ability to give near-instant feedback for a bit of fun.
I'm looking forward to 280 characters and all the extra context and nuance that Trump will be able to provide.
— Matt Buckland (@ElSatanico) September 27, 2017
(GRANDAD VOICE) Oh, these things come and go. At one time Twitter was 20 characters, and one tweet a month. You had to post it to them.
— Mark Watson (@watsoncomedian) September 27, 2017
literally my only talent was being able to think of tweets exactly 140 characters long. i don't know if I will be able to alter this to 280.
— christine teigen (@chrissyteigen) September 26, 2017
Tweets were already savage on 140 characters. Imagine the 280 character limit in twitter spats now... ?? pic.twitter.com/hwBibNZpG3
— Olivia Buckland (@OliviaDBuck) September 27, 2017
Please nobody tell Trump about the new 280-character Twitter limit https://t.co/wwASncw0JE pic.twitter.com/WNkDeMgjk3
— Newsweek (@Newsweek) September 27, 2017
Celebrating Twitter's 280 possibilities with this Tweet.
— Mark Millar (@mrmarkmillar) September 27, 2017
And in one stroke, Twitter doubles the complexity of our nation's foreign policy.
— Stephen Colbert (@StephenAtHome) September 27, 2017
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