Twitter redesign doubles down on news

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Twitter
Twitter is going to show you lots of news, all through the app. Hopefully that's what you want.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

A Twitter redesign will put breaking news and sports events at the top of your timeline. Expect updated iOS and Android apps to emphasize current happenings over casual chat.

Apparently being brushed under the rug are pictures of your cat. Twitter seems to want people to be consumers of Tweets, not creators.

Twitter plans to add news that it thinks is relevant to you to the top of your timeline. This will include Tweets and videos under “Happening Now”.

It’s also experimenting with sending people notifications about topics you’ve shown an interest in. These can be turned off, though.

When you do any kind of search, related news items will appear at the top of the results.

After the redesign, the Explore section will be organized into tabs by topic. It’s currently split by content type: video, articles, etc. 

Twitter promised the expanded/redesigned Happening Now, events notifications, and Explore will be “Available in the coming months to everyone in the US on iOS and Android.”

Redesigning Twitter Moments

The goal of Moments is to show “the best of what’s happening on Twitter”. This feature is getting a facelift: users will soon scroll through it vertically, not horizontally. 

And there will be different timelines for each Moment. They’ll be organized into a recap, the latest, and commentary.

Last but not least, with the FIFA World Cup going on, there’s a dedicated page, as well as individual pages for every game. This feature is available now on Twitter for iOS and Android.

Only time will tell what the President of the United States feels about changes to his favorite app.

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