Twitter Friday: Do the New Retweets Suck? How to Fix Them?
A few months ago I wrote for the first time about the new internal retweet feature on Twitter. I didn’t like it. Now it turns out as the feature is being gradually rolled out that seemingly most people don’t like it. So this time I won’t annoy you with another “it sucks” post I will try to suggest solutions where the new retweet feature actually sucks.
In principle it’s a good thing to embrace retweets for Twitter.
Twitter just follows the will of its users in a way. On the other hand it’s counterproductive to change retweets in such a way that we barely recognize them as such anymore.
There are a few issues with the new retweet feature though, some of them are:
- You see tweets by strangers
- You hardly notice that a tweet is a retweet (no “RT:” or “via” just a recycling icon)
- Third party tools don’t recognize new retweets yet (and don’t display them at all)
- You can’t add your opinion to a retweet, you can onle repeat it as a whole
- It adds a layer of complexity and it’s confusing
There are a few good points about the new retweets as well:
- They require less space
- You see how many people retweeted a particualr tweet. it says “retweeted by and x others” where x is the number of retweets
Some features can be both good or bad depending on their use on the perspective
- You can block retweets by a person
The option to block retweets means that some people will become real followers while others will just read your direct tweets.
There is a simple solution for most of the issues: Let the Twitter users decide how they display retweets. Twitter should offer “advanced options” for retweet display. The options should be:
- Choose retweet display: icon, RT, via etc.
- Choose retweet avatar: The retweeting user, the retweeted user
- Retweet editing: Edit as new or just forward unchanged
- Switch off native retweet feature to add retweets manually
Also I want to see which followers block my retweets. Sometimes it can be as simple as letting people decide themselves. Of course we’re not as important as TechCrunch or Mashable to make Twitter listen but you can by suggesting it.
November 20th, 2009 at 7:52 pm
i agree w/u. Fyi rt option doesn’t work on my phone browser mini opera 4.02 thank you for all the info you give
November 20th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
I like it, I really do, i aint bothered about seeing strangers in my timeline – it actually opens up the chances of following some really interesting people, I struggle to understand what is complex about it as some people have shouted – it can reduce tweet jacking and also it stops the bandwagon of chinese whispers Rt’s
Also from a search perspective suddenly the title of the retweet used with the new functionality has all that RT @ stripped from the Title – more chance of being seeded in the search engines.
I might be in a group of 1 considering the search communities dislike towards it but I am only stressing my opinion and frankly for me it is a massive step forward on how information is shared on Twitter. My tuppence worth.
November 21st, 2009 at 3:33 am
I like the new retweet feature. As a new user, it makes it easier for me to recognize the distinction (as opposed to a ‘RT’). All of the RTs, #s, or @s really throw me. It’s much cleaner/aesthetically pleasing.
November 21st, 2009 at 3:37 am
They suck. Plain and simple. For all the reasons listed in this post and even more so because Twitter is too late to the RT bandwagon. If they had jumped in earlier and *lead*, it might have been a different story. As it is, they are flaunting the existing conventions and reinventing this particular wheel instead of adding value. I don’t even see what’s in it for them by doing it this way.
November 21st, 2009 at 3:47 am
I would like to be able to add comments to and edit tweets before retweeting.
November 21st, 2009 at 9:41 am
I think both types of retweet, the traditional and the new, have their place and I am using both now.
November 21st, 2009 at 11:37 pm
I think the powers at Twitter had very specific, deliberate, money-driven reasons for designing this feature the way they did, and they have no intention of accepting good ideas like yours which will cut against the grain of whatever their scheme is.
It is noteworthy that they did not consult with their customers before coming up with their “beta”, and their “beta” isn’t a true beta at all, since they are not soliciting, and are not interested in, user input.
I am one of the most prolific non-robotic retweeters on Twitter, and am usually in the top 50 of those being retweeted by others, and they’ve never talked to me, and I do not know anyone else with whom they spoke prior to implementing this foolish imitation of a retweet.
A business which thinks it knows more than its customers is one on the road to failure.
My recommendations on how we should proceed are here: http://is.gd/4YRfB
November 23rd, 2009 at 2:26 pm
I agree with Sherry – I would love to easily add my 2 cents when retweeting. Otherwise, I have to “resend” it by retyping… and am just hoping the original sender gets credit for the RT.
November 27th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
I really loathe seeing strangers in my time line. It’s enough for me to stop using twitter I must say.
January 25th, 2010 at 12:30 am
I’ve created a Greasemonkey script for Firefox/Safari that converts new style RTs to old style ones :-) It’s restored my sanity! See http://bit.ly/oldRTs
February 25th, 2010 at 5:14 am
@twitter Pls fix retweeting as per http://www.seoptimise.com/blog/2009/11/twitter-friday-do-the-new-retweets-suck-how-to-fix-them.html