Twitter could introduce threaded replies
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Twitter could introduce threaded replies

Twitter’s potential makeover looks familiar.

Luis Colindres

Monica Riese— | Last updated

Twitter could be mulling a substantial redesign—but it’s not what you might have expected.

In a tweet sent Friday, Twitter Director of Product Management Sara Haider shared screenshots of two proposed features and solicited feedback from her followers.

The proposed features in the screenshots mimic Reddit and Facebook Messenger in many ways: Both platforms have threaded comments (Facebook introduced that feature in March 2013), and the little green online indicator light is very similar to what you’d see on Messenger or Google Hangouts.

The replies to Haider’s post are filled with feedback about the features. At least one commenter actually wants Twitter to go one step further and co-opt another feature from Reddit’s app: the ability to collapse comment threads and skip to the next parent comment. Others expressed concerns about the look and feel of the threads: Common refrains were concerns about too little whitespace and a need for different colors on the reply comments, either for accessibility or aesthetics.

More users had concerns about the online status indicator: Some are concerned about privacy, while others just don’t see the point of sharing that data on Twitter, since they use other apps for real-time chat.

Twitter’s users have been begging the team for years to implement new features to help curb some of the hate speech and harassment that are rampant on the platform, and this mock-up isn’t exactly that. Indeed, online status lights could subject users to more harassment, not less. But it’s possible these features may never see the light of day:

If you’d like to share your feedback on the design, Haider stayed active in the thread through Saturday, responding to users who’ve weighed in and soliciting more detail from the knee-jerk “ugh” crowd. The thread has quieted down, but we suspect her little green light would still be on if that feature were live today.

H/T the Verge

Monica Riese

Monica Riese

Monica Riese now serves as the Daily Dot’s director of production, having previously been the publication’s entertainment editor and assistant managing editor. She is based in Austin, Texas, and formerly contributed to the Austin Chronicle, where her breaking news work was recognized by the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies.

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