Now, you can share new "Voice Tweets": Here's how
Continuing with its product-improvement plans, microblogging giant Twitter has announced a new 'voice tweeting' capability for its users. The feature, available to a limited set of users, is aimed at giving people a more "human way" to share their thoughts and ensuring that certain "conversational nuances are not lost in translation." Here's all you need to know about it.
Option to tweet with your own voice
For years, Twitter has offered the option to share thoughts using media (photos/videos/GIFs) and 280-characters, but users have asked for more - asserting that the character limit is not enough to express what they want to. Now, to change this, the company is adding a dedicated option to record and share an audio tweet, instead of typing it out.
140-second limit on audio tweets
The voice tweeting capability removes the 280-character limit and lets you share your perspective, be it a personal experience or breaking news, quickly and easily, and without leaving things unsaid or uninterpreted. However, despite expanding the ability to convey more, these audio tweets will carry a limit of 140 seconds. Once you hit this threshold, a new voice tweet will start, creating a thread.
So, how to start audio tweeting?
Eligible users can start audio tweeting by heading over to the 'Tweet composer' and selecting the new icon with wavelengths. Here, you will see your profile photo with a record button at the bottom - just tap on it and record what you want to say. Once recorded, select the 'Done' button and tweet the audio message.
Then, others will see your audio message
Once shared, the audio tweet will appear on the timeline of people following you. They can then tap on it and listen to the whole thing while scrolling through other posts or browsing other things on their phone - it all works like listening to music on an app with a player docked at the bottom of the timeline.
Capability being tested with iOS users only
As of now, Twitter is testing this capability with iOS users only. The company has made the feature available to select people using Twitter for iOS and plans to expand on the platform in the coming weeks. It has not given a word on the roll-out plan for those who use Twitter on Android or on the web.
Exploring new ways for users to communicate, control conversations
The development of the feature comes as part of Twitter's efforts to try new ways to let users communicate and control their conversations. A week ago, the platform released Fleets, its own version of Stories, for users in India. It has also announced capabilities to control who can reply to tweets as well as prompts to keep harmful replying and uninformed retweeting in check.
