We’ve all heard of “fake news” by now. Twitter is taking steps to limit the spread of misinformation during the election.
Starting October 20 until at least November 3 (aka Election Day) the platform will:
- Add credible information about topics on Tweets that have been flagged as misleading or disputed; this will pop up when someone tries to Retweet those flagged posts.
- Prompt Quote Tweets before Retweets.
- The official Twitter Blog says “Though this adds some extra friction for those who simply want to Retweet, we hope it will encourage everyone to not only consider why they are amplifying a Tweet, but also increase the likelihood that people add their own thoughts, reactions and perspectives to the conversation. If people don’t add anything on the Quote Tweet composer, it will still appear as a Retweet.”
- Prevent “liked by” and “followed by” recommendations from people you don’t follow from showing up in your timeline.
- Update the trending topics For You by only including topics with additional context to better explain why they are trending.
There is nothing saying this will stop, or continue, after the election, but I’m thinking if they do all this work and it increases the credibility of posts I can see them keeping these changes.
