UPDATE: An X person claims that this report relies on false data that they shared with Fortune.
I’m not likely certain why Elon Musk is so irritated by muddle in the principle X feed, however for some motive, he needs to chop out as a lot as completely potential, with a purpose to make it a extra “clear”, easy UI.
Which could be extra enticing, I suppose, however…
Musk’s newest suggestion alongside this line is to take away the date/time markers from the principle X feed, so that you simply simply have a transparent, scrolling row of posts, with the principle put up itself being the main focus.
As reported by Fortune:
“The proposal of eradicating date stamps can be restricted to the timeline of posts on X, in line with the supply. If a person clicks via on the put up, the date of when the put up was created would then be seen. Musk has advised staffers he believes the change will enhance the person interface of X.”
Which is alongside the identical traces as Musk’s push to take away all perform buttons and engagement counts in-stream, which would depart posts trying like this:
iOS customers can now allow this show, by deactivating engagement buttons and efficiency knowledge on posts, as an non-obligatory setting, whereas they will additionally swap on X’s side-swiping capabilities to work together with posts, versus tapping handbook buttons.
At one stage, X was seeking to implement this for all customers, at Elon’s request, but it surely now appears to have eased again on that push, making it an non-obligatory UI as a substitute.
Beneath this new proposal, nonetheless, X would even be seeking to take away the time/date indicator, together with the perform buttons and efficiency counts.
Which would depart the principle feed trying one thing like this:
That may truly make common X posts look similar to X advertisements, which additionally don’t embrace a time/date stamp.
And truthfully, I feel that it could improve engagement, as a result of individuals wouldn’t have the context of time to know the way recent posts are in the principle feed. So X might present you a put up from days in the past, and your instinctive response can be to the content material itself, to not the date that it was posted, which could improve your tendency to react. As a result of perhaps you’d really feel much less inclined to react to an older, much less well timed replace, feeling such as you’d missed the boat or pattern.
However as Fortune factors out, it might additionally result in extra misinformation being shared within the app:
“Some X staffers imagine eradicating the dates will make the platform needlessly “complicated” and can possible make problems with misinformation on the platform worse. Traditionally, most customers of Twitter, and now X, solely casually scroll on the platform, hardly ever clicking via on particular person posts. The absence of dates from the timeline would possible depart most customers with out important context about data they’re seeing.”
So you possibly can see a put up from days or perhaps weeks in the past, and react to that as if it’s latest information, whereas older updates might be extra simply re-shared, and seen in a unique context, based mostly on present occasions.
Basically, because the X supply notes, it could add a degree of confusion within the app. However then once more, if it elicits extra response, perhaps it’s value making an attempt?
It does instinctively really feel like a backwards transfer, however as famous, Elon is reportedly “obsessed” with revamping the UI of the app. It’s additionally value noting on this context that Twitter was lengthy criticized for its lack of innovation, and its hesitance to attempt new issues.
Musk has proven that he has no such qualms, and perhaps, a extra plain X feed, even with out timestamps in the principle timeline, might drive extra curiosity.
It’s arduous to say with out experiencing it, and nobody’s going to take action until X makes it occur.