Twitter to give users new options to limit replies to their tweets

Twitter will soon give users an option to post a tweet as a ‘Statement’ to which no users can reply. The new features are expected to be available later this year.

Twitter’s new features give users more control on who can reply to their tweets (REUTERS)

Twitter will soon allow users to give more control on who can reply to their tweets. Users will get the following options when composing a tweet- Statement (no reply from anyone), Panel (reply only from those tagged in the tweet), Group (reply from user's followers and people mentioned), and Global (reply from anyone).

Twitter said it will conduct a trial of the feature in the first quarter before rolling out to all users. While announcing the new feature at the CES 2020, Twitter's VP of product Kayvon Beykpour said, "The primary motivation is control. We want to build on the theme of authors getting more control and we've thought… that there are many analogs of how people have communications in life."

The new update is a part of Twitter's efforts to make the platform less toxic for its users. Last year, Twitter introduced a similar feature aimed at controlling the replies.

The feature allows users to hide replies that they deemed abusive or harassing. Users, however, can still be peeked at and engaged with by tapping a gray icon. These hidden replies will not be part of the main conversation on the micro-blogging platform.

Apart from new controls on replies, Twitter is soon going to launch a conversation view, including threading, wherein users can read an entire conversation on one screen.