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The Feed Is Dying

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Re: The Feed Is Dying

#11

Post by askafriend »

partiallypro wrote: post #10
askafriend wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can't be replaced but it can be made easily mutable. For example, imagine a quick-switcher that flips the feed from algorithmic to time based with a single tap. That's a powerful feature and adapts twitter to different use-cases fast. I think the key here is to give users options instead of trying to shepard them into a particular direction, especially with their bipolar userbase (e.g. people use Twitter for vario…

But making the algorithmic feed the default, alone, is enough to kill the platform. For the mere fact of nudging, and human laziness. It will just make the shit rise to the top, instead of the hidden gems that make Twitter golden. Twitter has to be one of the most poorly run tech companies, outside of Yahoo. They changed their API token limits, and destroyed 3rd party clients. They bought TweetDeck and then utterly d…

I completely agree with you on all counts. Why they forced the algo as a default is a mystery to me.

I mean...the old Discover tab was fantastic and if they filtered that with their new algos, then I think people would love the result! Instead we get a static list of top news (Moments) that you can find on Yahoo's homepage.

Re: The Feed Is Dying

#12

Post by erichocean »

partiallypro wrote: post #10
askafriend wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can't be replaced but it can be made easily mutable. For example, imagine a quick-switcher that flips the feed from algorithmic to time based with a single tap. That's a powerful feature and adapts twitter to different use-cases fast. I think the key here is to give users options instead of trying to shepard them into a particular direction, especially with their bipolar userbase (e.g. people use Twitter for vario…

But making the algorithmic feed the default, alone, is enough to kill the platform. For the mere fact of nudging, and human laziness. It will just make the shit rise to the top, instead of the hidden gems that make Twitter golden. Twitter has to be one of the most poorly run tech companies, outside of Yahoo. They changed their API token limits, and destroyed 3rd party clients. They bought TweetDeck and then utterly d…

> Facebook has figured this out and that's why they are rolling out offerings like Paper

Right, but hasn't Paper been a gigantic flop?

Re: The Feed Is Dying

#15

Post by ilamont »

The other thing about the transformation of my Twitter feed is it is now mostly oriented toward images - photos, dancing GIFs, videos, or logos associated with accounts being retweeted.

Sometimes the people I follow append the images, but most of the time Twitter attaches the images to individual tweets or RTs. It's possible to disable most of the images on my phone (via the Twitter app settings), but on the Web the images cannot be stopped. Even if autoplay videos are disabled, the preview image will still show up.

It's irritating and lowers the value of the feed I have created on Twitter. Most of the time I just want to read opinions or retweets of the people I follow without an image or logo getting in my way.

Re: The Feed Is Dying

#16

Post by ttam »

drdeca wrote: post #3
yolesaber wrote: post #2

I recently got the algorithmic timeline for one of my more popular Twitter accounts. The algo has rendered it completely useless - it prioritizes all the wrong stuff and the lack of chronological ordering made it literally impossible to use during the debates. I wanted the sharp minute by minute commentary of my friends and news outlets but instead I was getting memes and dumb retweets from days ago. At least give th…

Supposedly if it is enabled for your account it can be disabled through menus the "while you were gone" cannot be though. I don't know this firsthand because it doesn't seem to have been enabled on my account.

the "while you were gone" feature is easily dismissed with a refresh

Re: The Feed Is Dying

#17

Post by slyall »

drdeca wrote: post #3
yolesaber wrote: post #2

I recently got the algorithmic timeline for one of my more popular Twitter accounts. The algo has rendered it completely useless - it prioritizes all the wrong stuff and the lack of chronological ordering made it literally impossible to use during the debates. I wanted the sharp minute by minute commentary of my friends and news outlets but instead I was getting memes and dumb retweets from days ago. At least give th…

Supposedly if it is enabled for your account it can be disabled through menus the "while you were gone" cannot be though. I don't know this firsthand because it doesn't seem to have been enabled on my account.

I like the "whiule you were" gone thing. Useful for when I woke up in the morning and it shows me half a dozen overnight tweets. Usually a couple of these are good.

A few months ago the "gone" time got reduced to just a few hours which was a little annoying but survivable. I don't really want to go 100% algorithmic though. If I just wanted to see the popular stuff I'd follow buzzfeed or something.

Re: The Feed Is Dying

#18

Post by intrasight »

ilamont wrote: post #15

The other thing about the transformation of my Twitter feed is it is now mostly oriented toward images - photos, dancing GIFs, videos, or logos associated with accounts being retweeted. Sometimes the people I follow append the images, but most of the time Twitter attaches the images to individual tweets or RTs. It's possible to disable most of the images on my phone (via the Twitter app settings), but on the Web the…

Filter out the images. They don't fit in 140 characters and thus shouldn't even be there.

Re: The Feed Is Dying

#19

Post by JoshTriplett »

slyall wrote: post #17
drdeca wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Supposedly if it is enabled for your account it can be disabled through menus the "while you were gone" cannot be though. I don't know this firsthand because it doesn't seem to have been enabled on my account.

I like the "whiule you were" gone thing. Useful for when I woke up in the morning and it shows me half a dozen overnight tweets. Usually a couple of these are good. A few months ago the "gone" time got reduced to just a few hours which was a little annoying but survivable. I don't really want to go 100% algorithmic though. If I just wanted to see the popular stuff I'd follow buzzfeed or something.

"While you were gone" breaks completely when it grabs one tweet out of a series of tweets, out of context. And it has far too subtle a break (a tiny bit of vertical whitespace and no new heading) to indicate the end of the "highlights" and the start of the content I actually want.

Re: The Feed Is Dying

#20

Post by plorkyeran »

ttam wrote: post #16
drdeca wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Supposedly if it is enabled for your account it can be disabled through menus the "while you were gone" cannot be though. I don't know this firsthand because it doesn't seem to have been enabled on my account.

the "while you were gone" feature is easily dismissed with a refresh

Yeah, the main effect of "while you were gone" is just that I have to reload the page twice when it stops updating or when I restart my browser. Dumb and mildly annoying, but only mildly.
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