Twitterannounced an update todayon how you might see tweets displayed on your timeline. Specifically, the company has implemented a new enforcement philosophy called “Freedom of Speech, not Freedom of Reach," which is less a new policy and more just some extra transparency around an old one.
As the name suggests, the new philosophy is centered around the concept that while users might have the freedom to say what they would like on the platform, those tweets don’t necessarily need to be shared with the entireTwitterecosystem.
When appropriate, the company says it will restrict the reach of tweets through visibility filtering. Twitter actually already does that totweets it deemed problematic; however, historically it hasn’t been shared with the public when that action has been taken.
Now if someone’s tweet has restricted visibility, Twitter will add a publicly-visible label to the tweet letting both the tweeter and their audience know that the message isn’t being shared with the masses and why. Tweets with limited visibility will be less discoverable on the platform and Twitter won’t place ads beside them. If you go to a person’s timeline, however, you’ll still be able to read them.
If a tweet is given a label a user disagrees with, which is bound to happen, they can submit feedback in an attempt to get it removed. The label will initially only apply to tweets that violate the company’s Hateful Content policy, but will extend to other policy areas in the coming months.
Twitter notes that submitting a request to have the label removed “does not guarantee you will receive a response or that your Tweet’s reach will be restored.” Given the limited staff the company seems to be working with as of late, we wouldn’t count on anyone even reading your request much less acting on it.
In general, this is less a policy change and more just a bit of transparency around something that was already happening on the service. It will be interesting to see how widespread the labels are, and what that appeal process ends up looking like.
