Mashable - The Social Media Guide - Latest Comments in #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Bluesconnect — Wed, 13 May 2009 16:43:22 -0000

As a new twitter, I found replies very helpful in learning twitter, meeting new twitters and finding great tweets!

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Zigor — Wed, 13 May 2009 15:35:22 -0000

This post so reminds me of yesterday's post from LC.

Evil Twitter.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Spot Cool Stuff — Wed, 13 May 2009 15:23:32 -0000

Like everyone else here, I think this is a terrible change. It is the equivalent of hosting a party but forbidding people from speaking to anyone they didn't know before the party began.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Kenya — Wed, 13 May 2009 14:27:26 -0000

This is not the case as people who I do not follow are still able to @ me.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Gail Gardner — Wed, 13 May 2009 13:20:42 -0000

You are probably correct. When a company does something that makes no sense TO US it is usually because their goals are NOT what we think they are - even if we what we think is based on what they SAY their goals are.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Gail Gardner — Wed, 13 May 2009 13:15:22 -0000

This also means that you can not @reply to anyone who is not already following you so effectively you can not reach them at all any more.

Many do not realize there was an option under Settings, Notices that allowed you to decide which @replies you would receive. If you had that set to everyone ANYONE who wanted to contact you could.

Do you know how many times someone has asked me to DM them that wasn't following me so I could not use DM? Now I won't be able to send them an @ message either so they'll just think I'm ignoring them.

The workaround is to use the search function to search for your @messages but even this is only going to work if Twitter keeps those messages available for search. They might just delete them all.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

gwendolen — Wed, 13 May 2009 12:52:25 -0000

The @replies are the best way to discover new people on Twitter. Why on earth would one want to take that away?

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

homeofgolftv — Wed, 13 May 2009 12:50:14 -0000

Surely it is only a matter of time before Twitter reverse this poorly thought out decision

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

karolijn — Wed, 13 May 2009 12:26:23 -0000

I hadn't even thought of this before, but this is a great idea. I used the see-all-replies feature when I moved to a new city and wanted to meet new people. I've since turned it off because of the 'noise' but it would be great to keep it on for just certain people that are likely to lead to new connections.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Shawn Farner — Wed, 13 May 2009 11:33:30 -0000

Yeah, I'm sure every Twitter user is going to run to FriendFeed now. o_O

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

krc936 — Wed, 13 May 2009 11:13:55 -0000

Personally I prefer not to see everyone's @ replies in my Twitter feed.. But I agree that this should be each user's choice.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Guest — Wed, 13 May 2009 11:00:04 -0000

Agreed. I want to see the conversations of friends and strangers I'm interested in. I don't give a flip about celebrities' conversations with everyone.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Richard Pendergast — Wed, 13 May 2009 10:56:29 -0000

Twitter is a real time discussion medium - not a broadcast medium. We discuss things, and the value is in the conversation.

As an example of why this latest move by Twitter is a really bad call, take the Australian federal budget which aired last night, and which was discussed in real-time via Twitter.

Watching the budget on television I would have just sat back and listened with no opportunity to participate in discussions, to ask questions, or to provide insight. Following the coverage on Twitter on the other hand I was able to actively take part in an ever increasing conversation.

My experience of the event was one of a discussion which grew quickly from the couple of friends I have who know the space, to one involving 20 or 30 actively involved parties.

The reason this was possible is that each time a friend replied to a question I was not aware of in a way that interested me, I was able to simply follow the user asking the question, in order to add them to the discussion.

Take away the ability to grow your awareness of others by picking up on replies not directed at you, and the only people who will get anything out of coverage such as this are the ones with the largest number of followers present.

This takes us right back to the days when we had to wait until those with the reach pulled in all of the information available and passed it on. This is television. This is sad.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Navahk — Wed, 13 May 2009 10:38:57 -0000

I also agree with this, you can find people in other ways. No need for them to read your discussions.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Jorge Barba — Wed, 13 May 2009 10:16:43 -0000

I think this is Twitters way of dealing with their retention rate of new users to service. You can see that they're clearly moving to the use of their recommendation system which included people they choose and not us.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Mary — Wed, 13 May 2009 09:59:25 -0000

Why didn't they just make the mutual followers view the DEFAULT? That seemed to be the problem, that it was showing everyone right out of the gate.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

roncasalotti — Wed, 13 May 2009 09:18:36 -0000

Let's face it, removing choice for this function serves one purpose only -- reducing bandwidth requirements for Twitter. If doing this to improve user experience were the case, the options would remain -- defaulting to what Twitter believes is the "desired" setting. This has the potential for greatly reducing Twitter's effectiveness as a business tool for companies wishing to engage their customers wherever they aggregate on the Web (whether individually known to them or not). Yes, you can use third-pary apps to do this, but why should you have to?

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Georg Portenkirchner — Wed, 13 May 2009 08:32:58 -0000

Facebbok tries to be like Twitter, but now Twitter became as boring as Facebook!

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Andy — Wed, 13 May 2009 08:23:01 -0000

Don't fix something that's not broken... period.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Jeff O'Hara — Wed, 13 May 2009 08:10:07 -0000

Not sure why people are complaining, just create a saved search of your username and all fixed :)

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Shéamus — Wed, 13 May 2009 07:22:57 -0000

While I agree we should have the option to turn this on/off ourselves, at least 98 per cent of Twitter users did not make use of, nor were not even aware of, this facility. That number (98%) was provided by @ev a year ago to the day, and is likely well over 99 per cent now, given Twitter's recent boom. Why? Because it was the default setting, and very few people changed it.

Sure, "very few" still equates to several hundred thousand, but it does seem to be a case of majority rule here, for Twitter. Poor a decision as it was, one can somewhat understand why a service that 98-99+ per cent were not taking advantage of might be removed.

It’s increasingly apparent that those users that did have their settings pegged on all replies seemed to feel that this was something everybody was doing, when this couldn’t be further from the truth. Moreover, it's now obvious that a lot of people didn’t understand how @replies worked, and started many messages with @username, not realising the network treated this as a reply, and it would have been invisible to 98+ per cent of their followers (assuming all things being equal).

(For more detail on how Twitter will be impacted by this decision, please see my blog.)

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Average Joes — Wed, 13 May 2009 07:06:09 -0000

Does this post have the facts right? You never get all @replies as that would mean everyone. What it actually means is you could see an @reply assuming you were following them, and you did not need to follow the other person?

Not you will only get @replies if you follow both people, which personally is my preferred method. Why would you want to see an '@mom dinner for 6 please?'.

If people want the option leave it, but the standard should be you only see conversations that you follow.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Jay Freeman (saurik) — Wed, 13 May 2009 06:51:38 -0000

What we really need is this setting to be per-followee. I have written more about this on my website. http://www.saurik.com/id/11

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Farhan Lalji — Wed, 13 May 2009 06:04:37 -0000

It's all about options. Giving something and then taking it away completely is not the same as introducing a new feature (as facebook did with newsfeeds). If you're taking things away make sure people don't like the feature your removing all together.

Re: #fixreplies Controversy: Twitter Users Want @Reply Options Back

Doubledown Tandino — Wed, 13 May 2009 06:04:06 -0000

I even think the issue itself is hard to understand. As a twitter user, you cannot even see what's been removed from view, and the twitter company description doesn't make sense.
I'm finding it hard to understand now what I'll be seeing and what I won't be seeing... and I can't even comprehend what others will see when I tweet.
The point is.... open free all streams for everyone.... today marks the next step in the coffin on twitter and the migration to friendfeed. http://twitpic.com/51728