Twitter Takes On TikTok With Similarly-Named ‘For You’ Default Timeline Tab
If there’s one thing TikTok has become synonymous with, it’s the app’s famous (or infamous) ‘For You’ tab, presenting users with hours upon hours of content specially curated to an individual’s likes and interests.
Now, there’s another ‘For You’ page in the game, but this time, it’s on Twitter. It appears Chief Twit Elon Musk has rolled out a new default timeline to users worldwide. Though, as with most of the platform’s recent changes, not everyone’s too happy.
Twitter officially rolls out split timeline with ‘For You’ and ‘Following’ tabs for iOS users.
— Pop Base (@PopBase) January 11, 2023
‘For You’ will show tweets recommended, while ‘Following’ will show tweets from accounts you follow. pic.twitter.com/epllLMmCfu
Twitter’s new homepage now gives users the ability to swipe between a ‘Following’ timeline, in which only tweets from those a user is following are displayed, and a ‘For You’ timeline, where recommended tweets include those from anyone on the application.
As Social Media Today noted, the ‘Following’ tab doesn’t differ much from the ‘Latest Tweets’ timeline the network rolled out in March last year, simply displaying tweets from followed users in reverse chronological order.
According to Fast Company, the reason for the sudden change is simple, in which Musk wishes to drive engagement on the site by exposing users to tweets they won’t usually see to encourage more interaction.
Twitter stop fixing things that are not broken.
— Dr Nimelesh (@HausofHilton) January 11, 2023
We didn’t ask for the “For You” timeline option.
However, unlike the popularity of TikTok’s algorithm, it seems not everyone on Twitter is quite impressed with the ‘For You’ page, with one user citing that the tab gives his feed “75% more spam” and is filled with tweets of people he has “zero interest in.”
It seems iOS users are having it harder, as the application currently does not allow for the ‘Following’ tab to be set as a default feed. As such, every time the platform is opened, the homepage goes back to the ‘For You’ timeline by default.
why i got a “for you” and a “following” tab now. twitter be yourself
— iyosias (@whitest_injera) January 12, 2023
“It changes back to ‘For You’ every time I re-open the app. I just want to see everything in liner order from the accounts I’m following, nothing more, which is how it was before you unnecessarily changed it,” leveled one angry user at Musk.
Despite the backlash, it doesn’t seem the social media network is going to stop tinkering with its system, considering Musk said that the swappable timelines were just the first part of a “much larger UI overhaul.”
Stay tuned as more changes roll out on the site, beginning with a new bookmark button, referred to as a “de facto silent like,” up next, followed by long-form tweets in February.
Easy swipe right/left to move between recommended vs followed tweets rolls out later this week.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 8, 2023
First part of a much larger UI overhaul.
Bookmark button (de facto silent like) on Tweet details rolls out a week later.
Long form tweets early Feb.
[via Social Media Today and Fast Company, cover image via Md Majharul Islam | Dreamstime.com]
