The implicit trust in the new RT function on Twitter
Many people have asked me for my opinion on why I don’t like the new retweet (RT) function on Twitter. I am writing this short post from home so I don’t have access to a screen capture that I got the other day to show the function itself, but my thoughts can be summarized as follows.
First, in the new RT function, there is an implicit assumption of the person originating the tweet that is being RT’d is trusted by the person retweeting. This assumption is made by the platform, not by the individual (and very clearly explicitly stated on the new RT function explanatory bubble). I don’t feel comfortable with anyone assuming anything on why I retweet something. Sometimes, I share stuff that I find valuable. Sometimes, it’s something that shocks me or surprises me. But that doesn’t really establish any implicit trust contract between me and the person that is being RT’d
Second, in the new RT function, there is no way to annotate a tweet. The argument can be (a) that characters are lost in the annotation and (b) that it preserves the integrity of the tweet being retweeted. However, what happens if I want to annotate the tweet I’m RT’ing and add my commentary in the opposite direction e.g.
“wow, this was completely false RT @fulanodetal I am the owner of the world”.
It would have been SO much easier if Twitter had just copied the RT function on Power Twitter. Why break something that isn’t broken?
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Agreed. Plus, to me it escalates the Auto feel of twitter and de-escalates the human voice. I first and foremost want to see the person who is doing the RT, who I am following, and only *then* do I want to know what they are saying be it their original tweet or their RT. I want my first “connection” to be that kinda social/emotional one. Otherwise, it’s simply an info stream, not a “Hey there’s my pal Raul. What’s he saying today?” stream.
But can’t you still just RT the old fashioned way if you want to annotate the tweet? Have they really “broken” that?
The current method of retweeting is horribly broken for a great many reasons. I’m willing to give up annotations for the improvements it offers. Some examples of things fixed in the new format:
1. People rewriting my tweets when they retweet: I’m tired of seeing people turn a tweet like ‘You are not the only person to feel you’re alone’ to ‘ur not the only person 2 feel ur alone’ just so they can add a commentary like ‘so true!’ Suddenly, you’re quoting me on something I didn’t actually say (and I look like a retard to your followers).
2. 10 people retweeting the same thing, flooding my stream: This is irritating because once I’ve seen it, I don’t want to see it again. Especially not 5-10 times. Alyssa Milano likes toffee nut lattes, I get it, but I don’t care that much. Let me see it once (at most), and let’s move on.
3. Chained retweets: ‘RT @somedude: RT @dudeguy: Man, I could use some nachos (via @dudeface) (@via awesomesauce)’. So, who made the original tweet? And what order were they retweeted in? And why on earth do I care who else has retweeted it? This gets even worse when you run out of space in a tweet, and the original poster (maybe @dudeguy) gets *removed from the retweet* to make room. Suddenly attribution is completely lost, and the original poster doesn’t get credit.
4. Tracking your retweets: Instead of watching your mentions, now you can just see which tweets were retweeted and by whom. This will also help Twitter search to find more relevant tweets, but I’m more interested in who’s retweeting, without having to do a search for what I said (to see people who’ve removed my attribution).
5. Excessive retweeters: Some people are worth following, but retweet a ton of stuff I just don’t care about. Sometimes it’s worthless content, and sometimes it’s content that’s just irrelevant to me. Now I can choose to follow someone, but not hear their useless retweets.
The ONLY thing we lose is attribution (and as Randomgeek points out, you can still do old-style retweets; alternately just post a link to the tweet, which is a better option), but the things we gain are worth the change.
I agree with Dan. Though at the end he said “The ONLY thing we lose is attribution”, when really the only thing we lose is annotation.
@ all but especially Dan
I see the value of what we gain with the new RT function, but I feel that I lose more than what I gain. That said, it saves us from the endless RT chains!